Judging by fountain pens, save your CD systems!

[Skip]

When the 'new' ballpoints became readily available in the 50's I remember fountain pens becoming like today's CD's. That is, they were still liked and appreciated by the few, but roundly rejected by the many as being cumbersome and obsolete. ~But consider how many of these same pens are greatly valued today!
~So save your CDs and CD players, because you never know....

[~JJ]

Hell, I've still got my 8-track stuff! Problem is, I picked up one of my Radio Shack mix tapes to play, & Prince started singing Reddish-Brown Rain! (The zombie mime version.)

But serially, I've wondered about the on board records with the Chuck Berry music going out with the Voyager missions. When some-thing intercepts one, what the hell are they gonna play it on? 👽

[catbert]

Hell, I've still got my 8-track stuff! Problem is, I picked up one of my Radio Shack mix tapes to play, & Prince started singing Reddish-Brown Rain! (The zombie mime version.)

But serially, I've wondered about the on board records with the Chuck Berry music going out with the Voyager missions. When some-thing intercepts one, what the hell are they gonna play it on? 👽

The golden record came with a stylus and instructions and will probably outlive some of my CDs.
https://science.nasa.gov/mission/voy...-record-cover/

[Ron Z]

I still buy CDs. I like owning my media. If I want, I can rip them to iTunes.... or just rip them to a .wav file and play in Adobe Audition. A really good DAC reveals details that you will never hear on a compress format or on a CD player with cheap DACs.

[FredRydr]

Ron, what's a DAC?

My set-up:

IMG_2548.JPG

[Dougc]

I still buy CDs. I like owning my media. If I want, I can rip them to iTunes.... or just rip them to a .wav file and play in Adobe Audition. A really good DAC reveals details that you will never hear on a compress format or on a CD player with cheap DACs.

I have a Cambridge Audio CD transport and my DAC crapped out so I have get a new one.

Sent from my SM-G781V using Tapatalk

[Robert]

I still have my CD's and several different players. I also have 1000's of LP's, three turntables w/ arms and several different cartridges. As I write this, spinning on my Rega P9 is a Pat Metheny/Lyle Mays record from 1980 - *As Falls Wichita, So Falls Wichita Falls*. You might wonder about all the pops, crackles and other surface noise commonly found on old records. They're totally absent on this disc, a mint ECM LP that plays flawlessly.

[Scrawler]

I still have my vinyl from the 1970s and I remember the people when CD came out claiming vinyl sounded better and insisted on sticking with that.

[Ron Z]

Ron, what's a DAC?

Digital to audio converter. It takes the data from the PC and converts it to audio. I use a Focusrite 2i2 4th generation for recording and listening. Gen 3 is very good too. There is a huge difference in the audio quality between the sound card and an external audio interface. There are some really expensive ones, but the Focusrites do quite well. Street price is under $200, and well worth the money. I think that they work with Apple products as well.

[Jon Szanto]

...Pat Metheny/Lyle Mays record from 1980 - *As Falls Wichita, So Falls Wichita Falls*.

One of the greatest recordings of the 20th Century, on a record label that was born for moments like that. Still remarkable, and so sad that Mays is gone.

As to source material... yikes. In addition to all my usual (commercial) music product - vinyl, CD, digital - I still have to keep track of other formats, as I'm an archivist for a composer who was/is well-known in many classical circles. I have well over 100 of his own reel-to-reel taps, many that were then archived onto DAT. I recently had to hunt down a good cassette deck because they almost aren't being made (at least quality ones), as there are also a large number of cassettes from live performance. I've even got some of my early recordings on a format that I don't currently have, as the player bonked out after many years: Beta Hi-Fi. Oh, 78s, too. It's like the fricking Library of Congress in here!

[Chrissy]

We still have loads of CD's and very recently I took them all out of the furniture unit where they are kept and put them all on the floor behind the sofa so that I could put them in alphabetical order and load up some more onto iTunes. The stack stretched all of the way along a 3 seater sofa.

I finally managed to get some albums onto my iPhone despite it not being straightforward.

[kazoolaw]

Funny thing about CDs-they seem to multiply.
Love Metheny. Michael Hedges, and other Windham Hill artists.
Being old, I like something tangible and easy enough even I can use it.

[Robert]

Jon: I also have quite a few cassettes. For years back in the 90's and early 2000's I listened to a local jazz program, *Milestones*, than ran every Saturday evening from 6 to 9. The DJ was Miles Willis, and his program was a wealth of musical information. I recorded many of his programs to cassette and still listen to some of them when in the mood - that is, until my Nakamichi DR-10 quit playing - - apparently one of the belts is bad, a common problem with old cassette players. In trouble-shooting this matter, I happened upon this site, which (if you haven't already found it) may be useful for your own cassette-related needs:

http://www.tapeheads.net

[calamus]

On a related note, DVDs are going away, and with it genuine ownership of copies of movies. You can "buy" a movie from a streaming service, but you own it only as long as that service stays in business, or its agreement with the content provider remains in effect. After that, the movie you bought goes bye-bye. Also, you have to keep paying the streaming service to have continued access to the content you've "bought."

[Niner]

On a related note, DVDs are going away

Please expound.

[Robalone]

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Started shifting all my collection to CD as soon as they came out ….then when iTunes was invented, I started to get albums on that platform AND buy the hard copy from DISCOGS ….that way if digital goes t*ts up …I don’t care 🤣

And…sure I can rip them to my Mac, and do occasionally…but I’m lazy 🤪….
And I just don’t trust streaming services 👴🏻👴🏻👴🏻🧨

[FredRydr]

Nice! I like those wooden towers. Finding decent CD furniture isn't so easy these days.

[Robalone]

I still have my CD's and several different players. I also have 1000's of LP's, three turntables w/ arms and several different cartridges. As I write this, spinning on my Rega P9 is a Pat Metheny/Lyle Mays record from 1980 - *As Falls Wichita, So Falls Wichita Falls*. You might wonder about all the pops, crackles and other surface noise commonly found on old records. They're totally absent on this disc, a mint ECM LP that plays flawlessly.

I have nearly everything by PM &LM , and 'As falls Wichita….' Is in my top five best albums of all time 👍🏻👍🏻😎. Hardly a month goes by since it came out (halcyon days living in Vancouver and Seattle ) that I don’t listen to it !!! Lyle Mays (r.i.p) has to be one of the best pianists EVER !!

[calamus]

On a related note, DVDs are going away

Please expound.

They're becoming obsolete, similar to CDs. Fewer are being made, and they are become increasingly difficult to find, as the industry pushes streaming ever more aggressively. For example, a couple of years ago our local Target had about six or eight double-sided racks maybe 25 feet long of DVDs and Blu-ray discs. Now they're down to one one-sided rack and have stopped carrying DVD players.