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Are Disc Players Dead?

How important is a disc player anymore? I think that stand alone DAC's have far eclipsed the stand alone disc player in importance over the last 3 years with the rise of server based music.

Only an SACD really needs a disc player anymore. In what instance can you get better sound from a disc player than when you download the music, CD or HiRez, then play it back through a new stand alone DAC with the latest technology?

I really only use my very humble disc player to watch movies that I own now. I download most movies to rent through AppleTV, and if I buy a CD (rare) I download it to the server, where it takes up residence in iTunes for playback in AIFF format.

So, disc players on their deathbed, as DAC move to the top of the digital mountain?

I say yes.
macdadtexas

Showing 3 responses by dhl93449

dhl93449
455 posts
 
Cloud is useless when your internet connection goes down. And yes it happens.

Vinyl will always be around because to some, it represents the ultimate in sonic quality. It is a major pain to use, and very expensive these days to outfit with hardware (TT, RIAA phono preamp, and the LPs themselves). It has fallen down the priority scale because of the convenience factor of digitally based media.

I'm stuck at the CD stage myself, prefering CD discs to thumb drives or WiFi connections. I still like to be able to pull a jewel case and view the cover art, and still look at the concept of an "album" as a related sequence of sonic experiences. Not a digitally selected set of random top 40's hits. I have Direct TV music channels for that kind of listening, and I don't do it on my high end audio system.

Plus the direct digital route is fraught with other problems. Just go to the computeraudiophile site and read about sonic quality losses from digital files being sent from common PCs or Macs. Apparently lossless digital isn't as perfect as many would lead us to believe. Plus, ever have your computer go down when playing a sound file via USB? The resulting screech will tear your ears off.
dhl93449
455 posts
 
Another thing folks are overlooking. There is NO storage media in a PC or Mac that is archival quality. What happens when your hard drive crashes and destroys all your files? Or you lose or misplace a thumb drive? They can be a pain to recover. And those CDROMs and DVDs that are burned in consumer burners will not last 20 years either. Commercial CDs have a better chance, and I have some that are early 80's (that's 30 years) that still play fine.

Playing a CD does not wear it out, unless you are such a putz you scratch the surface. Most of mine are perfect because I take some moderate care in handling them and storing them.

The rapid obsolecence of digital media make the constant migration of your stored data a constant and perpetual task. If you had data on Jazz drives or other obsolete media (floppies?) you are SOL now trying to get it back.
dhl93449
455 posts
 
Kijanki:

I have not had a hard drive fail either, but I use very expensive SCSI drives for my servers. The popular and cheap SATA drives have a poor reliability record. Just look at the selection of reviews on NewEgg for any of them.

Even though I have not had a drive failure, migrating data from older SCSI drives is still a major pain. Newer drives are much faster and have different connectors, so getting data off an older SCSI drive is problematic from a system integration point of view. And I did have a lot of data stored on Jazz media, now you cannot find a playback/read device for these unless you get some used junk off EBay.

I have not heard of any media that has a real, proven 100 year lifespan. You are luckiy if you can get most consumer burned media to play back properly in more than one playback device.

Online backups are an option but even the fastest wideband is gonna take quite a while to download 1 Terabyte in data.
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