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Goodbye CD's

Seems that Borders by me is unloading all their cd's..They claim they are just not selling...Im sure this is just the beginning of the end in the retail stores for cd's...can it long before cd's are gone completely? Many Ive spoken with including some dealers have mentioned this and said "the writing is on the wall" for cd playback..

I have been on the fence about going to a file data system for music, and have been eyeing a Squeezebox duet and setting up my hard drive to take the plunge..maybe now its that time??

Or..maybe just Im just a geezer in my heart of hearts and should just look for old and new Vinyl to keep me going...hmmm..I could be very happy with a mainly vinyl set up ;-)
kehut

Showing 2 responses by gmood1

gmood1
1,251 posts
 
I would suggest to anyone new to this hobby to move towards an HD based music system from the start. For someone that already has a nice CD player..I would enjoy it for what it is, but slowly transition over to the HD based system as well.

Chances are once you cross that threshold you most likely won't be going back. The convenience is just unbeatable.

Being able to hear a recording on your system before you ever buy it is a god send for me. I've been bit several times listening in the store with headphones only to find the recording terrible at home. Over dubbing and too much compression just kills otherwise good music.
gmood1
1,251 posts
 
Well Pdn..yes there have been downloads with higher resolution than MP3 for some time now. And it is growing by the day.

Are high rez files on par with CDs bought in store?..Yes.
In some cases they have more resolution than a store bought CD.

For example, you can download a CD quality file in Flac.The file sizes vary depending on the sample rates and recording lengths.

We'll use the "Just like a woman - hymn to Nina" by Barb Jungr download from Linn records as a reference.

Let's say you have a standard redbook CD of this recording. That's 16 bit 44.1 kHz. That file size is 293.00 MB. The Studio Master sampling rate of this file is 24 bit 88.2 kHz.The file size of that same recording is 1,053.1 MB.

So as you can see we have a downloaded recording that is more than 3 times the size of a store bought red book CD.
After all a standard CD will only hold up to 700 MBs of information.

Just as the difference in sound between MP3s and red book are undeniable. The same goes with red book verses the Studio Master.

A downloaded Studio Master or Hi Rez is similar to 2 channel SACD.


Here's a few sites you can look over.Try some of the samples on both sites. Even with basic computer speakers you can hear the difference in quality.

Itrax
Linn Records
Here's a totally free site of thousands of live recordings from venues all over the country.Some of the recordings are HiRez as well.
Etree.org.
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