This is an issue that obviously brings some emotion to the table.
The reality is the vast majority of CDs had their music contents transferred from a hard drive. Perhaps some old ones were transferred directly from an analog source through a ADC without a stopover on a hard drive, but I imagine those are few and far between.
If there is any significant difference between a CD and hard drive based playback system, it is a matter of implementation as opposed to any theoretical advantage one way or the other, IMO.
Consumer CD players have been on the market longer and sold in far greater numbers than hard drive based systems so have the advantage of being more familiar to users and more settled as a consumer product.
Some years back I did some serious comparison between a HD and CD based system and satisfied myself I would be losing nothing in making a switch. I would also be gaining great versatility in terms of accessing my fairly large music collection. Now, neither my main or second system have a CD player and I don't miss it at all. Only my computer audio work station still has CD, tape deck and turntable capability and that is primarily used to get material onto my hard drive.
As for HD crashes, yes that can happen. However, backup is far easier for a hard drive than any other format. CDs can rot and scratch, LPs can warp, get moldy and are easily damaged. Backups for those are not nearly as fast and convenient. (I actually keep two HD backups with one off premises.)
The nice thing about this hobby is people can pursue it in whatever fashion makes them happy. I've found what works for me and have no urge to go back. |
Lloydc wrote: I am puzzled by claims that data from a hard drive equals data read from a great cd transport. Data has to get onto that HD in the first place. Huh? Doesn't data have to "get onto the CD in the first place" also? If not, where does it come from? Take a trip through a recording studio and with very, very few exceptions you will see all of the music played is being recorded to a hard drive. If hard drives are the fatal flaw, then CDs inherit that fault. If you listen to a playback in a recording studio, they are going to stream it from a hard drive, not a CD. The CD, by itself, cannot make that recording any better than what was on the studio's hard drive. I've heard stunning music from systems with open reel, turntables, CDs and hard drives as the source. Implementation is the key (and money doesn't guarantee the door is unlocked.) I like CDs and still buy them. It's still a great way to add music to my server based system. Their overall sales volume is down from several years ago but CDs will still be around for quite a while. Ultimately this whole subject is once again about personal preferences. It is inevitable that opinions will vary widely, but just don't forget the parents of the music on that CD almost certainly include a hard drive. ;-) |
Tvad wrote: Consider that you buy a music file, and your storage drive crashes. Consider that your back-up also crashes...
Consider also that Apple maintains control of downloaded music files....
With CDs, once you've purchased the disc, you own it forever, and given proper care and storage... Lots of red herrings in this. First, if hard drives are that flawed, then the world as we know it is in imminent danger. Every major institution in the world - banks, governments, hospitals, insurers, manufacturers and so on - store the vast bulk of their critical information on computers. And they count on backups to preserve that info. And, Apple does not maintain control of your downloads. The current downloads have no DRM and Apple has no way to remove them from your computer or backup drive. Perhaps you are confusing this with the Kindle ebook story from last year. In my particular case, purchased downloads are less than one-quarter of 1% of the collection on my server. What happens when you lose CDs due to CD rot? What happens when your collection is stolen? What happens when it is damaged in a house fire or windstorm? You'll have to buy replacements, assuming they are still available on the market. You don't even have the option of looking to a backup. And, if all backups for a HD user fail, he's now in the same boat you are. He gets to go buy new material. Nothing is risk free, but hard drives are so cheap that multiple backups are a great option and can certainly give you favorable odds. I certainly have no problem with anyone who wishes to keep their music collection CD or LP based instead of on a music server. However, I think we could do without the "Chicken Little" horror stories. |
I'm sorry you've had problems with hard drive crashes. I don't view it as anything more than a maintenance item, rather like periodically needing new tires for your car.
Also, replacing a motherboard does not mean losing data if you have a backup. I know, as I've replaced motherboards before.
Unlike you, I have lost CDs to rot. And I've also lost them due to kids, friends and my own carelessness. The same thing applies to LPs.
And for house fires, FEMA statistics indicate there are 400,000 house fires on average each year. That's a pretty serious number. While I hope no one has one, and if they do music is going to be pretty far down their list for a while, but a simple off-premises hard drive backup solves that problem without the need to repurchase music when they finally get around to this hobby again.
One only needs to peruse the internet and you can find horror stories about any product or device ever made, whether unwanted Toyota acceleration, computer problems, CD players or turntables.
Yes, some people have problems with computer music players, but there are many of us who are quite satisfied with our system and who feel well protected with our backup systems.
You're the one with the doom and gloom scenario so you shouldn't be surprised with others point out the weak points of the alternatives. Everyone needs to find their own comfort zone. |
Tvad: What does that mean? Replacing a hard drive every so often? Sure. Why not. Its a mechanical device. Drives are cheap. I replace them about ever 4 years or so. Duplicate the old drive to the new one and you're off and running. Perhaps the schedules are different, but my turntables, open reels, cassette decks and the like also require periodic maintenance. Tvad: To me, cloud based back-up (I assume that's what you're referring to...apologies if it's not) Nope, that's not what I do. I keep an off premises USB drive backup and bring it home about every week to two to catch up. The drive can be at work, at your parents or anywhere else away from your home. It could be cloud based, but that's hardly a requirement. Transfer time would be a bigger issue for this than security. It's not like we're talking about your banking records. If nothing else, backups are an option that is extremely impractical for LP and CD collections. If you have a large collection, buying or creating duplicates and storing them off premises is not even a possibility for most people. I've simply not had the problems with a music server that you keep coming back to. I have a substantial and extremely eclectic collection (49,000 songs) and I love the ability to easily and rapidly search and access material in a manner that would simply be impossible with a LP or CD collection. That's important to me. If you go back to my very first post in this thread, I concluded my comments with: "The nice thing about this hobby is people can pursue it in whatever fashion makes them happy. I've found what works for me and have no urge to go back." |
Pettyofficer wrote: "The Computer was NEVER REALLY DESIGNED for Music Storage" Hmmm, wonder what all of those recording studios that make our music are doing for DAW recording equipment... ;-) |
In an effort to drag this discussion back to reality, the "high end" audio industry has never been anything more than a cottage industry. The vast majority of fancy audio electronics, for example, are constructed using individual parts developed for other purposes or consumer products. One can find exceptions, but even the most high faluting component will contain a good percentage of parts primarily made for the non-audio industry.
The companies that make recording studio equipment haven't sat around waiting for the computer industry to do something. They've taken the components available on the market and turned out some very fine equipment. I've heard some stunning recordings on CD that equal anything I've heard on vinyl or open reel. Try Edvard Grieg's "3 Sonatas for Violin and Piano" from Bridge Records or The Great American Main Street Band's "Silks and Rags" on Angel.
It is also easy to forget something like the much revered vinyl LP was developed in 1948 by a committee and included the very same type of technical compromises made when they settled on a 16/44.1 format for the CD.
The same thing happened a few years later in the 1950s when the stereo LP was introduced - design by committee with compromises. And some competing "formats" were thrown overboard.
I'm not quite sure who you are alleging is plotting to eliminate what music format as you didn't specify. There have certainly been a lot tried: SACD, 24/96 and 24/192 and so on.
If they don't make it on the market, it will not be due to some evil corporation axing them. It will be due to the fact that not enough customers are buying them.
I'm not sure the source of your apparent anger on this subject. If you don't like computer audio, don't use it. If you think the world of computer audio should be run differently, then start your own company. |
That's quite a treatise, Pettyofficer. Not sure what it has to do with the subject at hand, but interesting nonetheless.
BTW, the "free market" has nothing to do with price. It is the opposite of a "centrally controlled" economy where everything is run by "experts."
And, as for lightbulbs, Edison held 1093 patents. If you read some history, you'll find that a portion of his inventions were indeed failures because no one bought them. His portland cement piano housing just didn't take off for some reason.
;-) |
Nice summary, Knownothing.
In short, lots of options for everyone.
And, if you look at the history of recorded music, the one constant has been change. No format has ever had an unchallenged, unlimited run and never will.
Music boxes were the hot item in the early 1800s, but they had precedents going back hundreds of years. Later in the 19th century one had player pianos.
Wax cylinders were the first recording/playback devices, which gave way to 78 phono records in the early 1900s. Wire recorders popped up, but we acquired the open reel recorder from Germany after WWII. 1948 brought the LP record, the 1970s brought the invasion of the music cassette and 1980 the CD.
And here we are today. I guess the message is don't get too comfortable. Things will change whether you want them to or not. |
Just curious, PO, what recording have you tried to buy that hasn't been available in your desired CD format?
You seem irritated that something has been taken away from you but in spite of your verbosity, I'm not sure what that is. |
PO, I've no clue where you are getting your numbers. According to Nielsen Soundscan, there were 374 million CDs sold last year. Digital downloads accounted for 40% of the market.
That means CDs still represent the majority of music purchases.
While CD sales are trending downward and have been for many years, as long as people keep buying them, the factories will keep making them.
It seems you are determined to go all doom and gloom over something that hasn't happened yet. Yes, things are changing, but angst filled predictions about the future are probably more often wrong than they are right.
Rather than engage in projection, I'd recommend you relax with some Albeniz, perhaps played by Norbert Kraft. Very relaxing. And it's even available on CD. |
While your additional detail is correct, I noted in my post that things had been trending down for many years. I believe the highest sales year for CD was 2000, 10 years ago.
The music industry is changing for a variety of factors. But it has been doing that for the past hundred years or more. I imagine the sheet music publishers were sad when their top-dog spot was overtaken by 78s.
For years, radio was the driver for music recording sales. Top 40 AM stations in the 1960s drove acts like the Beatles and Rolling Stones. That trend continued with FM radio in the 1970s and in the 1980s MTV was the driver with music videos.
Today, MTV is mainly concerned with reality shows, not music. Radio stations are a pale ghost of their former selves when it comes to music. An oldies station doesn't generate new album sales - how many copies of "A Hard Day's Night" does a person need? Re-releases aren't going to generate the sales volume needed.
We've also got both the legal and underground download market. We've got a fragmented music scene with endless genres appealing to various subsects of the market.
Keep in mind that teenagers drive the volume end of the CD market and they are not listening to albums. In a fashion, this is a return the the market of the 1950s and before when singles drove the music scene.
In short, things are changing, but they've always been changing. The industry will need to readjust to the change in the volume of CD units sold, but I don't think CDs will be going away for quite some time. |
Plutos: "Don`t forget that you still need to use some transport to load and rip your CD-s in to your hard drive. This all involves additional jitter and other problems." Jitter only occurs during the actual decoding step, when the digital is transferred to analog. Until then, it is just another data file and you can move it around all you want. (It was certainly transferred multiple times on hard drives at the studio and production plant prior to becoming a CD.) The only issue with a poor drive would be a read error, but that is not jitter. Read errors on CD are mainly an issue only if the CD is damaged or defective. Read errors on a disc in good condition are fairly rare (or no computer program would ever install and run.) Most computer drives will read a disc multiple times to get rid of errors. Many CD players differ from computers in they only get one shot to read a disc correctly since the data is delivered in real time. |
PO, you seem dead stuck on your 90%. When shown wrong with a referenced source, you declare numbers "irrelevant." Then you call everything else "propaganda" and then you're back to your "90%." Nice circle.
I see you love a good conspiracy theory and you've settled on yours, damn the facts. "They" are just out to get you!
I can see you're having a grand time wallowing in your misery, so enjoy! (And go buy a few CDs while you still can.) |
Aplhifi, I think you're conflating several issues into one. A cheap CD drive is perfectly capable of delivering a perfect bit performance as far as data goes. If it couldn't, it would be useless in a computer. Corrupted data is no more useful to computer program than it is to a music system.
Of course, the drive may also be producing digital hash that gets picked up by the analog circuiting.
If the cheap and electrically noisy CD drive is side-by-side with the fancy audio electronics, it will likely influence the sound.
An, if a cheap drive has its output rebuffered, then it can't be blamed for a jittery signal - the buffer isn't doing its job.
If that cheap CD drive is in a computer far away from the stereo and is only being used to transfer data to another storage device, I become far more skeptical that there is an issue.
I rip my CDs to a music server (as noted earlier in this thread) and I've gone through several computers and optical drives over the years. I've yet to come across a situation where I can tell the difference between a file ripped on a Sony drive versus an Lite-On or other drive. Same thing with hard drives. I don't go "boy that Western Digital drive just doesn't have the same tone as my old Seagate...."
Of course, I keep my computer equipment away from my stereo in a different room.
Once again, in your next to last paragraph, you comingle two separate issues - jitter and noise. Jitter is a timing error that occurs when the data packet is converted to an analog sound. Jitter can be caused and addressed by several different issues.
EMI is a byproduct of the operation of digital circuits and other electrical devices. Good practice dictates that care be taken in circuit design to minimize that issue. It's tough to do that right in cheap products.
Finally, please do not put me in the "everything sounds the same" box. I've spent a lot of years picking out the equipment I like.
And I've also never said a word about MP3s in this discussion. The bulk of my collection is ripped to FLAC and I download very little music. Less than one-quarter of 1% of my collection is downloaded. Approximately 40% is material I've converted myself from LP and open reel to digital. (I'm in my 9th year of converting my analog collection to digital and working on another album as I type this.)
So to wrap this up, if you are going to have a CDP sitting on your system rack, it is important that it is a well designed piece of kit. If you are going to tell me that I can't get a bit perfect rip using the Sony drive in my DAW, then I guess we'll have to disagree. |
You're a real slice, PO! And the acronym is appropriate, too.
See you around... |
