Reasons to keep physical media (from the Stereophile piece just posted):
1. Control. Streaming services may not exist forever. The financial health of even Qobuz and Tidal "is largely unknown."
2. Control. Streaming services often don't provide information about which version or mastering of a given "song" is being played.
3. Control. Searching on streaming services, even using Roon, is often difficult or even impossible. If you keep your CDs in a sensible order, you can find what you're looking for very easily.
4. Control. With so-called classical music, there's a lot of information one wants to know that streaming services rarely provide. The Strereophile essay indicates that, with a given symphony, it was impossible to determine from the stream which orchestra was performing it! But what about when the recording was made? (Von Karajan recorded Beethoven's Ninth at least four times, three times with the BPO, but streaming services rarely reveal this kind of information.) How about where it was recorded? Audiophiles speak of hearing the venue's ambiance on a superlative recording. But streamed recordings will rarely, if ever, identify what that venue was. And streaming services identify "songs," as mentioned above, which can be movements in a larger orchestral or instrumental piece. That fact can be obscured or even effaced.
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I always enjoy these dialogues. I'm probably in the "upper age range" of participants on this forum. As a youngster growing up in the fifties (baby boomer) my parents had a large collection of records they played on a Zenith console. That was my first exposure to recorded music. I loved it. One uncle was into reel to reel tape recorders and I loved that sound. Time marched on and another uncle had his Caddy with the optional record player. Sounded good as long as the car was not moving:) Then 8 tracks (invented by Bill Lear of Lear Jet fame in conjunction with FMC) came in the mid 60s and went into oblivion less than 20 years later. It was the only viable recorded media solution for automobiles at the time. That was followed by tape cassettes which are still around but mainly for non musical use. Then CDs came into the fray. I was married to vinyl and it took me a while appreciate the CD format. To my ears Cds sounded "different" and it took me a while to warm up to the new format. My first player was a Kyocera DA-610CX. Now fast forward to the present. I'm getting into streaming to "sample" different musical genres but it is not my primary listening source, I am fortunate enough to have TTs, Cd players,etc that allow me to enjoy any type of media any any time. IMO vinyl and CD will always be viable formats and will fluctuate in popularity. The pleasure will always be in the playing, the listening and the our enjoyment of music regardless of format, genre or generation.
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Well if you look you will find mint cds for Cheap...but you have to search.I found a antique store that had lps they were 10,20,30 bucks used in very good condition .while searching I found a Cd Gold mine, cds were sealed or in mint condition, for $5 bucks each ,OK I have found them as cheap as a buck....But these cds were sealed Japanese with OBIs,Sealed cd double sets,triple set ,even4 ,5,cd set Sealed for $ 5 bucks....I bought 12 loo Grateful Dead Rhino reissue HCCD mult tracks on each .Plus Doors Strange Days and LA woman Japanese OBI sealed.I ended up buying 25 cds....Well I went back the next day and bought every Japanese sealed obi cds,Pink Floyd, Beatles, Thin Lizzy, John Mayall,Kinks,Rolling Stones..and others.Well I bought all they had another 25...This place had Hundreds to look through. I hadn't been there in like a year,they never had a cd collection like this,one of the guys told me he was getting alot more in ....this is a,big place with lots of aisles to go through but ,I will be going back...these Japanese obi cds, sell for 20 to 50 bucks apiece...Oh ,it's on Long Island......
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I have no doubt that streaming offers better SQ than I can get from my vinyl and CD's. So many very experienced people have attested to that. However, I can not stream due to where I live.I get very unreliable and poor quality land line DSL service. I haven't saved money by not having to invest in streaming gear because I upgrade CD equipment along with the rest of the gear. I am even toying with a TT upgrade from my VPI. Oh well, it never ends. I do like being able to go to my fave place, Music Millenium, in Portland,OR and perusing the vast wall of used CD's. And walking out with a pile of new to me stuff. Life is good.
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I’ve gone back to CD’s because, to me, the quality is clearly better than streaming from Tidal the exact CD quality track hardwired etc to the same DAC. I enjoy not having a computer, phone, tablet, etc when I want to listen to music as my whole day is spent in front of a screen. A/B testing on my McIntosh MCT500 vs my computer, both hardwired into the McIntosh DA2 btw.
I have wondered whether errors in the music while being transported over the internet/server/etc just create more issues than a simple CD transport to the DAC.
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"I have wondered whether errors in the music while being transported over the internet/server/etc just create more issues than a simple CD transport to the DAC. "
The answer is no. The interent simply wouldn’t work at all if data were not transmitted accurately.
One thing that can occur is line noise getting into the connection to dac from streamer and causing jitter, however that is not a practical issue even anymore with modern DACs and streamers that are designed to deal with that effectively, ie are jitter resistant.
CD or streaming might sound better case by case. The devil is in the details.
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The Stereophile thread is more sophisticated on this topic. Thanks for the link.
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BTW I have multiple streamers in several rooms of the house and have used wi-fi (wireless LAN connections) exclusively since I started streaming in place of CDs 15 years ago (wow how time flies). These days I stream mostly with Roon and that includes high resolution files up to 192 khz. As long as the wifi connections are all strong, this works like a charm, sounds greate, and isolates my hifi completely from network wiring and any noise/jitter issues that might pop up there.
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There are many independent, off label, small label, and self release artists out there releasing on file sharing platforms, but also media. Cassettes and CD's, because of the economies of production will be around for awhile yet. Some artists I follow only release physical media on cassette and CDr. Many also sell/publish digital files. Think R. Stevie Moore and his subscription cassettes, which blazed a trail still much followed, The Corporate Music Business will be just fine (for a time) without selling physical media, if that's how they want to market their commodity.
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So in summary, CDs still can play a useful role (including coasters for drinks as mentioned) but sound quality should not be an issue. I still have hundreds of CDs but all are ripped to music server and I play them only from there via Roon these days (I used Plex in the past for many years). They are useful as a backup in case I should lose files in the future and there is not an option to stream some of my favorites from a high res streaming service (I use Qobuz).
Physical media including CDs and vinyl also come in packages with supplemental material that is not available (today) with streaming equivalent. As long as I have internet access to read up on whatever topic I might choose, I tend to not miss the supplemental info in records or CDs much. I can’t remember last time I went to a CD to find out something about what I was listening to. I do go to records however on occasion for that. 331/3 vinyl still retains the unique advantage of being a larger format that also often also includes interesting supplemental information and materials. CDs are smaller and less useful that way, though box sets and newer expanded editions make an effort to compensate for that in cases where the market interest supports such products. Demand for physical media is likely to not go away totally for quite a while yet, but these days it all plays a distant second fiddle to streaming and all the advantages and conveniences that go with it.
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Oh another reason I find I still retain all my records and CDs collected over the years is sentimental value. I’ve been collecting these since a kid and I associate specific records and CDs with various experiences and events in my life. I suspect that matters to a lot of older guys like me. Not so much with younger generations. I have young adult children that love music and neither has much if any investment in physical media. Streaming rules. My daughter is a big Michael Jackson fan and does collect MJ collectable things including a few records that she never played, but that’s it.
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Inspite of millions of music selections on streaming. I have some cd collections that are not on streaming.
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Also worth noting FWIW that just because something is available on streaming today, it may not be at some point in the future if say there is no significant demand or perhaps even if legal issues were to arise that prevented access.
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As previously stated, at this juncture, I like streaming my music exclusively, and I enjoy it immensely. But, to be perfectly honest with you, I wish that CD, reel to reel, cassettes, turn tables, and even 8 track, would all make huge come backs. Especially amongst our younger music lovers. The young--those who are the future of the high end audio industry. The young--those who stream their music pretty much exclusively. I'll take anything that'll revival and restore our extremely diminished and dying high end audio industry back to it's former glory.
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From Wikipedia
The revival peaked in the 2020s decade, with various publications and record stores crediting Taylor Swift with driving vinyl sales.[12][13][14][15] In 2022, Swift's Midnightsbecame the first major album release to have its vinyl sales outpace CDs since 1987,[16][17]with approximately 600,000 sold in the US and 80,000 sold in the UK at the time of the record occurring.[18] In 2023, Swift's re-recorded 1989 (Taylor's Version) became the first album to sell over a million vinyl LPs within a single calendar year in the US.[19] In 2024, Swift's The Tortured Poets Department broke the record for the single-largest sales week for a vinyl album in the modern era, with 859,000 sales in its first week.[20] For 2022 the Recording Industry Association of America reported that: "Revenues from vinyl records grew 17% to $1.2 billion – the sixteenth consecutive year of growth – and accounted for 71% of physical format revenues. For the first time since 1987, vinyl albums outsold CDs in units (41 million vs 33 million)."[21
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CDs and Record album sales will never go back to what it once was. Streaming will grow in popularity, but CD and vinyls will continue to be a niche hobby for many people.
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@mapman Thought I was reading my own entries!
There is value to all the various means to playback music. I have turntable, reel to reel, two cassette players, cd transport, tuner. And I've held on to all my physical media,
Streaming became my primary choice for listening to music over time. Initially, it was the novelty of a new format with access to an incredible number of recordings. Over time the complexity was the allure, I was bored with digital playback via cd, tt setups have the complexity, but I was set at the time. With streaming one can have a simple setup or extremely complex array of equipment, I've gone with the latter. As an audiophile I admit to fascination with the equipment and diy aspect of my setups. My streaming setup very much custom, diy and complex, and still, and always will be in flux. And then we have the music, my streaming setup provides me with hours of best sound quality I've experienced, this with decades of audio experiences. Streaming listening sessions can be stream of consciousness experience, no physical media can replicate it with all the getting up and changing out cd's and vinyl. This stream of consciousness mode of listening has completely changed my level of engagement with the music, five, six hour listening sessions pass by so fast, believe it to be 11pm, clock says 2,3am, time to go to bed, sigh.
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Who cares about the future. All we have is now. Enjoy whatever format you prefer while you’ve got ‘em! I won’t be giving up my vinyl or cd’s!
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5 years ago, when I thought I'd try streaming, 90% of my listening was on vinyl, 10% was CD.
Now it's 85% streaming, 10% vinyl and 5% CD.
Like many have stated, convenience and the vast library have made streaming the go-to for much of my listening.
But, I wouldn't consider selling any of my vinyl or CD's because they were curated by me over the last 55 years, and they represent much of my favorite works. Streaming is cheap and convenient now, but the future is unknown. Perhaps it will become prohibitively expensive for me in my retirement years if the pricing structure changes. Maybe as I downsize and move to a smaller home I won't have access to the gigabyte, fiber internet that I enjoy now. All I know is that if I suddenly had to do without streaming it would not be that big a deal since I have backup sources. Without vinyl and CD backup sources I'd be up shits Creek if my streaming went away.
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Do you own or rent your house (or whatever you live in)? Streaming is in effect 'renting' the music, and the cost never ends, and will surely increase. I have a fairly large collection of both vinyl and CDs, but just bought an entry level streamer this week because of the wide variety of music it brings. As several others have said in this thread, it's all good as long as we are happy listening to the music.
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I've been into audio since the 1970's so I've seen audio formats come and go . . . and come back again. Every time I travel to a new city, I search out audio and record shops. In every case, the owners have told me the primary group that buys LPs are 12-34's and at least half don't even own a turntable; they buy the records mostly to support the artists and hope someday to have something on which to play them. At my local used record and CD shops, I actually see people of all ages shopping for both. Perhaps my town is unusual but I don't think so.
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I just love looking at a stream. The art work and the production credits... makes me want to cuddle it does.
I have a ton of physical media. I have always wanted my own music store and now I feel like I live in the middle of one. People freak when they see it. I still have never heard anyone say, Wow! Look at your download collection!
Enjoy the music my friends~
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I still have never heard anyone say, Wow! Look at your download collection!
@vinylvision1 But you’re kinda missing a lot of the point of streaming. I don’t care how large your current music library is, it’s just a fraction of what’s available to stream, and there are worlds of new music to be heard that you’d never hear otherwise. And that’s the point — finding worlds of wonderful new music rather than playing the same stuff you’ve already heard over and over again. Not saying that’s not rewarding as far as it goes and I still do that as well, but that’s as far as it goes. The ability to effortlessly explore and find unlimited new music is the most exciting and rewarding thing I’ve experienced as an audiophile of over 40 years. Ignore that to your own detriment.
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For most of us the technologies are not mutually exclusive. Some have dispensed with their CDPs altogether but I think most still have players and may spin some CDs. And the difference between CD, CDs ripped to a server, downloads , and a streaming service are not that great. Vinyl is different, not necessarily better, but one that has a lot of extra musical factors at work. Same with Reel2Reel. Surround sound is the one format that (regrettably) is headed for extinction .
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Yes I buy lots of cds.I only buy mint condition ones.My local sells cds for a buck and no tax. I went to a antique shop and found brand new Japanese cds with the obi tags ,for 5 bucks.Brand new,cd box sets 3 ,4,5 cds I'm them 5 bucks come on man that's a steal.They sell on ebay for 30 to 50 bucks plus shipping. LoLBut I did buy the new Rhino reissue of Black Sabbaths first it was 39 bucks.I also bought 3 of the Doors ,45 rpm albums that was $180.Why because I'm a old fool ...
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DACs have improved till, for single-ended use, there is a new Sabre chip ESS9038 outclasses far more expensive and difficult to get accurate ladder DACs. I still use mostly discs: CDs and 5-channel SACDs, but I have some downloaded copies of symphonies and ripped CDs on my computer. I am unwilling to tie myself down to a paid subscription service. I do not care for how music is catalogued by name of artist and name of song because I know which composer I want to hear and what symphony, concerto, overture, etc. I want to choose.
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I don't get the aversion to streaming if the intent of this hobby is the music. Streaming easily beats out any physical media for easy access and affordability. Between my cd's, vinyl, cassettes, reel to reel I probably have well over 10k physical media, this simply pales in comparison to whats available with streaming. I could never have the storage space or afford to purchase even 1% of the entirety of streaming libraries, streaming is a music lover's paradise.
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Cd, reel to reel, vinyl, steaming, cassettes, it’s all good afaic…have it all and love it all…certainly not getting rid of collections I’ve been building since the 1960s…enjoy …
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I don't get the appeal to streaming because my intent is the music I like to listen to. Having the world at my fingertips is meaningless and wasteful if I only like to listen to what would amount to about 1% of the music out there, comparatively speaking.
I get my take on what's out there easily enough to not have to spend on streaming what I had to with my CD set up to have it sound as good. For me, that's money down the drain. I'd rather buy better speakers for that kind of money.
I've been to sites where you type in your favorite musician(s) and up will pop recommendations that closely align displayed in a field with the closest ones being the most similar and the furthest ones not so much. In each and every instance of investigation of said artists, not one appealed to me as much as the one I used for input. The display wasn't meager and would show about 20-30 artists. After a while, I stopped using it for its uselessness.
This was some time ago and I can see how it was a primitive precursor to what's now used by Tidal, Qobuz, Spotify and others as part of some algorithm in their searches for similar music, with images and liner notes to sweeten the deal. I'd still have the same results if I streamed.
There are places to go and listen to what's out there without paying a thing for it. That's more than enough for me. Spending time to listen to what others have collated and curated resulted in disliking most of what I listened to, just like with that site I mentioned before. To be honest, I find it boring.
It appears to me that some sort of hoarding is the latent function with pride and command of ownership as the manifest function (it's the way my mind works, YMMV). Like I've mentioned before (twice), this passive aggressive push to get others to stream by faint condemnation and curiosity (sealioning) instead of just letting it go, is what unnecessarily divides us. There's no need for hard lined conformity. I've never asked for justification for my set up: just wanted to share for those who are curious. Happy listening to one and all in your own way.
All the best,
Nonoise
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@nonoise Nobody wants to make you stream. Some people really like being able to find new (to them) music through streaming and are free to express that like on this forum.
There are probably more threads with differences of opinion on Audiogon than not. That's the way forums work. If you don't like reading about streaming, don't read the threads. There are many topics I avoid in these forums. It's easy to do.
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Funny, I have 31,100 LPs and 16,300 CDs. I need to cull 15% of each (duplicates and just uninteresting to me). However, I would not want to be without either and I'm 68, part-time musician, recording engineer, composer (2X) archivist and singer. However, that's my hobby. I play my CDs through a Lampizator Poseidon (2nd system Topping D70s) and Jay's Audio Transport CDt3 Mk3. CDs have exactly the same sonic and musical appeal as does analog. Good mastering and good sound trumps the formats. Streaming can be an equal but generally isn't as the source material is inferior 85% of the time, often as good and rarely better. The best streaming sound is generally more expensive than my analog and digital setups.
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@nonoise Nobody wants to make you stream.
I wasn't reading between the lines. It was fairly obvious in a few posts That's why I said what I said.
You can go back to threads where an OP asks for advice with CDTs or CDPs, expressing no interests or wish to do streaming only to be assailed on his choices and told to start streaming. Time is short and it's getting old.
All the best,
Nonoise
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There are several drawbacks with streaming.
1. Historical and documentary information is generally unavailable on the recordings/artists.
2.1/3 or more of my 78s, LPs and CDs will never be streamed, especially ethnic music. Out of 61,100 LPs/78s/CDs/R2R
3. Streamed material can be added and deleted so that it’s here today and gone tomorrow.
4. Quality of the source material.
Actually, I prefer listening to solid state types of digital reproduction, flashdrives for instance perfect transfers from mastertapes/digital source material. I have saved 100s of my favorite and rare CDs to solid state. It's also transportable with ease.
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@nonoise When you run across those annoying, "you’ve got to stream" posts, stop reading and post about the benefits of how you prefer to listen to music.
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@tomcy6 I did, unless you meant for me to start a thread on how I prefer to listen to music. The same can be said for those who do what I mentioned when the shoe is on the other foot. Happens all the time and probably will not change.
I'm not worked up or upset, if that is what you're getting at. Being a contrarian on something so simple a matter as to which means of playback one prefers to use and why, is not grounds for acrimony. To say any more would be to rehash everything I've already said.
It seems that being a mite esoteric and matter of fact was misinterpreted as some kind of attack when it was just a rebuttal.
All the best,
Nonoise
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The great demise of the CD! So why did WADAX's bother to incorporate CD/SCAD playback, along with streaming, in its new $40K Studio Player ? Why are there other highend CD , or CD/SACD players - e.g. Soulnote, Goldnote, Neodio, Metronome, Accustic Arts, Canor,just to name a few?
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@nonoise Your posts weren't taken as an attack.
Considering that there will be many more "Isn't streaming great" posts, I was just offering a suggestion for dealing with them. Enough said. Enjoy your music! In whatever format you choose!
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From personal experience of owning both very high-end CD/CDT players, and of late the incredible Shanling ET3 ($729), I find the tech in less expensive CD/CDT players was the main problem that is until the ET3 especially when combined with the Vera-Fi Audio Snubway ($295). This combination rivals many $5000+ players/transports Ive owned
HTH
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@tweak1, can a Subway benefit an Audio lab CDT6000?
Thx, Chaz
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Meant Snubway, of course. Effin spell-checker tried to change it in this followup! Grrrrr.
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@facten I'll spare you the economics lesson, but:
CD sales are a small fraction of what they used to be and still declining. Manufacturers of CD players, CDs and creators who publish on CD look at these numbers to determine their path. As that number decreases fewer consumer CD players will be manufactured and artists will choose another means to deliver their work.
Super high-end manufacturers of audiophile CD transports do not care if last year 1 million CDs were sold versus 15 million a few years before. They're only concern is that the small number of audiophileswith very deep pockets want to buy a handful of these super expensive devices.
A small number of high-end CD transport manufacturers do not affect and are not affected by the millions of CDs that may or may not be sold.
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@mwinkc "I’ll spare you the economics lesson"
Guess I should turn in my MBA in Finance, and the 40 years I spent in business finance roles in a fortune 100 company must have been a dream. Let me know when your classes start so I can finally understand business economics from the great man himself
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@chazz101s
The beauty of the Snubway is it improves your entire playback. Mine is plugged into a CorePower 1800 which is plugged into a 20amp dedicated line
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@fleschler - obviously you are a hoarder or maybe more kindly, an overcollector. What is the point of having a record that you can't possibly listen to more than once in your lifetime? I listen maybe 15-20 hours a week which equates to about 1000 records a year. If you listen more than that, maybe you can listen to it twice in your lifetime (on average).
I listen to records I like and selectively add to my library of 350 or so records so the longest I would go without listening to a particular title (adhering to a fairly tight rotation based on how they are sorted) is 3-4 months. I can understand maybe going to 1000 records and listening once a year - maybe. Beyond that makes no sense to me.
I try to get the best issue/pressing I can (which are coming out all the time thanks to Chad at Acoustic Sounds, Mofi/Music Direct, Blue Note, Speakers Corner and the others) and occasionally replace them if a much better sounding new issue becomes available and I really like the album. Then I sell the old one! These guys who have 6 copies of the same record are a curiosity to me unless they are hoarders or overcollectors. Why wouldn't you just listen to the best sounding one and be done with it?
As long as there is profit in a format, the manufacturers will make them. There is enough support for vinyl to be growing for the past 20 years. They will never go away.
I am surprised no one is talking about HiRez downloads - they sound like a good alternative for the paranoid out there who don't trust the streamers or streaming quality is not good (I wouldn't know). I don't have that set up - I am vinyl only on my home system. Just make sure you back up your server.
Any HiRezers (if that's what you call them)?
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@sokogear So, I am a hoarder and overcollector. I am 68. At 5 years old I had 300 records (78s & LPs). The variety provided that I would not get bored. I removed/sold 18,000 records in the past two decades. I have probably another 10,000+ to remove. I also have 3,000 books in two libraries. I put more money into my music than into my equipment and listening room until 5 years ago when I purchased a home with a 5,700' ground floor and an upscale guard gated neighborhood where I thought theft would be less likely, especially with 13 tons of music.
I chose this as my primary hobby since I was a child. I had friends Thomas Chandler, Chandler's Wind-Up in San Bernardino with 1.5 million recordings, Music Man Murray with 1 million, Michael Lane with 250,000 78s and 50s LPs and my a half dozen friends of Thomas Null with 225,000 recordings (Varese Sarabande and other mid-tier record/CD producer.
My ethnic music collection of 3,750 recordings, 150+ made/recorded/mastered by me including major venues Disney Hall, Royce Hall, Ford Ampitheater, etc. has provided music to many other musicians in Southern California. I was and am the archivist for two mid-level classical composers including the 11 CD compilation of the Erich Zeisl Vienna Centennial in 2005.
So, if you want to throw negativity on my collecting music for the purpose of listening to it or using it like a lending library for ethnic music, go ahead if it makes you feel better.
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+1@oddiofyl...I too have an Aurender and a transport. The streamer certainly has its role in my system but appreciate the consistency of redbook playback.
+2@jmalen123...I have four front ends in my system and use all four daily. Only one has a computer in the signal path.
For those living in the northeast check out "nyrecordfairs.com." Various sites throughout the year and usually held at a church or VFW. Great selections and typically $5-$8 for a CD.
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Sakogear makes sense in my case, vast majority of my vinyl stored away, likely never to be played again, prior to my streaming same situation. I've always maintained around 500 vinyl in listening room and I likely really only rotate about 100 on semi regular basis.
And yet I find myself unable to liquidate a single vinyl, have sold a minimal amount of cd's. I'm at point where I'm selling off excess of material possessions, I have rule that if something hasn't been used in past seven years, out the door. Suppose it's nostalgia that keeps me in hoarding position. There is a certain memory that goes with every vinyl, just looking at cover brings it all back, cd's don't do this for me.
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@fleschler - I didn't even think of the term archivist. If you are creating a reference library for others to access, it makes sense, especially since it sounds like you have the space for it and can find a title in a minute or so. As far as listening to them, you can't listen to all of them and get to them all.
I have to expand my storage every 60 records or so and am constantly rearranging them so I don't have to think much on my next selection (with exceptions of course) to maintain a pretty even rotation between artists or types of artist (in the case of jazz where they aren't a top favorite like Trane or Miles).
@sns - at least the ones you don't listen to are stored away and you can listen to the ones you like.
You can't really like everything....or else you really don't like anything.
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This an odd site to be attacking someone with a large music collection
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