kompakt disks

[cthulufhtagn]

so i've pretty much decided that cds suck. for me they serve very little purpose, since i listen in my living room stereo through my laptop and they more often than not end up permanently shelved after being ripped to my hd. more or less i've decided they aren't worth my money, which i should use on vinyl instead. because let's face it, only vinyl is real--it makes cds look straight-up disposable.

thoughts?

 

[rms]

I like owning the cd even though I will more than often listen to my music digitally through my PC or mp3 player

 

[J.]

i still only listen to CDs. except in those rare uber elite diehards shits vinyl-only releases that interest me, which i think i have three.

sell your CDs for cheap then.

 

[The Invisible Guest]

I've got no use for the CD any longer. Soon Apple, and also the record companies, will be releasing digital albums that contain all the artwork, liner notes, songs, lyrics, etc. Once that happens .. as long as the price is reasonable I will probably never buy another cd.

Here's an article about it. http://www.appleinsider.com/article...ail_may_spur_whole_album_sales_in_itunes.html


Britt

 

[Dev]

As long as it's not Lossless and open-source (FLAC for instance), I will continue to buy cds. Then I guess I'll buy vinyls

Believe me, dematerialization is boring. And yes, we've all been fucked up by consumerism.

 

[Ars Magna]

I love cds. Love them.

 

[Reign in Acai]

They provide a good enough sound quality while fulfilling the need for tangibility. I've invested enough in the format where it's too late to turn back on it. There's too much effort in collecting vinyl. I want to be able to have 5-6 hours worth of music set up on my stereo. Where as with vinyl I'd be arsed to carefully switch records every twenty five minutes. Just too cumbersome and I'd fear that this disgusting L.A weather would lend to warping.

Listening to mp3s through a laptop is a piss poor music experience. Even if you have your pc hooked up to your stereo you're listening to 192kbps audio rips.

1star

 

[Vittra]

Listening to mp3s through a laptop is a piss poor music experience. Even if you have your pc hooked up to your stereo you're listening to 192kbps audio rips.

For a laptop yes due to certain limitations, but for listening to digital music in general (Not necessarily through or with a computer) it would depend entirely on what you have and how it is setup, as well as if you rip to 192kbps in the first place rather than the formats where there is no audio quality loss (such as FLAC as mentioned previously, or even simply straight to .WAV, or Apple lossless). You can have equal (some would argue superior) quality to playing the actual CD with the added convenience of not having to deal with them. Ultimately your point does stand for 95% of people regardless. A couple interesting solutions I've come across in my recent research to put together a system are the Wadia 170iTransport and the Squeezebox in conjunction with an external DAC.

In regards to this thread.. I love owning the physical medium, and I have no intention to stop buying CDs entirely unless they simply stop making them. I generally only get something on Vinyl if it cannot be acquired on CD. There is something lifeless and austere about owning a virtual library. Our lives are digitized quite enough as is... I'd say CDs are already proof of that as is.

 

[cthulufhtagn]

sell your CDs for cheap then.

meh unlikely, i do still enjoy owning them. a lot of stuff is only available, at least realistically, on cd and those i'll continue to buy. i just can't stand to spend more than $7 or 8 on a cd when i could get it on vinyl, which is so much more...tangible. which is why i'd never pay for mp3 downloads, because they're completely intangible.

i suppose i should have said i plan on focusing on vinyl more. and jerry i suppose you're right about sound quality but i really don't care about hearing transilvanian hunger (or anything else) in the most crystal-clear audio format.

 

[einride]

dont care about anything. have stopped listening to music on computer. cds are better because they discourage attention span zero mtv behaviour. i am a believer in the album as art form. fuck spotify itunes and everything else

 

[Krigloch the Furious]

wut?

 

[skeptik]

cds are better because they discourage attention span zero mtv behaviour.

 

[einride]

wut?

i make even less sense than usual when i type on a cellphone keyboard and try to save words

 

[dorian gray]

Part One: Great thread. I finally got a laptop for school purposes and the first thing I tried to do is rip all my CDs to the hard drive so I could just hook the computer up to my car stereo and never have to lug my CD case around ever again. This served to be fruitless in two ways. The first is that it's incredibly annoying to rip CDs to a hard drive. Secondly, listening to music by routing a laptop through a stereo is one of the dumber ideas I've ever come up with. I quite literally didn't make it out of the driveway before I achieved utter failure. Since that debacle I have simply grabbed whatever CD (case, artwork, everything) and TAKEN IT IN THE CAR WITH ME. It's a crazy concept that I haven't visited since 1996 or so. And even then, it was probably a cassette.

Part Two: I just got back from IKEA Atlanta (I fucking hate IKEA, btw) where I purchased a CD tower for which to store my CDs. See, I have a plan where I'm going to sit and listen to a CD and read the lyrics and look at the artwork while I do. Sounds crazy but I'm really going to do it. When I have money, I'm also going to buy awesome speakers and an awesome CD player and amp. But by that time, the fine folks at companies like Apple and whatnot will have completely ruined the opportunity

Part Three: Dear Apple and other geek companies: stop ruining my life by making anything and everything i-this and e-that. I don't need i-blow jobs. I don't want to use to fucking i-tunes. I don't listen to tunes. I don't want to listen to mp3s while I e-xercise. You're boring the hell out of me. You're going to be the cause of cool things like CDs becoming obsolete. Go away

 

[dorian gray]

Oh yeah, the actual topic. Well, Matt, I don't know what to tell you about vinyl. Sounds pretty cool to use vinyl instead of something else but I have no personal experience in this modern era. I haven't listened to vinyl since probably 1984.
And listening to music through your laptop on your home stereo sounds like it's pretty blah. Maybe not. I only wanted to do it through my car stereo because, well, it's in a car, and it'd be pretty convenient. If I had a nice home setup like Ken, I'd probably have a cool vinyl setup and I'd sit in a chair in the middle of the stereo soundstage.

 

[J.]

Since that debacle I have simply grabbed whatever CD (case, artwork, everything) and TAKEN IT IN THE CAR WITH ME. It's a crazy concept that I haven't visited since 1996 or so.

this is all i have ever done, and still do and will continue to do. i grab about 3 CDs off my music rack every morning. i fail to see the inconvenience some claim.

all that mongoloid gadget bullshit just seems so pointless

 

[skeptik]

The only downside to grabbing a few CDs for the car before you run out the door is that you can often experience musical mood swings, and then you find yourself stuck with nothing that you really want to listen to right now. I don't even have an mp3 player (yet) though. Fuck, I still bring along cassettes to listen to in the car. I sit and listen to records in a chair and follow along to the lyrics, even when they're in Czech. It's so much more rewarding to experience a recording than it is to jam some tunes.

 

[Krigloch the Furious]

dorian has cds?