Physical copies (CDs) vs digital (Mp3s)

[Uladyne]

I was cleaning out a bunch of old shit from storage today and noticed I have a shit ton of empty cd cases taking up my fucking living space. All the CD's are safely tucked away in CD folders in my car, and also ripped to my hard drive.

With this realization I figured it would be pointless to hold on to the empty cases, but I couldn't bring myself to throw away the booklets. I removed all the books and trashed the jewel cases. But now I still have a big ass stack of cd booklets I may never actually look at again.

I hate to say it, but I might be completely finished with buying plastic CDs. I know the sound quality is better with an actual non compressed 16 bit CD, and its nice to have something tangible to hold in your hands, but I don't think I could discern an audible difference between the original cd's and my rips. I love having the artwork and everything, too, for the first couple days. After the excitement wears off though I need to find a place to stash the case/booklet, and the disc ends up in a sleeve somewhere. Usually the next time I get an urge to hear a specific album I can't find the cd in a timely manner and end up burning a new one from my rip.

Also with the possibilty of burning mp3 cd's or using a car stereo with USB thumbdrive or ipod capabilties, FUCK audio cd's with one measley album on them. What's that shit all about? I assume that any day we'll be seeing car stereos with just a usb jack and no cd player (if they aren't already out).

There is much to be said though about the artwork. Itunes is getting better about including pdf files of the art with albums, but it would be nice to see some sort of online database with PDFs of the artwork from all our favorite albums. Then I could let go of this big stack of paper. Perhaps a whole new art format will be in order soon, like a giant jpeg or something that comes with digital distrubutions, for exploration while listening to the album, or some sort of interactive artwork that will come bundled with the audio files.

I dunno, sorry for the super long mostly pointless rambling, but I'm starting to look at CD's and jewel cases almost the same way as I looked at cassette tapes when I made the switch to CDs.

 

[Jind]

While I can understand your point of view and at times I look at my stacks and stacks of CD's and wonder if I'll ever open them again after I rip the contents to FLAC files for storage, I still prefer buying the physical CD and doing my own lossless conversion. I like having that little CD booklet in my hands while reading through the lyric sheets, looking at both the cover art and other internal artwork, hell even the media labeling for those first few listens after purchasing them.

I do buy some music digitally, but most is still physical media - perhaps someday I'll go completely downloadable music, but not any time soon I predict since I've actually been buying quite a few releases on vinyl these days if they are available.

Different strokes for different folks I guess.

 

[Pman]

I had this same way of thinking until literally last week when i lost all my data on my computer. This meant losing all my music and i dont even know where to begin getting it all back on the computer. I at least still have most of it available via the actual cds which has just changed my mind about owning a hardcopy of the music.

 

[abigor731]

i ripped my whole cd collection years ago
too bad i had no clue about all these audio formats back then
now i have like 10GB of 128kbit/s WMAs
fuck yeah
and i bought myself an ipod without realizing that it needs to encode it again to apple format

 

[professorlamp]

I still use my CD on a regular basis, waking up in the morning, getting dressed, doing small things. there's no point in turning on the computer to play one or two songs it takes too long which is why I'll always have a place for my CD player

 

[Uladyne]

Excellent points, all of ye.

 

[Executioner213]

I only use 2 cd players: the one on my comp to rip music when I get a cd...and the one in my car. Often using the one on the computer to burn discs for use in the car. My car has a 1/8" jack on the stereo, and my Droid holds plenty of music. I don't use the cd player a whole lot.

I do like having the tangible product, but I really only buy cds (physical form) anymore at shows. Most of my physical cd purchases are from bands who's disc isn't buyable online...other than ordering it from them...or stocked in stores. I'm kinda leaning more towards buying vinyl lately for the 'collectible' aspect. I got a few signed vinyl that I hold in higher regard than a bunch of my signed cds. More like buying a real package for me, at that point.

 

[LeSedna]

For me, playing a CD in a CD player out from any computer is like a ritual, it's just something pleasant to do.

I like the sound of the CD player opening, closing, the sound of the CD moving inside, and hearing the song start.

Also, what I don't like about an mp3 library, is that it's so convenient to change songs that you end listening always to the same songs, and never listen to an ENTIRE CD, or at least a lot less.
In my car, I only have the choice to put an entire CD, and it's what I like : I have to listen to the whole cd because changing the CD at each song would be a pain, and therefore, I discover songs I would have missed, and also, it's sometimes really nice to listen to the whole product because most albums are made coherently and listening from the first song to the last one is the only way to feel it.

 

[LeSedna]

i ripped my whole cd collection years ago
too bad i had no clue about all these audio formats back then
now i have like 10GB of 128kbit/s WMAs
fuck yeah
and i bought myself an ipod without realizing that it needs to encode it again to apple format

Don't buy iPod, they sound like shit and are a pain in the ass.

Buy an Archos : pure win

 

[Charlie E.]

I had this great idea to not buy any more CD's myself a few months ago.
I have about 200 CD's if not more and I wanted to save space.

But then I realized that most of the CD's that I wanted to purchase weren't on iTunes in the first place. Then when I was going to purchase the few that were I realized that they still don't offer lossless formats. I think the highest is currently 192kbps mp3 files?

To top it off, I still don't own an iPod and my car stereo system doesn't have an aux in. So I'd have to buy the expensive iPod $249 plus a new car stereo + install (prolly another 200ish bucks) just to be able to take advantage of it.

So instead I just bought a sturdy CD box for my car and simply rotate CD's out as I get bored with them.

To me quality is a huge deal so until iTunes starts offering lossless formats I'm not switching from CD's anytime soon.

Also, I've heard some iPods through aux ins before and it sounded like ass. Granted I don't think my friend used a high quality format, but still....
Guess I'll look up Archos now.

 

[arv_foh]

My car stereo was like $150 and it has a usb port with iPod control right from the deck.

 

[Mikaël-ange]

For me, playing a CD in a CD player out from any computer is like a ritual, it's just something pleasant to do.

I like the sound of the CD player opening, closing, the sound of the CD moving inside, and hearing the song start.

Same for me

 

[GarethSE]

What LeSedna said, but I dunno, for the most part CD doesn't do it for me anymore, which is why I buy vinyl.

The ritualistic aspect is 10x as over the top, the packaging's bigger and the sound is.. subjective? hah.
i do still buy some cd's though. i go out of my way to get cd's if the packaging is cool, i dig stuff that's been done on a limited run, then i get a lot of stuff if i want a flac but can't find it online, for the most part I find CD's to be a very boring medium though.

 

[xFkx]

kill me, but I pirate mp3's, and the ones I like I order as tangible legal cd's. The one's I don't like get deleted.

 

[Harry Hughes]

I still like buying CDs.
For various reasons, I refuse to own a portable MP3 player.
I'm of the opinion that, while I'm at home, I can listen to music and play guitar, but while I'm outta the house, I want some contrast in my life. Listen to the sounds of the city and environment, not have some bloody earphones shoved in my ears blocking me out from the world.
I like MP3s too, but most of the time if I want an intense listening session, I need to be away from the computer and just throw in a CD and lie down and listen, without the distraction of reading forums, facebook etc etc

 

[DanLights]

I love having some bloody earphones shoved in my ears blocking me from the world. THe world is boring, my music isn't. Iphone all the way, high quality mp3 and don't give no shit

 

[GarethSE]

i dont usually stroll around with earphones in anymore, but thats because i tend not to stroll anywhere if i dont like how its going to sound anyway.
ive all but stopped going into town, miserable grey dull despicable little town full of people i'd rather not see and places id rather not visit, the countryside on the other hand, i can dig just listening to the wind.

 

[James Murphy]

i never... EVER.. take the actual CDs to my car... fuck that.. i know far too many people that have lost 150-300 CDs at a shot in those damned giant "CD wallets" thanks to car burglaries... then, like you Uladyne, they have hundreds of CD cases back home but with no CDs to ever put back in them.

no, my CDs stay in the home, on thier shelves.. i listen to them in my stereo in my house. for my car... well that's what Toast is for, i rip a copy to a cheap CD/R, wich i could care less if it gets stolen, scratched, warped by heat, etc.... and if something like that does happen, i just grab the real CD of the shelf again and make a new one.

i'll never give up my hard copy CDs... i love them... the look, the touch, the smell, the reliability... and, compared to mp3, the sound.

 

[GarethSE]

and, compared to mp3, the sound.

this. fuck lossy. >:{

 

[Terminus]

i never... EVER.. take the actual CDs to my car... fuck that.. i know far too many people that have lost 150-300 CDs at a shot in those damned giant "CD wallets" thanks to car burglaries... then, like you Uladyne, they have hundreds of CD cases back home but with no CDs to ever put back in them.

no, my CDs stay in the home, on thier shelves.. i listen to them in my stereo in my house. for my car... well that's what Toast is for, i rip a copy to a cheap CD/R, wich i could care less if it gets stolen, scratched, warped by heat, etc.... and if something like that does happen, i just grab the real CD of the shelf again and make a new one.

i'll never give up my hard copy CDs... i love them... the look, the touch, the smell, the reliability... and, compared to mp3, the sound.

this actually happened to me, I left a cd book on my passenger seat full of cdr's. the guy broke my side window, opened the thing on the seat and probably said "FUCK!!!" cuz it wasnt worth spit hah. Unfortunately still cost me 185 bucks for a new window, but that cd wallet was still there.