Not mentioned in this thread that I saw: Owning physical media gives the owner unlimited license to listen to the music, for as long as the playback capability can be sustained. I don't have to have a subscription or an account with anyone to listen to CD's and vinyl records in my collection.
CD players are as good as any current playback technology in audio performance, so the usual anti-vinyl arguments don't apply. Not that it's as important to most of us as we pretend. I can sit down and listen to a scratchy old LP through which the crappy record players of my youth have plowed furrows, and still enjoy the music. With CD's, I enjoy them every bit as much as I would enjoy any digital storage and playback technology, even when paying attention to technical quality.
I have many of my CD's ripped and stored on a computer, and it's convenient in some ways. But when I sit down to listen to my main system, I usually fetch an actual CD or LP and put it in an actual player, as part of listening intentionally instead of just playing background music.
Now, to the sustainability of the technology. All machines are subject to wear, and there is much said about the failure of CD drive mechanisms. But in my experience, the laser assembly not usually a problem for long-term sustainability--all the old players I have bought were rejected for other reasons and the lasers are fine. The problem for me has been the loading mechanisms. Those often use chains of plastic parts, gears, and belts, and are often simply too complicated and overdesigned. For example, I have an otherwise very nice Denon DCD-1560 CD player that simply will not open and close the drawer reliably. It uses the elasticity of a thick and heavy belt to lock and unlock the drawer, and the drawer motor doesn't have the power to overcome that belt as it tried to reliably swing one pulley around the latch. That one is still on my long-term fix-it pile.
I have two Tascam CD-401 players. One of them required supergluing a plastic assembly back down to the bed on which it sits, and I also needed to resolder an RCA socket. Now it is reliable. Both needed belts (a five-minute change with those decks). As far the rest of the transport goes, it's the excellent Sony KSS-151 laser assembly (like the Denon) and they were Sony's premium mech at the time. They use linear motors to track the laser--silent and fast. I've never had one fail. I have a Magnavox CDB-650, which is nearly legendary at this point with its Philips transport and DAC. It needs a belt, but the electronics work perfectly. I have a Cambridge Audio D500SE from the late 90's that uses a Sony KSS-213 laser and after installing a fresh belt it works perfectly. The Cambridge Audio CXC is relatively recent, and it has the only currently available drive mech for these sorts of players, which is a Sanyo. Cheap--not on the same build-quality planet as the old Sony or Philips stuff, but still serviceable and for the moment sustainable. And my standard main-system player is a Naim CD5, with a Philips mech and a manual drawer that means there are no belts at all. I've paid as little as $25 (for the Tascam that needed Superglue) to as much as 30 times that (for the Naim in restored condition). They all sound great.
(Most CD players these days are computer-grade DVD/CD drives, which are designed for intermittent very high-speed data transfer loaded down with a range of error-correcting protocols, rather than being designed for high duty-cycle real-time data transfer with minimal dependence on read-back error correction. The older ones are simply made better, to higher price points. it's worth keeping the best of the old ones running, just as with most things.)
I suspect that as internet-based rent-seeking services get even greedier, or service providers (with the loss of net neutrality) start charging extra monthly fees for accessing streaming services (audio and video), or as the streamers require us to endure advertising, or after one of their databases gets publicly hacked, or when people start being judged in the workplace or the court of public opinion about their music and video choices, people will tire of having their entire world delivered to them through that leaky pipe. I predict that owning stuff will make a comeback, or at least it will be missed by those who presently eschew it.
The only question is whether anybody will remember how to make the stuff, let alone repair it.
Finally, there is a question of curation. My CD/record collection is small by the standards of many here, but it is carefully selected. There's very little in my CD cabinet that doesn't represent something special or unusually interesting, even if it's just the best example of recording and performing a particular piece of music, or an earlier version. As I have been ripping my CD's, I have not been tempted to skip more than a couple of them as being redundant. Yes, that includes all five versions that I have of the Shostakovich 5th Symphony, or the four versions I have of the startling Vaughan Williams 4th Symphony. If I search on "Shostakovich 5th" in an online service, maybe a version that I like will be there. Maybe not. Qobuz doesn't have any of the versions of Shostakovich that I have, and Tidal, near as I can tell, doesn't even let me look at their database without signing up. Even if I never buy another CD, I have a well-curated sampling of all kinds of music that has already stood the test of time with me. Nevertheless, I am still buying CD's of recordings made within the last year, and those will be part of my well-curated collection 20 years from now.
Rick "who would probably go to a streaming service if the house burned down and had to start all over, but would still be scouring ebay and bargain bins for treasured old stuff" Denney
. In addition to HDMI and optical, has analog output. Available used on eBay for $30 - $40.
Otari MX5050 010215 1
stella
we will have to endure MQA for at least 20 more years.
