will CDs eventually become obsolete due to no CD transports surviving?

[antcollinet]

Oldest CD in my collection, to my best recollection, is Van Halen II. It's probably spot-on 40 years old. Just put it in the Oppo and it sounds great.

One of my favorite VH albums.

I think my oldest CD is Brothers in Arms. 39 years old. Probably 20% of my collection is older than 35years.

 

[antcollinet]

Could someone explain what the point of backing up CDs is when we can access nearly all music via streaming services?

I can stream my ripped CDS free of charge. That is a lot more cost effective than £15 to @20 a month for a streaming service.

 

[Esprit]

As long as it's possible: Tidal shared with friends.
2.8€ per month.
I can listen on my iPhone while I'm not at home, I can listen in the car with CarPlay, I can listen even without internet by downloading songs or albums to my phone.

 

[Matt_Holland]

I can stream my ripped CDS free of charge. That is a lot more cost effective than £15 to @20 a month for a streaming service.

That argument stacks up in some ways.
However on the assumption that you now don’t buy new CDs and instead are paying for a streaming service as your primary way of listening to new music, it doesn’t.

When I considered ripping my 600 CDs about 10 years ago, my OCD method using EAC, plus the ball-ache off adding missing meta data, etc, meant that I couldn’t justify the time. It was literally weeks of work.

Each to their own of course.

 

[sergeauckland]

I can stream my ripped CDS free of charge. That is a lot more cost effective than £15 to @20 a month for a streaming service.

Not to mention that you can stream your own original CDs rather than whatever Remastered version the streaming service provides.

With classical music, it's even more difficult to find a specific performance of a work.

S

 

[antcollinet]

and instead are paying for a streaming service as your primary way of listening to new music, it doesn’t.

Correct - but I'm not . I had a 6 month free trial of apple muic. It almost didn't get used.

 

[Sokel]

I hope it won't become obsolete.
I mean,have you ever tried to find a specific old performance of a classical work at streaming services?

And then there stuff like that,which is treasure (to me) :

https://www.discogs.com/release/6018385-Fritz-Reiner-Chicago-Symphony-Orchestra-The-Complete-RCA-Album-Collection

(doesn't matter that I also have the LPs,I consider CDs to be the equivalent of back-up to older stuff)

 

[Mean & Green]

CDs, CD players and transports are along way from being dead. They are all still being made and sold.

Don’t believe the media BS regarding the format being dead. Many people still buy, play and rip them. I still buy new CD albums on Amazon regularly and I know that in the UK CDs outsell vinyl on a roughly 2:1 ratio.

Streaming has taken a hold for the masses for sure, but there is still a place for the CD and music collectors haven’t stopped collecting just because streaming exists.

I am not discarding the digital library I’ve spent over two decades curating. Neither will I stop adding to the physical library I’ve spent 30 years building. I can stream my own library locally and choose any mastered version of an album I want to hear unlike a streaming service where you get what you’re given. I can place a new album in my CD player and operate a physical device and put my phone down and just simply absorb the music without the need for Wi-Fi and software to sometimes get in the way of the process.

I’m not alone in these feelings, many people still do this. I think it’s going to be a long time until we are struggling to physically play a CD. Also the claims for CD rot seem to be unfounded at least in my experience. All of my discs are as they were when they were new and some of them are 40 years old. I have a pretty decent sample size of discs, if it were an issue I’d expect to be experiencing it.

 

[Gorgonzola]

Anther vote for CDs ... although I don't actually listen to spinning CDs anymore. I buy CDs and rip them before listening.

But if I want a good selection of Classical music, CD is the place to look for it, IMO. I find the downloads offer a limited selection of Classical, and that streaming services, (last I checked), are somewhat limited and the searches they provide aren't optimal for Classical music.

 

[Yuhasz01]

"According to data from the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), shipments of compact discs rose from 31.6 million in 2020 to 46.6 million in 2021 – a rise of 47 per cent. Revenue also rose from $483.2 million to $584.2 million. The last time sales of CDs were on the up was in 2004.
CD sales peaked in 2000, when nearly a billion discs were shipped in the US alone."
Lots of music available on cds and much of it (especially classical and jazz specific recordings)not available on streaming services.

 

[beagleman]

I've bought a couple of new releases in the past year, brand new albums, all available on brand new CDs.

Maybe it will become like vinyl did in the 1990s when it got to the stage where some new albums were no longer released on that format. (Which is what compelled me to finally buy a CD player back in 1995). But we're not there yet.

Seems to me as long as there are new CDs being produced there will be new players being made.

Streaming has various disadvantages:

1) Monthly subscription payments regardless of how much or little you use it
2) Not all music, or all of the different masters of that music, are available
3) No end user control over the quality of the feed
4) Needs an internet connection (internet connections go down occasionally or often depending on location)
5) Needs a computer and software, both of which can be problematic
6) Browsing choice from a screen is not the same as browsing a physical library. Some may prefer screen access, many don't.
7) Cost of access may increase, if you don't have an alternative it's either suck it up or no more music
8) The time and effort required to copy a CD collection to hard drive
9) The need to create and manage multiple back up drives

In contrast the arguments against a physical CD collection are IMV weak:

1) Degradation - absolutely no evidence that this is an issue, except for production from one plant, decades ago, of which all affected CDs have long since failed and been binned.

2) Storage space - I estimate I can store 5000 CDs in one alcove of my living room. How many do you need? Where is the time to listen to them all? Who does not have one alcove of space to devote (even assuming they have that many discs)?

3) Sound quality - CD does not offer inferior sound because it is read from a disc. Learn how CD works.

4) Availability of hardware - seems like a month does not pass without a new transport coming on the market. Millions of functioning devices already out there. Even if I was in my 20s I would not be concerned about not being able to buy a player in the future. In any case do people think they will live forever?

I love streaming. I love my actual CDs.

Honestly though, I find myself almost 100% of the time using streaming spotify on my roku.
The convenience, sound quality and ease are simply incredible.

It is like having a huge library instantly at my fingertips.
I still LOVE CD and have all of mine, but the convenience with streaming is huge in comparison.
I tend to go from thing to thing, and find things that are similar to what I like, its like discovering a huge candy store to me!


Honestly a few bucks a month, to have access to Tens of thousands of any Genre of album, nothing compares.

I used to say most of what you said in your post, until I really started streaming on my system with my Roku. No computer, and so on, just a remote and TV screen.

 

[Devnull]

Think about the fact that you can laser scan wax cylinder recordings, that's retrieving data from a 125+ year old technology. If the physical CD is around and readable in a 100 years something will be able to read it

 

[rank]

Billions of CDs have been sold, but sales are now declining, as is the case for all forms of artistic media.

 

[Mart68]

I love streaming. I love my actual CDs.

Honestly though, I find myself almost 100% of the time using streaming spotify on my roku.
The convenience, sound quality and ease are simply incredible.

It is like having a huge library instantly at my fingertips.
I still LOVE CD and have all of mine, but the convenience with streaming is huge in comparison.
I tend to go from thing to thing, and find things that are similar to what I like, its like discovering a huge candy store to me!


Honestly a few bucks a month, to have access to Tens of thousands of any Genre of album, nothing compares.

I used to say most of what you said in your post, until I really started streaming on my system with my Roku. No computer, and so on, just a remote and TV screen.

I hear what you are saying and please don't think my post was in any way a criticism of those who access their music via a streaming service. It was just to point out that it is not a universal panacea.

Having access to tens of thousands of albums is really no use to me as I don't have the time to sample even a small portion of that. If there's an album I want, I will just order the CD, it arrives in a couple of days. So I do still have access to any music available, just not instantaneously.

Since I usually only listen at weekends (like right now) the delay is inconsequential.

For random selection I make regular trips to record shops and charity shops where I often buy albums unknown to me just to see what they are like. In the days of vinyl I used to love crate digging and the thrill of the hunt, so that keeps that pleasure alive for me.

If I discover an artist I like, I will then order more of their albums for delivery.

My CDs are organised by genre and alphabetically, all in the same area of the room, so finding a specific album I want to play is not overly time-consuming or onerous in any way.

 

[EJ3]

I've bought a couple of new releases in the past year, brand new albums, all available on brand new CDs.

Maybe it will become like vinyl did in the 1990s when it got to the stage where some new albums were no longer released on that format. (Which is what compelled me to finally buy a CD player back in 1995). But we're not there yet.

Seems to me as long as there are new CDs being produced there will be new players being made.

Streaming has various disadvantages:

1) Monthly subscription payments regardless of how much or little you use it
2) Not all music, or all of the different masters of that music, are available
3) No end user control over the quality of the feed
4) Needs an internet connection (internet connections go down occasionally or often depending on location)
5) Needs a computer and software, both of which can be problematic
6) Browsing choice from a screen is not the same as browsing a physical library. Some may prefer screen access, many don't.
7) Cost of access may increase, if you don't have an alternative it's either suck it up or no more music
8) The time and effort required to copy a CD collection to hard drive
9) The need to create and manage multiple back up drives

In contrast the arguments against a physical CD collection are IMV weak:

1) Degradation - absolutely no evidence that this is an issue, except for production from one plant, decades ago, of which all affected CDs have long since failed and been binned.

2) Storage space - I estimate I can store 5000 CDs in one alcove of my living room. How many do you need? Where is the time to listen to them all? Who does not have one alcove of space to devote (even assuming they have that many discs)?

3) Sound quality - CD does not offer inferior sound because it is read from a disc. Learn how CD works.

4) Availability of hardware - seems like a month does not pass without a new transport coming on the market. Millions of functioning devices already out there. Even if I was in my 20s I would not be concerned about not being able to buy a player in the future. In any case do people think they will live forever?

I'm 100% agree (and do not stream for all those reasons) but I am going to key in on #4:
Where I am at, I can get 36 channels of over the air high def TV ([IF I wanted to, but I haven't owned a TV since 2007] the actual broadcast stations are in a radius of about 50-70 miles from me) FOR FREE. Same with FM radio (with an even larger 100 mile radius (with my outdoor antenna being on a rotator and 30 feet up). If it wasn't for the river about 10 feet way from the front door, there would be NO DIRECT sunlight hitting the home, due to I live in a forest.
In order to use my electronic leash (cell phone), I have to be outside, on my deck, in a specific spot and it is still intermittent.
Many times I am out at sea in a ship or large boat for months at a time.
There is usually a satellite link but streaming from that is slow, intermittent and very expensive.
And I REALLY do not like streaming at all for reasons 1 through 5 & 7.
Now I do want to digitize to FLAC but 7 & 8 are HUGE hurdles for me.
I like FM because (I can no longer hear to 19 KHz anyway) and I find out about events, restaurants and other things that I may want to do locally (within a 100 mile radius, I consider local).

 

[EJ3]

Almost EVERYTHING eventually becomes obsolete. But for now you can still buy them (as well as disc drives for computers) and my Blu-Ray player plays CDs and DVDs.

You can still but turntables and cassette players. I don't think anybody is making 8-track players or VCRs anymore. DVD-Audio, laser disc, and DAT never were mainstream and they have pretty-much disappeared too.

I think that is unfortunate about DAT.

 

[EJ3]

I mean CDs can technically last longer then vinyl by digital means on various digital formats. However, if you don't have 2 versions/backups of it, then your asking for trouble.


I trust SSDs more then hard drives but I still try to backup to SL Blu-rays. A good chunk of people use hard drives like a Flash drive, read from time to time but hard drives don't like that. I mean sure, I can make 5 copies of each CD with how cheap even the nice blanks are but Blu-rays are gonna last longer. Even though bit for bit a CD copy is a perfect but the outside isn't the same (The label and such).


I don't think any CD can last 40 years let alone 100 years. I think blu-rays can actually last 50+ years due to the way there made.

I like the Blue Ray idea for backups, as well as I can just copy (about 800 before it stops working) CD's using my SONY RCD-W500C (never fear, I have a second one still in the box for when the first one quits working).
But the quality archival media to record onto is getting harder to obtain (& recording units and media media for Blu Ray was never a thing in the USA due to Hollywood & DRM [so has always had a certain level of difficulty here that was not a BIG issue in other places]).

 

[Esprit]

And then there stuff like that,which is treasure (to me) :

Sorry but I didn't understand.
Are you saying that these works can only be found on CD or that they can ALSO be found on streaming services?

 

[sergeauckland]

Think about the fact that you can laser scan wax cylinder recordings, that's retrieving data from a 125+ year old technology. If the physical CD is around and readable in a 100 years something will be able to read it

The big difference is that retrieving information from wax cylinders or 78s, or even LPs is essentially a mechanical process and so could be remanufactured pretty easily if the original playback machines are no longer available. A half-decent mechanic with a lathe in their garage could make a wax cylinder reproducer or turntable, albeit a cartridge and stylus might be a bit more difficult. Making a CD player from scratch in someone's garage wouldn't be possible, and no industrial process would be economic for ones and twos, except perhaps for a National Museum.

I just hope that there are enough machines left around for CD playback to be possible 'forever'.

Similarly, optical film is still easily accessible, going back to the earliest. How many Quad VTRs are still operational? There's a lot of historic archive material on video tapes that future historians will need access to. Again hope that National Museums are keeping their AVR2s still going.

S.

 

[Esprit]

Many times I am out at sea in a ship or large boat for months at a time.

You can save music from the streaming service on your cell phone or tablet.