Why Do ~You~ Still Play CDs?


I'm curious why you still play CDs in the age of streaming. I recently got back into CD listening and I'm curious if your reasons align with mine, which are:

  • Enjoying the physical medium—the tactile nature of the case, the disc, the booklet, etc.
  • Forcing myself to actually listen to an album, versus being easily distracted by an algorithm, or "what's next" in my playlist.
  • Actually owning the music I purchase, versus being stuck with yet another monthly subscription.

Others? 

itanibro

@soix  When I said "Oftentimes, when I witness people listening to music via streaming, they just bounce from one song to another."  I didn't mean it to sound as if ALL people steam that way.  Hence the reason I put "oftentimes".

I just didn't want to fall into that "camp" if I were to start streaming at some point.  I admit, I have a lot to learn about streaming.  All of the in's and out's of it, etc.  I would like to think that I would utilize the streaming services as you do, if I ever get up the gumption to start down that road.

Best wishes,

Don

Soix how many songs you can play in one day be realistic . Thru it’s nice to have millions of choices but you can even play 10% of those millions in your life time. Is this like Imelda Marcos having thousands of shoes? That she did not wear?I respect your opinion don’t get me wrong.

Soix how many songs you can play in one day be realistic . Thru it’s nice to have millions of choices but you can even play 10% of those millions in your life time. Is this like Imelda Marcos having thousands of shoes? That she did not wear?I respect your opinion don’t get me wrong.

@jayctoy Well that’s just silly reasoning by someone who is obviously streaming ignorant and is just making up silly reasons why it’s not good. I just explore music I either hear about or am interested in and continually find awesome new songs/albums — no need to hear all of it. Ok don’t stream — it’s your sad loss and you’ve no idea what you’re missing. You can lead a horse to water…

This is a great time of year for streaming, with all the " best of "' lists coming out. I'll  probably buy a few of my favorites on CD.  I agree the benefits of access to music on streaming cannot be denied. I again enjoy,  CD - probably my favorite, LP in binges, and have streaming in every room. Most here seem to do both to some degree, with a few totally against streaming and a very vocal few stating only streaming, avoid and sell your CD collection...I think the latter is where these "discussions" seem to go off the rails...like the OP was asking why do people who play CD enjoy that...

@latik

Congratulations on an excellent reply to a dubious challenge!

The earliest Philips CD players used 4 times oversampling (obviously, on playback) and sounded better than other early players as a result.  Oversampling allows much more gentle filters to be used in the analogue domain because the digital hash is at four times higher frequency.  Philips, who invented the format, also did not bother to implement the last two bits in their early players.

You did not include Direct Stream Digital as a high-res format.  Maybe 1-bit at 64 times oversampling is a stretch too far for some, but Philips and Sony introduced it as a far better alternative to CD format.  Apart from anything else, it is so much simpler in principle for playback