The CD player is dead.......


I am still waiting for someone to explain why a cd player is superior to storing music on a hard drive and going to a dac. Probably because you all know it's not.

Every cd player has a dac. I'll repeat that. Every cd player has a dac. So if you can store the ones and zeros on a hard drive and use error correction JUST ONCE and then go to a high end dac, isn't that better than relying on a cd player's "on the fly" jitter correction every time you play a song? Not to mention the convenience of having hundreds of albums at your fingertips via an itouch remote.

If cd player sales drop, then will cd sales drop as well, making less music available to rip to a hard drive?
Maybe, but there's the internet to give us all the selection we've been missing. Has anyone been in a Barnes and Noble or Borders lately? The music section has shown shrinkage worse than George Costanza! This is an obvious sign of things to come.....

People still embracing cd players are the "comb over" equivalent of bald men. They're trying to hold on to something that isn't there and they know will ultimately vanish one day.

I say sell your cd players and embrace the future of things to come. Don't do the digital "comb over".
devilboy
Devilboy, what can I say that hasn't already been said here. Every once in a while, I come across someone who pangs to put the last nail in the coffin of CD. Perhaps there is a Technical advantage to Hard Drive Music Storage. The Technology is not the problem, it is the abysmal attitude by Computer Manufacturers towards anything High End with Computer Music Storage. In their own words, "The Computer was NEVER REALLY DESIGNED for Music Storage"! So, how long do we have to wait before someone actually DESIGNS a Computer for Music Storage? Forever? Go into Best Buy and talk to Geek Squad about High Definition Multi-Channel Music Storage. WHAT'S THAT? Hey Pal, it's just what you see! So long as I am hearing THAT, I am going to hold on to my CD Player like the only High Fidelity Life Preserver left on the Planet! Put the final nail in the Coffin of CD? What part of, "YOU ARE NOT READY!", don't you understand? Your Computer Industry is in COMPLETE DENIAL that High End Audio even exists in todays market. I presume that you are an Audiophile, Devilboy, why do you support an Industry that says you as an Audiophile don't exist? You are going to trust this Industry to control any future Standard of Sound Quality? They don't even know what Sound Quality is, Hell, they don't even know what an Audiophile is. Don't worry, Devilboy, I still believe you exist even if your Industry doesn't! It maybe small comfort, but it is the best that I can do!
Pettyofficer wrote: "The Computer was NEVER REALLY DESIGNED for Music Storage"
Hmmm, wonder what all of those recording studios that make our music are doing for DAW recording equipment...

;-)
Petty: "The computer was never really designed for music storage". Who cares if the computer wasn't originally DESIGNED for music storage. Who cares if the computer industry is "in complete denial that high end even exists". You ask, "why do you support an industry that says you as audiophiles don't exist". You don't think there are hard drives in recording studios?

Going through the responses, I've noticed that the majority of you have not gone the hard drive route because you don't want to spend the TIME copying your music to a hard drive. That doesn't tell me WHY you think cd players are superior to hard drives. That tells me you are lazy.

Ones and zeros have no memory where they come from, (hard drive or optical disc). What matters is the digital to analog conversion that follows. The cd player is device that has to retreive ones and zeros and then convert them to analog. That's all. A hard drive/dac does the same thing.
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this post falls into the philosophical argument : "a is better than b" .

our hobby is subjective. some people prefer a particular dac in a particular cd player over the latest technology.

it's not logic or mathematics, its taste.

there were some older players that were pretty good--perhaps some preferable over today's technology, e.g., older wadia, cal and forsell.