Used Rega Planet or Apollo vs. affordable PC audio

Robr45, alot of people say physical media is dead, and that is an interesting issue. Many people think physical media will never die, because of the pyschology of wanting to own something. People will still want to own copies of their favorite recordings, books, what have you. This is still true of many of the younger generation as well. It will be interesting to see what happens in the future.

Learsfool has a point. I know audiophiles who prefer CDs and vinyl just because of the media aspect - handing the case/cover, seeing the cover art, the liner notes, etc. I am not one of these types of folks. We have two diametrically opposite opinions in this thread, I wonder if anyone else will come in and clarify one side or another.
I doubt I will purchase a single-CD player, my listening habits just don't support the single-disc thing.

FWIW, a friend of mine from school who used to be an executive for a couple of different record labels is definitely of the opinion that physical media will never die, and he says that this is the prevailing opinion by far in the industry. The psychology of it is the main reason for him too, but there are also the myriad complications of digital rights issues, which are not even close to being solved satisfactorily yet, and those will obviously have to be solved before any kind of huge change happens. That has been and will continue to be a very long process, no matter how quickly technology advances.

Physical media is dying- I don't think there is any question. And I argue the point that the younger generation still wants something they can hold. I am fairly young and I don't even see hints of this! Next step is local storage in my opinion. The idea that you have to store content on one device and it isn't available everywhere is already antiquated. You will simply stream everything from a cloud to any device you own.

The above can be argued- but even so I just can't see going out and buying a single cd player for big money in this day and age. Especially considering how unbelievably good 24 bit material sounds on a pc/mac.

Really? An ex record exec said that discs will never die? Imagine that. ;-)

Look at your VHS movie collection. Look at Netflix plans (and actions).

There's no denying that the future is in file-based media...it's only a question of where you want to be in the adoption curve. For some of us it's now; for others it's never. YMMV.

And x2 the observation that if you're a changer kind of guy, file-based music is a neverending party.