Not the ES but still expensive ($900ish) and built like a TANK.
Posted on 07/09/2022 10:14:03 PM PDT by DallasBiff
When the first compact discs arrived on the Australian market in 1983, they ranged in price from $900-$1800. The price didn’t hold back the rapid adoption of the technology
(Excerpt) Read more at youtube.com ...
I have many digital music files on my cell phone that I play while driving around. Better selection then the radio offers.
Over 2,500 titles on my computer. I had long ago made copies of the cd music I bought so long ago to my computer then have used Youtube and other sources for my music.
Quality varies.....
I burned 2 dvd’s just yesterday for a backup of software files for a new graphics card I got. I had to download the nearly 700mb file. Best to have a convenient copy. The newer usb flash drives have no room on them to list the contents.
...or admire the artwork on an album cover.
Very rich guy down the street had a disc player flown over from Japan on a courier’s lap. Supposedly the first player in the states. That Christmas he gave a player to each of his kids, along with just about every available classical music title — only about a shelf-foot’s worth.
Not the ES but still expensive ($900ish) and built like a TANK.
Yeah you are correct, but I never understood the album cover from the 1977 Rolling Stones live album.
Smell the Glove?
Whose Glove?
Adjust the EQ. 2100 albums, and counting, fit in my pocket. Used CDs are 25 cents to a buck. Old, nasty, dusty, dirty and scratched LPs are what, $8 and above? And, to get the whole LP experience they have to be flipped over? Nah, moved on to CDs many moons ago.
The players cost that much in 1983-84, 900 to 1800...the discs were 12.50 to 30 dollars or so in 1983 dollars. Expensive to be sure. By 1985 I got a magnavox brand player for 100 dollars from Service Merchandise...the prices went down fast. The compact discs had moderated in price to where vinyl records had been in 1978 while vinyl dropped in price and quality compared to their cd cousins. I still have my first discs...my telarc sampler discs and a sampler from The Digital Domain sound and video works(still an active effects company for films).
I saw one that didn’t have auto-reverse on the cassettes. When it got to one end the tape assembly would eject, flip around, re-insert and play the other side. It was very cool to see.
I had been at Spangdahlem Air Base just a day (June 1984) or so and saw someone carrying one in his hands. I asked about it and immediately bought a stereo system that included a CD player. Some of my friends in the dorm would occasionally play frisbee in the hall with a CD. Cool times!!
I don’t think they put CD players in the new cars anymore. My 2019 and 2022 jeeps don’t have one.
I hate record surface noise, crackles and the ear fatigue that the low and sub bass rumble in the disc and platter (and perhaps a slight warp in the record) cause when listening over an hour or so. Records have a practical dynamic range of 60 to 70 db which drops to 40 to 50 db at the end of the tracks(the center of the record) because the grooves have to be cut and squeezed to accommodate at least 30 minutes to a side on your average long play 33.3 rpm records(record track velocity is slower in the center and faster at the edges so the tracks have to be cut with that in mind and the frequency spectra altered). I often find that the bass at the end of the record has been filtered and the music bright and tinny because reducing the bass decreases the width of the swing of the track and allows more time/music. The Needle and cartridge allows generally 30 to 40 db of stereo separation but a lot of channel cross talk occurs with l-r and r-l mono mixing in both channels. This mixing often causes a pleasant sense of warmer ambiance that sounds pleasant and more enveloping with two speakers but this may not have been the original intent of the producers. That l-r and r-l audio mixing during the stereo signal extraction process and the narrow dynamic range can sound easier and more mellow on some ears and allows a consistent volume to be set without having to constantly jump up to turn the volume up or down. The records scratch easily. It used to be the practice of many record owners like myself to record the first pass of a record onto high quality cassette tape on a middle of the road to high end cassette deck with dolbHX, Dolby C, or DBX(the best noise reduction for tapes but came late as did dolby c). The tapes by then could withstand hundreds of plays without too much loss in fidelity while the record could be stored and protected. The cassette heads had the same sorts of pleasant sounding crosstalk despite their excellent stereo separation since it recorded the record from the signal from the needle and cartridge. Now I think a lot of analog sourced music recorded directly to digital( tube powered audio pre-amps and such like it or analog tape then to digital media) can sound really wonderful or digital music played thru tube amplifiers. The digital recording of analog sources also allow for the lifting of the dynamic range restrictions that have to be imposed on vinyl records especially for wide range orchestral music. Obviously pop, rock, and folk music are generally recorded in a more restricted range anyway. Records generally sound better with a two speaker set up or a 4 speaker set up with the rear speakers wired in a hafler circuit to take more advantage of the l-r and r-l ambiance locked in the discs. Records played through more modern 5.1 surround systems can be a mixed bag and their recording imperfections show up almost immediately depending on the various matrix surround modes one may use, specific to the brand of receiver to play the record back. Best surround modes to my ears to use are the dolby prologic surround modes found in most modern multichannel receivers with the subwoofer set to process all the low bass. Avoid special artificial cinema modes or stadium effects though height effects channels with dolby prologic can sound pretty decent when playing records. Neural X does well will processed pop vinyl. The main drawback with multichannel play back of records is that record noise and sub bass rumble is that it is all magnified in all 5 to 7 to 9 channels depending on the size of your reciever. Instruments and voices can come from odd directions and mono narrations can sound like they are coming from one side of the room(front and back!) and not the center.(especially older records) Heavily multimixed and multitracked stereo records can behave unpredictably though old matrix quad records often sound great...especially in Prologic..since they were mixed to play well in mono, stereo or in quad.(SQ and QS matrixed records do well... sometimes quite startlingly well)
A better paragraph format.(Don’t know what happened with the previous post)
Like anything else recorded it depends on the engineering and what the individual likes and prefers...even sound techs and audio producers.
I hate record surface noise, crackles and the ear fatigue that the low and sub bass rumble in the disc and platter (and perhaps a slight warp in the record) cause when listening over an hour or so. Records have a practical dynamic range of 60 to 70 db which drops to 40 to 50 db at the end of the tracks(the center of the record) because the grooves have to be cut and squeezed to accommodate at least 30 minutes to a side on your average long play 33.3 rpm records(record track velocity is slower in the center and faster at the edges so the tracks have to be cut with that in mind and the frequency spectra altered). I often find that the bass at the end of the record has been filtered and the music bright and tinny because reducing the bass decreases the width of the swing of the track and allows more time/music. The Needle and cartridge allows generally 30 to 40 db of stereo separation but a lot of channel cross talk occurs with l-r and r-l mono mixing in both channels. This mixing often causes a pleasant sense of warmer ambiance that sounds pleasant and more enveloping with two speakers but this may not have been the original intent of the producers. That l-r and r-l audio mixing during the stereo signal extraction process and the narrow dynamic range can sound easier and more mellow on some ears and allows a consistent volume to be set without having to constantly jump up to turn the volume up or down.
The records scratch easily. It used to be the practice of many record owners like myself to record the first pass of a record onto high quality cassette tape on a middle of the road to high end cassette deck with dolbHX, Dolby C, or DBX(the best noise reduction for tapes but came late as did dolby c). The tapes by then could withstand hundreds of plays without too much loss in fidelity while the record could be stored and protected. The cassette heads had the same sorts of pleasant sounding crosstalk despite their excellent stereo separation since it recorded the record from the signal from the needle and cartridge.
Now I think a lot of analog sourced music recorded directly to digital( tube powered audio pre-amps and such like it or analog tape then to digital media) can sound really wonderful or digital music played thru tube amplifiers. The digital recording of analog sources also allow for the lifting of the dynamic range restrictions that have to be imposed on vinyl records especially for wide range orchestral music. Obviously pop, rock, and folk music are generally recorded in a more restricted range anyway.
Records generally sound better with a two speaker set up or a 4 speaker set up with the rear speakers wired in a hafler circuit to take more advantage of the l-r and r-l ambiance locked in the discs.
Records played through more modern 5.1 surround systems can be a mixed bag and their recording imperfections show up almost immediately depending on the various matrix surround modes one may use, specific to the brand of receiver to play the record back. Best surround modes to my ears to use are the dolby prologic surround modes found in most modern multichannel receivers with the subwoofer set to process all the low bass.
Avoid special artificial cinema modes or stadium effects for records though height effects channels with dolby prologic can sound pretty decent when playing records. Neural X does well will processed pop vinyl. The main drawback with multichannel play back of records is that record noise and sub bass rumble is that, it is all magnified in all 5 to 7 to 9 channels depending on the size of your reciever.
Instruments and voices can come from odd directions and mono narrations can sound like they are coming from one side of the room(front and back!) and not the center.(especially older records) Heavily multimixed and multitracked stereo records can behave unpredictably though old matrix quad records often sound great...especially in Prologic..since they were mixed to play well in mono, stereo or in quad.(SQ and QS matrixed records do well... sometimes quite startlingly well)
Now I use a TV to stream Amazon and Spotify to a Kenwood KA-75 and Vandersteen 1C’s.
We agree. I love my cds. If I could find some one to set up my audio
Awesome analysis.
That "warmer ambiance" is one of the things I love about vinyl, but nice to know its true origins - thanks!
Went from 8track to cassettes…. Had albums all along. Then came CD and then streaming. To me the worst thing about cd’s was remastering. A lot of the re-mixes were not as good as the originals. Agree vinyl sound is better and 12 album covers etc. I still have a brand new unopened techniques turntable. Have a recording studio and recorded several local artists and my own band… producing cd’s.
But you know…. I give Apple 9.99 a month and have access to 50 million songs. Can Bluetooth play them through surround sound system…. Or Bluetooth into my recording studio if I want, or through my truck audio system. I mean it doesn’t sound like an album but it has a lot of value….
Still playing my 78s on my 1917 Victor VV-IV...
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