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Which old disc?, the silver disc! After listening to my new Ipad through my main system, I doubt I will buy many more cd's. The sound was identical to my best CD player and so much more convenient. It's vinyl and computer digital for me. Vinyl still seems more 3 dimensional somehow.
"When the demon is at your door, in the mornin' it won't be there no more"
Steely Dan
Follow Ups:
If you are using the mini audio output jack on your iPad, and finding that the sound is as good as your CDP, you are telling us more about the quality of your system than anything else. While an iPad or iPod is amazingly good, it is nowhere near what you should get from a quality CDP, or from hi-rez iTunes files fed through a quality outboard DAC. Of course, I am assuming you rip your CD's using at least the loss-less format (128kpps just doesn't cut it.)
I use a Mac Mini (late 2009 edition) connected to a Apogee Duet (version 1, via FireWire port) connected via HDMI to a 42' flat screen TV for digital for the following reasons:
1. When I do get my external RAID case, I will not have to worry about losing any files. If the hard drive dies, the backup drive will 'kick-in' and then I can just put another one in and things 'copy' again.
2. I have a feeling that, like we do now in vinyl, CD's will be worth something in the future. I like the idea of having 'like new' copies of all my discs as I only have to have them physically 'read' to the drive once, then I can 'pack them up' for safekeeping.
3. ITunes makes a wonderful disc cover display on the screen in fullscreen playback.
4. In the computer realm; it's much "cheaper" to upgrade in the future to higher-resolution than in the "component" world.
5. The other "Mac" music server (as my amp chain is McIntosh...pun was intended when building this system up) is $2000.....and no way to recover if the hard drive dies......NOPE!!
Marty N.
I hooked up my PC to my big rig lately using a Tascam US122L external USB DAC. I used a decent IC, VandenHul. 320 Kbps MP3 was no match for my 25 year old Sony CDP. FLACs were a leap forward though. When high res digital downloads become available the old CD could become obsolete.
"The torture never stops"Greetings Freek.
"I hooked up my PC to my big rig lately using a Tascam US122L external USB DAC...... 320 Kbps MP3 was no match for my 25 year old Sony CDP."
Of course! Try lossless WAV or AIFF file. No one here takes the lossy MP3 format seriously.
"FLACs were a leap forward though."
That could be true but it also depends on the source. In other words, was the FLAC file created from a CD or a higher resolution source?
It's easy to match or exceed the performance of a CD player with a music server but using an MP3 file is not a good comparison.
Most folks around here who set up music servers do not run lossy MP3 files but rather lossless uncompressed formats like WAV or AIFF. For compressed but still lossless formats, many use FLAC or Apple Lossless.
AND.... most of us use our own CD's as the minimum starting point to create our music files in the formats listed above. At this point a properly set up music server and DAC will often be on par or possibly better sounding than a CD player.
My music server, DAC, and AIFF music files sound as good as my $6000 Accuphase CD player, and it's far more convenient to use.
With even higher quality downloads or music files created from one's own vinyl, a music server can far exceed the audio quality from just about any CD player.
My Mac Mini music server & W4S DAC2 setup
I concur that the quality of digital music that's been stored and 'played' from computer files is certainly equal to CD playback. The quality of the software players, DAC's and the like are the subject of hot debate in the PC Audio Asylum, but the overwhelming limiting factor affecting sound quality is, IMO, the medium itself. Vinyl always seems to have more to get out of the grooves, i.e. the marginal improvement for better turntables, carts etc. yields a better payback. Once you get the bits (from whatever source) you're pretty much done. Remember the prophetic sleeve blurb "Records are your best entertainment value!"
There are many sites selling MP3's- Amazon, Rhapsody, eMusic, etc. but the list of etailers selling Redbook CD quality 16/44.1 (or better) downloads seems pretty sparse. I'd like to hear some reccommendations for *digital* sources from the vinyl guys!
This lifelong vinyl and tape (analog) guy is really, really liking his Tascam DV-RA1000HD. I don't know if that qualifies as a source; but, 24/192 is !DANG! close to the input signal when recording from tape or vinyl. (I would imagine double-rate DSD is, too, and maybe smoother.) It leaves 16/44 in the dust. Whenever we get to 24/384 or the DSD equivalent, I doubt I'll be able to tell a difference anymore, at all.
I'm a music whore, so I'll take it any way I can get it. ;-) And, that includes CD's. However, if I never had to buy music on CD (distributed at 16/44 or lower) again, ever in my life, that would be just fine with me as long as I could still get vinyl, tape or high res files or even high res digital pressed on vinyl or recorded to tape.
I think with the right files, and DAC, and low jitter interfaces, digital playback can hold its own vs Vinyl.
"Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is knowing not to put it in a fruit salad"
...because I have made high quality copies of LPs on CDs and then downloaded them to files. Listening to all 3 critically, the digital versions definitely do 'hold their own' versus the LP. The differences in the sound of the LP are subtle, but I preferred the LP sound in my nonscientific experiment.
By faaaaar the biggest contribution to an enjoyable musical experience in my home is the quality of the performance and the love that went into the recording. Unfortunately many LPs are pretty bad-sounding, same as CDs. In my testing, I used really good sounding LP's, which of course prejudiced the experiment.
Sure, it's possible to make some amazing transfers from LP to digital--not necessarily at CD resolution, though. Generally 96 kHz or better at 24 bits resolution will sound pretty much indistinguishable from the LP, as long as all the equipment involved and the recordist's technique are up to it.
Two relevant perspectves:1. Digital (download) revenue outstrips physical in UK . (Billboard)
2. How vinyl and iPods ganged up to kill the audio CD . (Music Think Tank)Cheers!
Edits: 05/31/12
The study linked below, referred to in the "How vinyl and iPods ganged up to kill the audio CD" article, says basically that people today are keeping and playing CDs and listening to them regularly (at a 10:1 ratio versus vinyl in Scandanavia anyway). The participants in the study feel in 2-4 years they will be obtaining music from downloads at a ratio of 10:1 versus CDs. Odd...
It suggests to me that there will be an avalance effect at the time the major labels stop stamping CDs, much like the way vinyl exited the ordinary consumer's life in the mid-80's and ended up at Goodwill en masse. Ultimate Guitar e-zine says "A music industry insider says that the CD format will be killed off next year [2012] to make way for digital-only music sales." -- "Make way?" Yes, the music business marketing model only has room for one principal medium.
This avalance IMO is triggered by a shift in "consumer confidence" on the part of non-audiophile folks. To market downloads and media streamer technology as the cool hip frontier, the hype will be that CDs are a thing of the past-- there won't be any more and we have to get rid of that old junk.
My problem with eliminating CDs is this: How do we bands push music to radio stations, reviewers, etc?
Tell them to download your stuff and they'll just say, "why?", if they say anything at all.
Mush
Does the average radio station play music anymore?
In all honesty, I never listen to mainstream radio (except NPR) so when it came time, I contacted internet radio stations. They always preferred that I email them .mp3's.
Top 40 styled stations will roll only a limited catalogue of music. They are TOP 40 style stations and generally only the latest flavour of music will be played. Most of these stations do not feature DJ's much if at all anymore. They are computer programmed and one can easily tell so by the lack of any human interactivity between songs and before/after commercial breaks. These stations are IMO killing themselves off as they have taken much of the human out of radio.
Classic rock, Jazz, Classical, Alternative music radio will have often much wider catalogues of music and often will feature real DJ's and the life/interaction these DJ's bring to radio listening. Many of these but not all FM stereo stations will still try to deliver good to great audio quality.
FM stereo if managed properly can deliver very fine audio quality especially if the listener has a good tuner and antenna set up.
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