Category: Jam Session
http://www.cnn.com/2013/09/27/tech/innovation/death-stereo-system/index.html
i still believe in listening to audio on a home stereo system.
what do you all think? i'd be especially interested in what the younger croud thinks, as i think that people who are under 20 may not even know about systems that have everything as a seprit piece.
I believe people who are 20 and up probably have seen it at the very least.
receivers that you have a seprit tuner, CD player, turntable, cassette dek, etc.
I still have one of the bi bi big CD players hooked up to mine, that i got in 1992.
Cassette deck? You gotta be fucking kidding. I wouldn't mind having a big ass stereo however. Mine bit the dust a few years ago, so I just got bigger computer speakers. With winamp, and some DSP equalization and compression plug ins I'm pretty satisfied, but Iif I had the opportunity to get a new stereo I probably would. I would run music from the computer through it. I consider my CDs just a backup archive at this point. I'll keep them, but they're all ripped to my external hard drive.
I've stowed this away in the garage, but I've got a nice little Panasonic stereo with a single cassette deck, a digitally tuned AM/FM radio, and a CD player capable of playing MP3 CDs as well as standard ones. I only moved it out there due to space considerations because I wanted room for my new HD radio. The stereo is not anything huge or powerful but it serves my needs well.
Mine was a panasonic also. Two decks, five disc changer, radio, and RCA inputs and outputs.
I like panasonic, but i'm talking about something like a receiver, that has other stuff hooked up. mine has a denone dual cassette deck, panasonic CD Player, Techniqs turntable, Yamaha Tuner, etc. I still buy CD's and use cassette often.
Hi John,
I've never really had a multi-piece stereo system, though I have had several all-in-ones as others have. I suspect the quality is significantly better if you have separates made up of high end components, but there's little point in me having one as I listen to more spoken word than music and our apartment doesn't really lend itself to a powerful stereo system unless I want to do some serious damage to my ears and take advantage of it through headphones.
I think the quality debate is interesting. Even with the best components, I know many people who swear by vinyl over CDs.
vinyl rules! that is if its kept in good shape and played on a good system.
I had a component system for a long time growing up, but once I got a computer, All I ever used was the line in, and iTunes or winamp pushing music to it.
Now, its all about using air play. Its just so much more convenient than screwing around with switching out CDs. Even if I lose a bit on the quality end.
I wouldn't mind a receiver, I just wouldn't add any other stuff. I have some really long RCA cables that could run from the computer to the stereo.
I miss my big ole component system. I love the convenience of Bluetooth, computers, IPhones, etc, but nothing beats those big ginormous tower speakers when it comes to shaking the walls.
I live in an apartment with thin floorboards and walls so those aren't really a good idea.
i have two bookshelf speakers and a sub woofer.
qualety isnt what matters today, its quantidy that does.
Sad.
Bookshelf? so it's like a boombox?
i mean two speakers that sit on stands, that are hooked to my L/R and a sub woopher that is a mono woopher.
i've been doing my research. new cassette decks that are of any qualety are impossibel to find.
what i'd give to own a
ugh for not being able to edit posts...
Well, as technology advances, things get smaller. I guess it's kind of a fact of life. The average person sees no value in a component system when they can have everything they need in the palm of their hand.
Here's an interesting question, though. most people use IPhones nowadays, and those cost around $500, give or take, depending on where you buy it, which carrier you use, etc. Add a little more for an IPad and take away a little bit for an IPod. So, at the lowest, let's say you pay $200 for an IPod, and at the highest, maybe $700 for an IPad. When you think about that, and all the people who try to bludgeon older technologies such as vinyl and cassettes to death, how much more or less, on average, do you suppose people pay for the upkeep of their newer tech as opposed to the older stuff like stereo systems and so on?
probably a lot considering they get new tech toys more often....
or a that's how it seems anyway.
and there's something else.
what they carry around is lossy audio, so they are not getting the full frequency response and stereo seperation.
True, since most of these devices don't have enough memory to contain a bunch of lossless formats like flac or wav. I guess, in theory, you could, if you bought a bunch of sd cards and carried those around with you, but I've never actually heard of anyone doing that. that's not to say it never happens, though.
well when i cant find CD players anymore, that is an option i'll consider.
i expect lossless audio from my collection, since the radio compresses the hell outa it anyways.
ya know, its surprising that out of all of the companies that offer digital downloads not one has offered flac or wave file format.
3tb hard drives can be had for as little as $110 that are external. so its not like you couldn't store all of your music. and with services such as crash plann to back it all up, you wont lose it either.
Music sounds like shit on a phone, or any other mobile device.
so for those of you who carry mp3 devices around or your phone for music, why do you settle (im my opinion)for such shitty audio?
why do you stream (in my opinion) horible audio from services such as satelite? i cant stand the qualety of serius-XM (from either service!)
hell, mp3's sound better than serius-Xm and tha'ts sayin something.
HD radio, providing the stations straem no more than 2 streams on their main signal sound better than serius XM.
Analog AM and Fm sound the best though for radio IMO.
Vinyl, cassette and CD can sound excelent as well.
OMG, you're so totally right on the satellite sound. My mom and stepdad have it in their car and truck. The 80's on 8 channel sounds great but the 70's on 7 and 60's on 6 sound absolutely horrid, like a bad Napster download. It literally hurts my ears.
It's been so long since I've listened to music on CD and such I've probably just gotten used to the sound quality. Hmm, Now I'm going to have to dig up an old cd player to compare.
it all sounds like shit on satelite.
take a great sounding 80's song and compare it to a copy of that same son song in even a compressed mp3 format. you'll notice the difference.
first thing you should notice is wider stereo seperation, but you'll notice that even more with older 6's and 70's tunes with wider stereo imaging.
second you'll notice a higher end and on the low end, certain beats and base wont just appear missing for a beatg.
note that this doesn't happen on all songs or all parts of it, but take a dancyer track.
now compare those to a cd. your ears will be blessed!
compare this to vinyl. ah warmths baby! and cassette is nice too
A.M. radio? ugh.
you haven't heard good sounding AM, have you ?
ok, wel tel me what you think of this.
50's-80's Oldies 640 WVLG (Wildwood The Villages, FL) 1-23-2010, 8 00 PM Cafeleen Cain
http://www.sendspace.com/pro/dl/g1cx7x
Ok audio snobs I will answer why to settle on portable things?
You can use the iPod while working out, you can have something playing on your phone while you're running about the house doing things.
You really didn't want to know why, I bet. You simply wanted to give the masses grief for not being the audio elite you all are. lol
Lol in light of recent topics, I should say Audio Bilderberg s or audio illuminati. lol. You all are the audio equivalent of the top one percenters I guess.
lol leo.
Honestly, with a good mp3 converter, you can get some half decent sound out of an iPhone. Sure, its not lossless. But for most things, the jump from 320 K VBR ABR or CBr to .Flac isn't huge, considering most people don't use really nice portable headphones, anyway. Most people can't tell the difference between lossless audio, and 320 K, either. So for most, its a moot point. while I do prefer lossless to a degree, its inconvenient. I have a 64 gb iPhone 5. a good 40 gb of that is music. Several thousand songs. for the relative increase in quality to lossless, I lose a good fraction of music. Even with my higher end IEM's for listening on the go, I don't really feel like i'm missing a lot in quality, if anything, particularly with the way a lot of music is mixed.
Some digital services do support lossless downloads. Places like band camp, and the like that allow indie artists another option to sell their tracks. But, this will never be a common thing with iTunes and amazon, until storage allows people the luxury of caring just as much music in lossless formats as I can carry now. Am I going to want all of that music, every single day? nope. But because I can store a good chunk of my music collection, and get a variety, i'm satisfied. Making the jump to lossless would mean that I can only store about 1/4 of the music I can now, for the same space. Lossless is not 4 times as good as 320 K, IMO. particularly as mobile devices don't have audio circuitry powerful enough to really make that choice the most worth wile.
though I love my music, i'm not going to carry around a headphone amp, and all that, just to go on a run. Plus, lossless formats are not widely compatible with well, anything mainstream consumers use. There are the odd products here and there, but most stuff just isn't designed for it. I can't wirelessly stream anything lossless, because its just to big, and corruptible. You'd either need to cash a large chunk of it, or compress it down for streaming, or use something like 802.11 AC WIFI that is low latency enough to get the job done. Lossless audio tracks are huge. For the setup I have here, that is a killer for me. Again, because lossless is impractical.
To those thinking you spend more to keep your portable devices up to date, You clearly have never done any high end audio shopping.
To get a really respectable system in the audio file world will run you a few thousand easy. If not 10s of thousands. and again, its only on systems like that are you can actually here the difference. I know their will be people here that will say up and down they can here the difference between 320 and lossless on standard audio equipment, but statistically speaking, most of you can't. Scientists have studied this. For the most part, until you step up to quality gear you're a bit full of your own lies.
I need to find a few good audio tests, where everything was encoded properly, and see how people do here.
I suppose the TLDR of this is the following. while I love good audio, the price to pay to really enjoy it both in finances and storage makes this impractical.
I use dynamic range compression plugins which probably mask the shortcomings.
I can almost guarantee I wouldn't know the difference. lol
Stormwing, I do take your point, but what I was getting at is that some people, certainly not all, will buy all 3 of the IDevices. And if you assume that each device has music on it, well, that's over a thousand dollars the person spent right there. Add a protective case, Bluetooth speakers, insurance, and the fact that people don't always take good care of their devices, thus needing to replace them more often than a component system, and you could argue that people will end up paying as much to carry and store their music as they would to get a stereo. For example, people tend to replace their IPhones every year or two, at least, that's how often people I know have done so, and yet my dad has a component system that he's had for over 30 years, and it still works great.
Now, I know that's a bit of a stretch for the average user, but I'm just playing devil's advocate here. I honestly don't have an opinion of which is better than the other. For me, it depends entirely on circumstance. Would I love to have a big ass stereo system? Sure I would. I just don't have the money or space for it right now. But I certainly would like to think about buying one at some point, because I am a vinyl collector, and, while the turntable I have is good enough, it would be nice to get a more high-end one, not to mention having large speakers, maybe even surround sound, to really enjoy the full experience. But I also have a huge digital library of music, somewhere around 3tb, in fact, and I can assure you that I would never think of trying to store that in lossless format. Plus, no one is really going to have that much music in a physical format--you would need a warehouse to store it all. So, for me, the answer is having a bit of both. I know some people will swear up and down that digital is the way to go, or to completely forsake the digital mediums altogether, but I don't feel that way. Both have something to offer. This article that sparked the discussion is another nail in the coffin of analog devices, ensuring that future generations have even more of a reason to scoff at them. But, honestly, anyone who lives in the 21st century saw that coming anyway.
for the record i do have both digital mp3's and still by cd's, vinyl and cassettes too.
usually for the mp3, its a one song off one album deal, with cd's and other formats, i like ehe entire album.
I forget what kind mine was but it was a home theater with a sixty--disk changer. Regretably it died a few years back.
The last time I had any semblance of a stereo soundsystem (not just speakers) was in 2009. I think it was just a Phillips minny hifi system, with an A.M/FM radio, cassette deck and single CD tray. While I'm not the biggest of techies, I am all about the experience and absorbtion of an album. There is definitely something to be said for phizically putting a CD in to a machine and deving into that world alone, without the easy option of just hitting shuffle and moving on to something else. Each album is more of an individual discovery that way, because there is more of a commitment factor involved with putting it on in the first place. As I write this post, I'm suddernly realising how incredibly lazy, I, or we as a human race, have become. I now have a pair of wonderful KRK P8G2 bookshelf speakers, which sit on my draws, and go out to my laptop/any other device via a quarter inch to 3.5 mill stereo jack. I can see myself keeping them for many years to come, because they've served me so well over the past year. They're so powerful, I don't even need to pair them up with a sub.
If I have anything to say about it I always plan to have an actual stereo in whatever garden spot I call home, just as I plan to always have a TV and DVD player. I love my IPod but I agree there's nothing quite like putting a physical CD or DVD into the player and listening to it that way.
nothin like putting a piece of vinyl on the turntable and hearing the warmth either.
I'd get a turntable if I had the space and the money. Some of the stuff I want never came out on CD.
Damn straight.
I might also get a turntable if I had the space and money. TenI could get a copy of the old Beatle Barkers album we used to have.LOL.