After having been a vivid collector of CDs back in the days (I sold all of them some 15 years ago…), I started collecting vinyl and depend on streaming services ever since. Currently, I make use of a Quobuz subscription and Roon to manage my library which also includes various high-res downloads stored locally (with backups in the cloud).
But I miss physical media, and vinyl doesn’t cut it for me. Don’t get me wrong, nothing beats listening to a good record with a dram of Scotch, but quality wise, it’s nowhere near digital sources, at least not within any reasonable price point.
Where to go from here? Paying for high-res downloads I often can stream at the same time feels strangely unsatisfying, while falling back to CDs might be an option, but leaves out higher quality tiers. Physical alternatives such as HDCD, SACD or DVD-Audio seem more or less a niche for enthusiasts of classical music (if not dead), with a very limited catalogue.
Can some of you share my feelings? How do you deal with it?
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I run a podcast out of a night club, I almost always buy vinyl at shows and have the band sign it. every now and again buy on discogs or at a record store.
Like most man my age I buy vinyl so that they can collect dust while I stream the music…
Been reading that the best version of a song consistently is the Atmos track down mixed to 2 channel. I think there is a guy on this subreddit reviewing all the versions of a song (cd, vinyl, cd and stream) or albums.
One way to improve vinyl is a good phono preamp. Look around the used market for older top of line models. I got my slightly older $3000 original priced model for $500 used. The quietness is noticeable improvement. Still the same pops but all of a sudden my records sound like a digital version with all the magic of records retained.
CDs and cassettes from charity shops. You can pick up his quality cassette decks for bugger all.
Every time I start getting nostalgic about getting back into vinyl, I just look at the prices of records I actually want to buy, then I go back to my Spotify.
I buy vinyl (even stuff released today) because having the music on a physical media with a nice cover gives more quality and value to it. I don’t believe in the superiority of vinyl as a medium, but I always found it fascinating.
Vinyl.
I buy the odd CD if I can’t obtain the music in lossless file format, and failing that a vinyl to rip.
Mostly thrift store CDs and audiophile releases on SACD.
SSDs and M.2’s, they all hold my FLACs nicely.
New record releases are just compressed, equalized noisy copies of digital recordings so they are indeed lower quality. Perhaps playing pure analog records on a better record player and phono amp might sound better to you, but maybe not. I like the album covers too. There’s always the silly case that if electricity ever becomes unavailable, an old victrola could still play your music.
I had a pretty complete collection of classic rock SACD, DVD-A and Pure Audio Blu-Rays that I ripped and sold off. I miss having them though. Not because I played the discs. But I enjoyed having them. The only CDs I miss are Radiohead, since the master isn’t analog or high sample rate so they are the best sound and my MoFi A Day at the Races because I like that mix.
I listen to SACD, DVDA, BluRay Audio and ATMOS recordings (on the latter format). Unfortunately, the latter is expensive as they force you to buy box sets and the overall selection is limited. Fortunately, my favorite bands are represented well in these formats (Pink Floyd, Rush, Moody Blues - I’m a classic rock guy) but I lament the paltry selection. They sound WAY better than what I get from Amazon music though - especially the ATMOS recordings. Also, I hate perpetually renting my music. It’s like Columbia House back in the day where they send you an album once a month for $10-$12 - in 1980’s $ - but you have no return option and you don’t “own” what you paid for.
Still get CDs, Vinyl, and Blu-Ray, but pretty selective about it. Typically for music, it’s re-issues or if I really dig an album from Apple Music and think I want a higher quality version, I’ll get the CD (albeit that’s increasingly getting harder to do, a la “New Blue Sun” by Andre 3000 is streaming and vinyl only).
For movies, it’s pretty much movies that I think are essential to own personally. Like 2 weeks ago, bought “Trading Places”, “Tropic Thunder”, and “Across the Universe”.
I stream. I know I’m losing quality but I use Spotify connect straight to my receiver. I like streaming because I find it’s a good value for my money. I listen to at least half a dozen new artists (new to me at least) each month and it allows me to be adventurous with my taste while not having to waste money on CDs that I only want for a few songs. I’ve never had any issues with losing access to artists with the exception of Neil Young.
I have almost 800 records at this point, I hate the idea of renting streaming music in perpetuity. I also built an endgame turntable to get my records to sound as good of not better than any other source format I’ve tried. I’m content with my system as it sits, so now I just add records to the collection and worry about where the hell I’m going to fit more shelves. 😉