Both. My 2001 car is dual: Both CD and cassette player.

Little column A, little column B

Long ago Did rip songs from CD's I have, new purchases are digital since new vehicles we have do not have CD players and haven't bought a CD in many years.

All music I have is on the iPhone, making it easily portable and I always have the phone with me, motorcycle or car or working in yard etc.

Theres really no difference in sound quality from a CD to a digital purchase, the only advantage imo of the CD is if you lose your data files of music you could rip it again, but that's what backups are for....

quote:

Originally posted by Black92LX:
I buy CDs rip them in to the FLAC format so there is no quality loss.
They are then available on my Plex server and available on all my devices. It does not take any storage on my phone (aside from having the Plex app installed) and I don’t have to worry about loosing quality either.

Many music downloads are not full audio quality.
Mp3 specifically is complete crap in regard to audio quality.

I do the same except my Server is a DLNA Server on my NAS.

You definitely can download High Quality music ~ I will do so usually when the quality is better than CD.
CDs are 16-bit/44khz and many DL's are 24-bit and oversampled up to 192khz
I do both also subscribe to Quobuz where I can stream HiRes Audio which is helpful if I don't want to buy yet.
You can also buy there too, also use HDTracks to buy on occasion.

I buy CDs, never digital files online, I own maybe 1200 discs. For a number of years, I have been buying maybe 2-3 discs per month, but lately, easily half dozen. I have a vinyl collection of about 8 feet of albums, all purchased in the 70s and 80s, and a high-end audiophile grade turntable I bought in the late 80s, along with a record cleaning machine. I don't stream, don't subscribe to Spotify or any of that. I have ripped many of my CDs into FLAC files and have them in a dedicated PC laptop that feeds a DAC unit into my house sound system, piping music into most of the rooms. I also play CDs and vinyl albums on a specific sound system for serious listening.

I prefer CDs and don't down load anything. I'm old school and want to own my own stuff; not be at the mercy of some company or organization in a 'cloud' deciding what I can and cannot listen to. Just look at what the Left has begun to do to children's books; rewriting and editing. Do you think it won't be long before they do the same to music?
I don't want compressed files, either.
I say buy all the hard copies (CDs) you can now, as I suspect they will disappear sooner than later; they can't be as 'controlled' as down loads.

quote:

Originally posted by Sacramento Johnson:
I prefer CDs and don't down load anything. I'm old school and want to own my own stuff; not be at the mercy of some company or organization in a 'cloud' deciding what I can and cannot listen to. Just look at what the Left has begun to do to children's books; rewriting and editing. Do you think it won't be long before they do the same to music?
I don't want compressed files, either.
I say buy all the hard copies (CDs) you can now, as I suspect they will disappear sooner than later; they can't be as 'controlled' as down loads.

These are the exact reasons why I buy CD's as well.

.

quote:

Originally posted by oddball:
I buy CDs, never digital files online, I own maybe 1200 discs. For a number of years, I have been buying maybe 2-3 discs per month, but lately, easily half dozen. I have a vinyl collection of about 8 feet of albums, all purchased in the 70s and 80s, and a high-end audiophile grade turntable I bought in the late 80s, along with a record cleaning machine. I don't stream, don't subscribe to Spotify or any of that. I have ripped many of my CDs into FLAC files and have them in a dedicated PC laptop that feeds a DAC unit into my house sound system, piping music into most of the rooms. I also play CDs and vinyl albums on a specific sound system for serious listening.

I think you're my hero, oddball!

quote:

Originally posted by maxxpower:

quote:

Originally posted by Sacramento Johnson:
I prefer CDs and don't down load anything. I'm old school and want to own my own stuff; not be at the mercy of some company or organization in a 'cloud' deciding what I can and cannot listen to. Just look at what the Left has begun to do to children's books; rewriting and editing. Do you think it won't be long before they do the same to music?
I don't want compressed files, either.
I say buy all the hard copies (CDs) you can now, as I suspect they will disappear sooner than later; they can't be as 'controlled' as down loads.

These are the exact reasons why I buy CD's as well.

.

Streaming services are not the only online option.

There are plenty of online music vendors offering digital downloads that are completely copy-protection-free, not tied to any service, and that you can save and back up wherever and however you want. It's functionally equivalent to buying a CD, ripping the CD, and throwing the CD away.

Virtually all of them offer uncompressed (or losslessly-compressed, which does not impact sound quality) CD-quality audio.

Many of them offer uncompressed higher-than-CD-quality audio. I've used HDTracks for this a bunch.

You do know if you download and buy the music, you still own it?

You can always burn to CD to play in those devices.

Just don't initially acquire in the shitty MP3 format.

Any hints on how to use a NAS as music source for phone and Apple TV? If it sounds easy for me to do, I’ll buy a NAS.

quote:

Originally posted by konata88:
Any hints on how to use a NAS as music source for phone and Apple TV? If it sounds easy for me to do, I’ll buy a NAS.

Setup a Plex Media server. Though unless you just want a NAS you can just use an old PC or Mac you have.
I have an 8TB (for now) drive that holds all my audio and video.
Setup Plex Media server on the PC that runs my cameras.
So my only cost was the HD and subscription to Plex.

quote:

Plex Media server

Thanks. I'll look into Plex (never heard of it before).

I thought NAS was a device I buy - I didn't know a NAS could be an old PC. I'll try to research that. Not sure what it would take to make a PC a NAS device. But still, even if I figure that out, can I play music on the NAS via my apple tv or phone? How does the ATV or phone connect to the NAS? And what app would I use to play the music - apple Music app? Or some other 3rd party app?

I tried looking around ATV/phone Settings and the Music app but couldn't figure out how they would access music on a NAS.

quote:

Originally posted by konata88:

quote:

Plex Media server

Thanks. I'll look into Plex (never heard of it before).

I thought NAS was a device I buy - I didn't know a NAS could be an old PC.

NAS stands for Network Attached Storage and is usually a mini-server-computer running a version of Linux.
Most popular are QNAP, Synology, WD, Asustor, etc.

Yes you can turn a regular computer to do the same function.
Plex will run on multiple platforms including Windows.
Additionally you could install an OS storage software like TruNas but that might require a learning curve.

Most people will just install the Plex App on a traditional NAS or on a Windows Machine.

Also Plex isn't the only media serving software out there but it is fairly decent especially if you want to server video too.

Why buy anything these days?

Just get Spotify or Apple Music and you have access to millions of songs on demand. I was just creating a playlist for vacation and it’s really fun on Spotify the way it takes a few songs you pick and it goes crazy recommending others. Talk about rabbit holes!

My cars, for example, only allows for CDs. My phone can't take CDs. My receiver can use either streaming (ATV) or a CD (blu-ray).

So I can burn a CD after buying music online. Or I can buy the CD and then rip it for use on my phone.

Per the above, sounds like buying CD and then ripping is the way to go.

quote:

Originally posted by konata88:

quote:

Plex Media server

Thanks. I'll look into Plex (never heard of it before).

I thought NAS was a device I buy - I didn't know a NAS could be an old PC. I'll try to research that. Not sure what it would take to make a PC a NAS device. But still, even if I figure that out, can I play music on the NAS via my apple tv or phone? How does the ATV or phone connect to the NAS? And what app would I use to play the music - apple Music app? Or some other 3rd party app?

I tried looking around ATV/phone Settings and the Music app but couldn't figure out how they would access music on a NAS.

NAS and PC/Mac are two separate things. Plex is capable of running on a PC or a NAS.
The easiest was is to take an old PC or even just your current one if you don’t care to leave it on all the time. move your audio/video media to that PC/Mac install the Plex Media Server on that PC/Mac.

Install the Plex App on all your devices. I have the Plex App on my iPhone, iPads, XBOX, Amazon Fire TVs.

That App connects to your media server at the house and streams all your media to the device you want. You can also give other people access if you would like.

If you want full access to your media while off your home network you have to subscribe to PlexPremium which is like $5 a month or $100 for a lifetime. You also gain numerous other perks by going premium.

Quick screen shot of Plex on my iPhone

quote:

Originally posted by PASig:
Why buy anything these days?

Just get Spotify or Apple Music and you have access to millions of songs on demand. I was just creating a playlist for vacation and it’s really fun on Spotify the way it takes a few songs you pick and it goes crazy recommending others. Talk about rabbit holes!

I listen to a lot of music that most streaming services don’t have.

quote:

Originally posted by PASig:
Why buy anything these days?

Well that is a good point but what if you aren't connected at the time or place of choice?

Whether to buy a CD or DL then burn is just a choice that yields the same result.

A streaming service does have it's benefits but is not always the ideal option.
I wouldn't do it at all if I didn't have a High Res option.
I like because you can sample a lot of good old stuff,
Sometimes I buy and sometimes not.

quote:

Originally posted by konata88:
I’ve been curious about the re-popularity of vinyl. I didn’t like vinyl when it was the only thing available. Well other than some form of tape. I’ve loved CDs ever since they became affordable. Why is vinyl popular again?

Because Vinyl SOUNDS BETTER. I was an early adopter of CD's and noticed that after about 10 minutes of listening I would back off on the volume until it was elevator music. Even on an album like Machine Head. When I put on my vinyl version of Machine head the volume kept getting cranked up, until feedback thru the tonearm reared up. Yeah I do have some kick ass amps.

Now for some good news. The Codec used for Apple Music files has a much better sound that CD's. My hunch is that during the conversion process the soundstream is fed thru an digital to analog filtering scheme that smooths the spikes present in a digital file.

CD's were a rather early codec and at the time it was felt that the mass of a moving speaker cone would smooth any digital artifacts. Unfortunately in the real world high end tweeters have very short response times that allows these artifacts to become sort of audible. Basically it's an annoying harshness that becomes fatiguing in time, so you turn the volume down.

CD is over, stream or iTunes. If you're a hound for quality, vinyl but only for music recorded in analog.