"D.M. Procida" wrote in
message
...
Arny Krueger wrote:

Can you tell me (without informing me that I'm a lying, hating Luddite)
why you think that it's not true that most people are not very bothered
about sound quality?

One very big reason is that since CD's became popular and widely
available,
music lovers were no longer limited to the problematical sound quality of
vinyl LPs and analog tape. Sound quality at previously unobtainable
levels
became common and cheap for consumers.

No, that is an *assertion* that CD succeeded as a medium chiefly because
of its superior sound quality. I'm aware you think that. I was asking
*why* you think that.

I've got ears and 37 years of experience listening to LPs and analog tape
because there was no viable option.

Not only that, but I was around to see how high end audio dealers and
ragazines fabricated the myth of LP sonic superiority let alone parity, and
CD acceptance based primarily on convenience.

I think that CD succeeded mostly because CDs were more convenient than
the existing alternatives: easier to store, play and look after, more
durable, and so on.

OK, so you bought the myth.

I don't think that they succeeded because of superior sound quality,

Yet, that is their most obvious attribute.

because all the evidence is that before and since the advent of CD the
vast majority of people are quite evidently happy listening to
appalling-reproduced sound, whether it's coming from over-driven PA
systems, badly-tuned radios, scratched records and rubbishy record
players, warbling cassettes or hideously-compressed MP3 files.


Your account of the evidence leaves a lot to be desired.

Here's what really happened:

Prior to the advent of the CD, just about everybody tolerated listening to
appalling-reproduced sound, whether it's coming from over-driven PA systems,
badly-tuned radios, scratched records and rubbishy record
players, and/or warbling cassettes.

Even those of us who knew better and had better, were still inhabitants of
the real world, and that was how things were and are. Much of the time the
sound quality that we suffer with is way outside of our control.

The CD made two important changes. They have pretty well banished rubbishy
record players, and/or warbling cassettes. We're still often stuck with
appalling sound from those other sources.

CDs also raised the bar on recorded sound. Before the CD you were stuck with
all of the well known sonic failings of LPs and analog tapes, even when
played on the finest players around. Now we aren't.

Life has even changed life inside cheap music players. Inside each and every
one of them, there is generally a really y good analog music signal at the
inputs to their amplifiers. Better than that from any LP or analog tape,
given a good recording. That's why transports designed for boom boxes can
end up in $3,000 CD players. After that, it may be downhill fast. But you
can't blame that on the CD.

CDs didn't help the crappy speakers and amps on many boom boxes, cheap table
stereos, and poor PA systems. CDs did not tune the badly-tuned radios. It
would be unreasonable to expect that they would.