Do you still buy CDs? If not, when did you stop buying them?

[52290]

As a classical music fan I buy all my music on CD or SACD. I have several thousand of them and a similar number of LP's and cassette tapes. The latter are all things I have recorded myself off the radio over the years, the most recent being last week.
It's no use me going to HMV, they are useless for classical CD's. I get new issues from Europadisc and obsolete ones off Amazon.
The thing about a CD is that you also get a booklet often giving the words to vocal works, including complete operas, which is important, especially if it is in a foreign language.

 

[pdq]

As a classical music fan I buy all my music on CD or SACD. I have several thousand of them and a similar number of LP's and cassette tapes. The latter are all things I have recorded myself off the radio over the years, the most recent being last week.
It's no use me going to HMV, they are useless for classical CD's. I get new issues from Europadisc and obsolete ones off Amazon.
The thing about a CD is that you also get a booklet often giving the words to vocal works, including complete operas, which is important, especially if it is in a foreign language.

Chandos and Hyperion, amongst others, now offer high definition downloads including the PDF of the booklet. This includes many recordings that are no longer available to purchase as a physical disc.

 

[JohnMcL7]

As a classical music fan I buy all my music on CD or SACD. I have several thousand of them and a similar number of LP's and cassette tapes. The latter are all things I have recorded myself off the radio over the years, the most recent being last week.
It's no use me going to HMV, they are useless for classical CD's. I get new issues from Europadisc and obsolete ones off Amazon.
The thing about a CD is that you also get a booklet often giving the words to vocal works, including complete operas, which is important, especially if it is in a foreign language.

It's increasingly a feature when streaming a track that it will show you the vocals in time with the music as it's playing.

 

[Bevan Price]

I still buy occasional CDs to play in the (2010) car. I can also play them on the computer at home, If I want, but an oldish CD player is a bit temperamental.

To lessen the chance of CD damage, store them away from strong direct sunlight, and avoid damp environments.
Some CDs rely on chemical dyes as part of the data storage mechanism, and these can fade in strong light.

 

[Ashley Hill]

My previous house had some damp issues which led to mould on some CDs. Thankfully BR Speedclean for those that can get it removes it easily. If not try clear alcohol based window spray.

 

[Horizon22]

My old '55 reg car still had a CD player and I was using between 2012-2015. But even then I burnt a few CDs from MP3s I already had and I don't think I've bought a physical CD since about 2010.

 

[zero]

I've never bought a CD in my life, except for blank ones. The last time I did that was in 2006. I still have a laptop which can read and write to CDs/DVDs/blu ray but I haven't used this function for at least 10 years. I do have some of my old backups (from before 2006) on CDs.

 

[Essan]

I don't have a car .....

But I still buy CDs (and DVDs). I prefer to have a physical copy that I actually own and which (in theory) will last my lifetime. Some of which are also now worth a lot more than I paid for them (mainly limited edition box sets).

Over the years I have also downloaded albums, most of which have long since been "lost in the ether" (does iTunes even exist now?) except where I then recorded them onto a CD .....

I regularly play CDs at home. I do sometimes stream music (or videos) on youtube, but rarely use the likes of Spotify. Guess I'm just old fashioned!

 

[61653 HTAFC]

I still buy hard copies of music on CD or vinyl, but nothing like as much as I did when I was in my late teens and early twenties. Just 2-3 a year unless I get lucky in a charity shop and they've just had a load of weird indie/alternative stuff in!

I currently don't have a car, but may be getting back on the road in the not too distant future. Ideally I want something old enough that it doesn't have too much computer nonsense going on, but not so old that it's falling to bits. If it doesn't have a CD player I've got a head unit with CD and 3.5mm aux in, so I'll be fine for tunes.

 

[Herefordian]

Yes. I still buy CDs.

I prefer owning a physical copy of an album to streaming.

I feel I enjoy the music more.

 

[MikeWM]

I do, though not terribly often as by this time in my life I've already bought most of what I'd want to buy, and modern stuff is (in my opinion) more than sufficiently covered by picking up the three Now albums each year.

I rip anything I buy immediately - probably been a few years since I've actually listened direct from the CD - but I keep the disks.

 

[satisnek]

Yes, I still buy them. As far as I'm concerned, if it's not on commercially-produced CD, vinyl or, at a push, Minidisc digitally recorded from CD, then it's ephemeral; it's not in my 'collection'.

 

[SJL2020]

A slight coincidence.

Ever since 2005 there's been a fan petition running to get Neil Young's 1973 album Time Fades Away re-released on vinyl and released for the first time on CD.

Anyway, yesterday he said on his website that he's at last pushing for Reprise Records to re-issue/issue. (TFA has always been something of an unloved child from the point of view of the artist, but it's a fan favourite)

So, depending on the availability of vinyl there should be a release in time for the 50th birthday in October. And it will definitely be one of my CD acquisitions if it happens. There's a few blemishes on my 40+ year old vinyl copy so I'll be buying that as well.

 

[mikeg]

If I purchase music, it will usually be on CD unless it's particularly old/hard to get music that happens to be on vinyl. In particular the earlier masterings on CD tend to be better due to the relative lack of dynamic range compression. Of course were I to rely on streaming when something gets 'remastered' I would likely lose access to the older, better-sounding version. Vinyl is inconvenient and often inferior, streaming relies on the goodwill of the streaming service that I can continue to access more obscure tracks.

CD also has no DRM (unlike many streaming services), no fingerprinting (unlike many downloads) and can be resold should I decide I never want to listen to it again.

I do buy downloads from time to time, though usually this is only where the CD is significantly more expensive, the last thing I paid to download was about five years ago, Big Big Train's English Electric: Full Power. In total I have about 300 CDs and a slgihtly smaller number of vinyl records, about ten albums downloaded. I buy music much less often nowadays as I've got most of the essential 'classics' (for me) already, so will be typically when I discover something new.

 

[3141]

As a classical music fan I buy all my music on CD or SACD. I have several thousand of them and a similar number of LP's and cassette tapes...The thing about a CD is that you also get a booklet often giving the words to vocal works, including complete operas, which is important, especially if it is in a foreign language.

Me too, except that I have much smaller numbers of CDs and LPs. Much of what I listen to isn't available for streaming, and finding a way of saving online music so as to be able to replay it would be complicated and inconvenient. My car (2009) does have a CD player which I occasionally use but on a long journey I make greater use of the radio. So the last time a bought a CD was about six weeks ago.

 

[Jamesrob637]

I have a CD player in my 59 reg and I bought CDs until a couple of years ago.

 

[alex397]

Until quite recently I bought CDs, usually from charity shops, market stalls or Amazon. I liked uploading them to my computer to put on iTunes and then my iPod. I listened to the CDs on my CD player too. I liked owning physical copies of music.

I also used CDs in my car. However, since getting a Bluetooth device that connects my old phone (which now acts like an iPod) to the radio in the car, I just listen to that now.

However, my computer is getting old and slow plus my iPod is getting glitchy. I can’t be bothered to replace them or repair them, so now I just listen to music through Spotify. Also, it’s quite time consuming, and I have less and less free time.
A family member has a subscription to Spotify which I share, so there are no adverts. I like creating my own playlists and also putting songs into a queue like a DJ.

I did start collecting vinyl over recent years. You can still get original copies of vinyl of popular artists at cheap prices. I bought a Bowie album for a few quid recently which I wasn’t expecting. However, my record player has now broken, and new vinyl is very expensive. Hopefully I will try and fix my record player, as I do love playing records, but Spotify is fine for me now. I’ve also discovered BBC Radio 6 Music, which I usually put on in the background - no adverts and plays all the sort of music I enjoy.

 

[PeterY]

I rip anything I buy immediately - probably been a few years since I've actually listened direct from the CD - but I keep the disks.

I've a 55 plate on my car and it still has a cassette player. I've never used it.

I still buy CD's mainly from charity shops nowadays. I think all of a sudden CD's are becoming collectable. I volunteer in a charity shop and we don't get that many CD's being donated now and there's always people looking at them. We get 1000's of DVD's though.

I like the feel of physical media and I own it. CD's have a resale value downloads don't. In my flat I like to see my shelves with CD's on. Also for me, I love the booklets, artwork and lyrics that come with CD's, you don't get that on downloads. I've been buying CD's since they first came out. I recently put my collection on Discogs. I'm sitting on a goldmine I've never downloaded music.