Philips wanted 14 bit, as far as I know, and Sony 16. Philips used four times oversampling and very basic first-order noise shaping to get a 16 bit dynamic range out of its 14 bit DAC (TDA1540).
I used to be a Tracy Chapman fan and bought a second-hand CD player when her new albums weren't released on vinyl records anymore, only on CD or compact cassette. That must have been in the 1990's, somewhere between 1990 and 1994. It was a Philips CD player with four times oversampling and 16 bit DACs (TDA1541).
I used to be a Tracy Chapman fan and bought a second-hand CD player when her new albums weren't released on vinyl records anymore, only on CD or compact cassette. That must have been in the 1990's, somewhere between 1990 and 1994. It was a Philips CD player with four times oversampling and 16 bit DACs (TDA1541).
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Everybody is right!
The red book standard was agreed and published in '79, CDs were introduced in 1982 in Japan and 1983 in Europe.
The red book standard was agreed and published in '79, CDs were introduced in 1982 in Japan and 1983 in Europe.
Must read, seems accurate enough to inform the most(certainly did me):
https://www.dutchaudioclassics.nl/timeline-development-philips-compact-disc-system-1969-2009/
My father bought the CD304 around '86, together with loads of cd's. I recorded most on Compact Cassette, another one of those things used back in the day.
I was 12 years old in '86 and everybody else still used LP's. I still like dropping a needle on some vinyl and looking at the covers, but the sheer ease and lack of wow, flutter, scratches and dust was a real game changer. Nowadays i stream/playback locally, all digital. All systems are mostly personal choice, and they all have their positives and negatives, but when given the right attention and time, all can bring great listening pleasure.
Enjoy the music, whatever source it is.
https://www.dutchaudioclassics.nl/timeline-development-philips-compact-disc-system-1969-2009/
My father bought the CD304 around '86, together with loads of cd's. I recorded most on Compact Cassette, another one of those things used back in the day.
I was 12 years old in '86 and everybody else still used LP's. I still like dropping a needle on some vinyl and looking at the covers, but the sheer ease and lack of wow, flutter, scratches and dust was a real game changer. Nowadays i stream/playback locally, all digital. All systems are mostly personal choice, and they all have their positives and negatives, but when given the right attention and time, all can bring great listening pleasure.
Enjoy the music, whatever source it is.
Soundstream was recording in digital a little earlier. First releases were on Telarc if I recall. My first time employer had a Sony CDP-101, which I would love to own today just for the coolness factor.
The main impact of all this progress was on the artist. Their nightmare of cassette dubs (killing music) near overnight was replaced with easily replicable perfect copies.
The main impact of all this progress was on the artist. Their nightmare of cassette dubs (killing music) near overnight was replaced with easily replicable perfect copies.
I got my first CD player while I was in the middle of high school about 1987. First CD was Tears for Fears- Songs from the big chair.
This thread just makes me feel old.
Really happy with where things wound up. The desktop computer has all of the music I want in with local storage. Desktop speakers happen to be driven by an 845 amplifier and an SS amplifier for the IB subwoofers.
This thread just makes me feel old.
Really happy with where things wound up. The desktop computer has all of the music I want in with local storage. Desktop speakers happen to be driven by an 845 amplifier and an SS amplifier for the IB subwoofers.
According to Wikipedia, the first Compact Disc was introduced in October of 1982. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compact_disc
Which roughly matches my recollection. Digital audio recording technology, however, was introduced to consumers via digital-master to vinyl disc by 1979, as I recall. I still have a couple of such albums in my collection.
Which roughly matches my recollection. Digital audio recording technology, however, was introduced to consumers via digital-master to vinyl disc by 1979, as I recall. I still have a couple of such albums in my collection.
Oh wow memories and I still remember those heady days,
I saw the philips cd 101 at the hifi show at the penta hotel near hearhrow London around 80 it was a big display and they were very busy
I went again in 81 and some rooms already had the meridian cd 101 the show was very interesting because I also saw the krell 50 the kef 104 b and Luke Manley was showing his vtl amps and had stacked 4 rogers ls3 with some big clamps
Listening to the krell with some apogee scintilla and the meridian cd was an eye opener
In 82 I was invited to the launch of the cd 104 it was in a record shop called Covent garden records and the room was hooked up to the John bowers active speaker, the pre amp was dmm,dire straits just released brothers in arms and I was smitten so I placed an order of the player and cd and got a free poster of the steel guitar
I had already brought many CDs earlier as they were hard to come by,I think my first cd was marillion script for a jester tear I also had the vinyl and compared it with my rega 2 onix amp and proac tablets,I still have this cd
The player came with a deutch gramophone sampler with Karajan (still also have that)
81 and 82 was fantastic musical time in the uk
I remember the stores carrying lots of CD players in 84 mostly Japanese companies,there were some really cool ones from mission and some even front loading from hitachi,toshiba etc
Silly me stopped buying vinyl and I probably had around 300 CDs before I moved to New York due to the stock market crash and the decimation of the computer industry.
Did they sound good,a few did some sounded like the engineer left the Riaa filter on
I will post a favorite 81 songs in the lounge tomorrow
I remember making my first active subwoofer in 84 when I moved to London it was a volt dual coil 8 inch driver in a sealed cabinet,brought from Winslow audio
Are they forever? I still buy them and I have many that you cannot even get on any streaming service
So 40 years of my 60 years of life
P.s I started buying vinyl again in 89 because non of the bands I loved had CDs
Thanks for letting me indulge
I saw the philips cd 101 at the hifi show at the penta hotel near hearhrow London around 80 it was a big display and they were very busy
I went again in 81 and some rooms already had the meridian cd 101 the show was very interesting because I also saw the krell 50 the kef 104 b and Luke Manley was showing his vtl amps and had stacked 4 rogers ls3 with some big clamps
Listening to the krell with some apogee scintilla and the meridian cd was an eye opener
In 82 I was invited to the launch of the cd 104 it was in a record shop called Covent garden records and the room was hooked up to the John bowers active speaker, the pre amp was dmm,dire straits just released brothers in arms and I was smitten so I placed an order of the player and cd and got a free poster of the steel guitar
I had already brought many CDs earlier as they were hard to come by,I think my first cd was marillion script for a jester tear I also had the vinyl and compared it with my rega 2 onix amp and proac tablets,I still have this cd
The player came with a deutch gramophone sampler with Karajan (still also have that)
81 and 82 was fantastic musical time in the uk
I remember the stores carrying lots of CD players in 84 mostly Japanese companies,there were some really cool ones from mission and some even front loading from hitachi,toshiba etc
Silly me stopped buying vinyl and I probably had around 300 CDs before I moved to New York due to the stock market crash and the decimation of the computer industry.
Did they sound good,a few did some sounded like the engineer left the Riaa filter on
I will post a favorite 81 songs in the lounge tomorrow
I remember making my first active subwoofer in 84 when I moved to London it was a volt dual coil 8 inch driver in a sealed cabinet,brought from Winslow audio
Are they forever? I still buy them and I have many that you cannot even get on any streaming service
So 40 years of my 60 years of life
P.s I started buying vinyl again in 89 because non of the bands I loved had CDs
Thanks for letting me indulge
I was living in London at that same time @soulsheiksan but don’t remember CDs. Maybe I had heard of them, but I don’t think I had ever seen one.
@soulsheiksan I used to walk past Covent Garden Records on most days during the 80s. One day I heard a piano playing, followed the sound into the shop and down to the basement. There was no piano and no one in that part of the shop, just a CD player and a couple of bookshelf speakers. It was possibly the most realistic piano recording I think I ever heard and I was desperate to find out what recording it was. There was no empty case close by and in a shop full of CDs short of stopping the machine and opening the draw there was no chance of finding out. As it meant slipping behind the counter I chickened out. They used to heavily promote Karajan but I never found any pianist he conducted.
The weird sample rate of CDs was chosen for compatibility with professional videorecorder-based digital audio recorders: 44.1 kHz when using PAL or black-and-white NTSC recorders, 44.059 kHz when using colour NTSC recorders.
I know someone in the broadcasting industry who claims that 44.1 kHz is a consumer standard and 48 kHz a professional standard, but that's wrong, 44.1 kHz is just an older professional standard.
I know someone in the broadcasting industry who claims that 44.1 kHz is a consumer standard and 48 kHz a professional standard, but that's wrong, 44.1 kHz is just an older professional standard.
Argh! That was my sister's only album for about three years, all she ever played. Eight hours a day. I truely hope I never hear a song off it again!
The rest of the memories on this thread were good ones.
I think the first time I used a CD player was in the summer of 1984, and it was a Sony. I was amazed by the sound without any scratch noise, but I didn't think it was high-quality. Just lightly tapping the table on which the player was placed could easily make the needle jump, so it was probably more sensitive than a record player.
The CD's sampling frequency of 44.1kHz was chosen to be compatible with video recorders, but there is one strange thing. Normally, in the case of NTSC, there are 480 effective scan lines, not 490. Any video technician would have chosen 480. However, by choosing 490, 44100Hz became a strange number. 44100 = 2 * 2 * 3 * 3 * 5 * 5 * 7 * 7, which is the product of four small prime numbers squared. Alternatively, 44100 = 210 * 210. My guess is that the person who set the standard was not a video technician but a math geek.🙂
The above was translated by chatGTP from Japanese. I think it's better than myself. I don't know if it's worth using.
The CD's sampling frequency of 44.1kHz was chosen to be compatible with video recorders, but there is one strange thing. Normally, in the case of NTSC, there are 480 effective scan lines, not 490. Any video technician would have chosen 480. However, by choosing 490, 44100Hz became a strange number. 44100 = 2 * 2 * 3 * 3 * 5 * 5 * 7 * 7, which is the product of four small prime numbers squared. Alternatively, 44100 = 210 * 210. My guess is that the person who set the standard was not a video technician but a math geek.🙂
The above was translated by chatGTP from Japanese. I think it's better than myself. I don't know if it's worth using.
IIRC I got a Philips 304 as my first foray into CD, I'd worked in Tottenham Court Road for about a year and a half so was well versed in most things Hifi.
In my opinion, as a format, it was a big step up for entry level enthusiasts despite the digital analogue debate at the time -if you dice an apple is it still an apple or something like that. LP based systems could be quite basic in sound reproduction from the media, remember this was the era of the stack system and most were happy with Cassettes for portable sound reproduction🙂 . At the time, retrieving the information from the source media was part of a point of view where the source as all important. The idea was that if the source player could not retrieve the information from the media - you couldn't add it. Here we also see the amps start to loose their tone controls ( and the flip side of the coin - graphic equalizers!). So if you had a half decent system , the inclusion of a Cd player may well have been a big step up from what your LP player could achieve. To replicate the resolution from a base level cd player with a LP based system at the time would have cost a fair bit. Even then an LP12, arm and cartridge would have cost a fair few months pay....
Just my two pence worth.
Joe
In my opinion, as a format, it was a big step up for entry level enthusiasts despite the digital analogue debate at the time -if you dice an apple is it still an apple or something like that. LP based systems could be quite basic in sound reproduction from the media, remember this was the era of the stack system and most were happy with Cassettes for portable sound reproduction🙂 . At the time, retrieving the information from the source media was part of a point of view where the source as all important. The idea was that if the source player could not retrieve the information from the media - you couldn't add it. Here we also see the amps start to loose their tone controls ( and the flip side of the coin - graphic equalizers!). So if you had a half decent system , the inclusion of a Cd player may well have been a big step up from what your LP player could achieve. To replicate the resolution from a base level cd player with a LP based system at the time would have cost a fair bit. Even then an LP12, arm and cartridge would have cost a fair few months pay....
Just my two pence worth.
Joe
Just a follow up from my reply...end of 1982 i bought a Tandberg Reel to reel deck, cost a fortune, I was very disappoinhted with the sound of it, my Nakamichi 680ZX with Highcom 2, the Nakamichi one, sound was actually better, the fist cd player that hit the market, the Philips one with the drawer got my attention, swapped my Tandberg for this Player, lost a lot of money, but I had no regrets....
Pano it's interesting that you lived in London and don't remember,hmv the big music store on oxford st made the basement into the cd section and even had a pressing plant there ( maybe nimbus) ,I remember they made those stupid long cardboard boxes so that they could be displaced in the crates
Totally analogue yes Covent garden records was a really great store but mostly sold classical music
My favorite part of the CDs were when my housemate asked me to play side b
Btw the CD player I brought in 89 in New York was the Conrad Johnson df1 which was still 14 bit, I still have it.
I remember so many studios rushing to buy the Sony 1610and 1630 digital recorders and using umatic beta tape
Totally analogue yes Covent garden records was a really great store but mostly sold classical music
My favorite part of the CDs were when my housemate asked me to play side b
Btw the CD player I brought in 89 in New York was the Conrad Johnson df1 which was still 14 bit, I still have it.
I remember so many studios rushing to buy the Sony 1610and 1630 digital recorders and using umatic beta tape
But NTSC was analogue. No reference to this relationship turns up for me in searches. What relevance did video recorders have to digital audio at the time?
In the 1980s I was installing and operating very large Sony CD changers (now apparently lost to history) along side 48 kHz DAT machines in broadcast environments and never knew a time that 44.1 was treated as a pro standard. Soundstream recorders may have been 88.2 kHz.
You may have noticed that the internal construction of a DAT recorder, with the rotating heads and all, is quite similar to a video recorder. Before DAT was invented, converting boxes with ADCs, DACs and some clever circuit to make the PCM signal look like analogue video were used to record digital audio with analogue video recorders.