As a 40yr old I have seen the demise of vinyl and now it would seem the impending doom of the CD, so my question is, what are peoples thoughts on Hi-Fi and do you still enjoy sitting in front a pair of speakers listening to your favourite album ?

When I was a teenager, the Hi-Fi was the essential purchase and a weekly pilgrimage to the local hi-fi store was a must but music just seems so disposable nowadays, you get you're digital fix without any sleeve notes or real connection to what it is you're listening to.

In recent years I have succumb to i-Tunes and more recently Spotify for my music with the odd CD purchase BUT when I do find to relax and actually 'listen' to something on my Hi-Fi which includes a pre-amp feeding a mono-bloc per channel I am still blown away.

Is Hi-Fi a preserve of mine and older generations or are the younger crowd finding a foothold, in other words IS HI-FI DEAD ??

The last time I visited Best Buy I was stunned to see that miles of aisles of CDs have been done away with and replaced with rows and rows of Blu-Ray discs. The CD selection there is probably only 10-15% of what it used to be and a lot of the CD music area is devoted to concert DVDs. If it's happening at Best Buy, odds are the CD really IS on the way out.

I started collecting CDs back when they first started coming out, made regular pilgrimages to the Twin Cities, my local Mecca for new CD releases. I currently own a huge CD collection (not to mention a good 500 old vinyl LPs that aren't worth trying to sell) that encompasses every Billboard Top 40 hit from 1955 to 1985. I actually have in my library almost every Top 100 hit for those years.

I still like to crank up the stereo, though now I usually run it from a CD player to the inputs on my big Peavey PA system - I like to feel the bass beat as it massages my heart. My wife says I'm too old for AC/DC, but I'm not!

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Dennis in CR
Rockin' since 1963

I still buy and listen to LPs. I've had my Bang & Olufsen turntable since 1982 and still use it often. It could use a new belt, but the lps are my preferred media. I attended Record Store Day this year at a local store and was amazed at how many people were there already. Lots of new vinyl being issued, many of it by well-known bands.

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Current Gear: Ron Kirn Barnbuster Tele,
Marshall: 1971 SuperLead 100>1997 1960-TV, bunch of pedals
and a 1987 Porsche 911 Carrera coupe named Veronica

I only download music if it's the ONLY way to get it, or if months go by and Newbury Comics doesn't get the album in. Waited 6 months before I finally caved and bought The Pixies' "Doolittle" on iTunes.

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Favorite bands:

Melvins
The Jesus Lizard
Cows
Big Business
R***man
Minutemen
Flight
Minor Threat
Big Black
Shellac
Karp
Scratch Acid
Wipers
Pixies

I usually drop by the used clothing and Goodwill looking for interesting baseball caps for my collection and while there always look for used vinyl.I've found some gems in used merchandise stores such as a compilation set of 4 Mike Oldfield 33 1/3s that was only released to radio stations plus some Pursuit of Happiness vinyl and too much more to list.I hope that CDs never disappear as all this I-tunes etc. is way beyond my computer savy and I'm doubtful if the sound quality translates good to CD so that I can play it on my old component stereo that I just finished putting up an entertainment center for as I showed on a thread a while back.
Nothing can beat sitting back in a comfortable chair listening to vinyl from the old teenage years where a crowd of my friends would gather in my old basement rec room,it brings me back to the old days when a young guy's mind was on sucking the face off the girl of his dreams.Anyway it ain't too bad going back-I married her.

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'65 Strat,65 Mustang,65 Jaguar,4 more Strats,3 vintage Vox guitars,5 Vox amps,'69 Bassman with a '68 2-15 Bassman cab,36 guitars total-15asst'd amps total,2 vintage '60s Hammond organs & a myriad of effects-with a few rare vintage ones.

Preference is still vinyl through the old McIntosh amp and Jensen Model 15 real speakers.

It's positively amazing to this picker, so many folks who agonize over which pup windings and fretboard material on their guitars and and biasing of their tubes...

...listen to prerecorded music through the modern equivalent of a tin can with string on the bottom...

...huh?

I have to admit, I broke down and bought a nice Numark USB turntable a couple years ago and I have been slowly but surely converting a lot of my old vinyl to Wave files on the computer. Much of my obscure vinyl never made it to CD except for a few tunes here and there on compilations, so it's nice to be able to convert it and save it, albeit in a modern format. I can still listen to clicks and pops if I want, or tune them out.

I love my music!

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Dennis in CR
Rockin' since 1963

I have about 350 vinyl albums, mostly from the '60's. I started to convert them to wav. files with the intention of selling the albums but I changed my mind. I went out and bought a new turntable, pre amp and amp, hooked everthing to my JBL 4311's and I've been enjoying rediscovering all the nuggets hiding in my vinyl collection. I have a computer hooked up to the stereo so I can rip tunes to use on my lap top or Ipod for practicing, but I plan on keeping all my vinyl. I think vinyl is making a comeback of sorts. My daughters friend is 22 and just bought her first turntable. I occasionally buy from Itunes, but until they let me use those files to make compilation CD's, they'll get a very limited amount of my music budget.

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'10 American Deluxe HSS Sunset Metallic
'10 JA-90 Thinline Telecaster
'15 Music Man JP-15 Blueberry Burst
'07 Les Paul Standard Faded LCPG #82
'14 Carvin ST300
'12 Carvin CS424S
'66 Guild Starfire IV w/Bigsby
'14 Warmouth Partscaster Daphne Blue

I routinely burn compilation CD's using songs purchased from iTunes.

Arjay

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"Here's why reliability is job one: A great sounding amp that breaks down goes from being a favorite piece of gear to a useless piece of crap in less time than it takes to read this sentence." -- BRUCE ZINKY

I haven't tried because it was my understanding that you couldn't do that. Thanks, I'll give it a go.

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'10 American Deluxe HSS Sunset Metallic
'10 JA-90 Thinline Telecaster
'15 Music Man JP-15 Blueberry Burst
'07 Les Paul Standard Faded LCPG #82
'14 Carvin ST300
'12 Carvin CS424S
'66 Guild Starfire IV w/Bigsby
'14 Warmouth Partscaster Daphne Blue

There's a sub-routine within the iTunes software that actually helps assemble a CD and totals up the play times for the individual tracks so you don't exceed the disc's capacity. I use the iTunes Store and this program all the time as I cannot stomach "store-bought" compilations.

Arjay

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"Here's why reliability is job one: A great sounding amp that breaks down goes from being a favorite piece of gear to a useless piece of crap in less time than it takes to read this sentence." -- BRUCE ZINKY

I don't own any mp3 players at all. I like my CDs. As a musician, and a car audio designer/installer; sound quality is of utmost importance to me. I hate installing top of the line (take Boston Acoustics Pro components as an example) and then having my customer come back and hook up an iPod full of low quality Mp3s to the system to see how it sounds. Call me crazy, but the best quality mp3s aren't even close (SQ - wise) to CDs. I'll stick to CDs.

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Check out my new FB music page!

https://www.facebook.com/TheDevilandMe.Music

My Toyota Tacoma has the top-of-the-line JBL/Bose/Harmon-Kardon audio system -- eleven speakers, about 1.21 jigga-watts. I discern no significant difference in fidelity between music loaded onto my wife's iPod and a store-bought CD.



The truck rawks as well as the stereo.



Arjay

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"Here's why reliability is job one: A great sounding amp that breaks down goes from being a favorite piece of gear to a useless piece of crap in less time than it takes to read this sentence." -- BRUCE ZINKY

Having re-decorated and re-organised our lounge, I spent a whole week transfering my 400+ CD collection to MP3 format onto an external HD using iTunes. I now have the HD connected to my Pioneer 5.1 home cinema system so I can play anything I want. I would have chosen the m4a format over mp3 but the Blu-Ray/Home Cinema does not read it, unfortunately. My system also simulates 5.1 surround sound from 'normal' music and it sounds great.
I have put my CDs in large plastic boxes for storage and intend to keep them. I also prefer the idea of owning something physical for the money I've paid but I felt the time had come to evolve, for want of a better word.
Here in the UK, HMV is pretty much the only place where you can buy CDs (except online) and as somebody has already mentioned, their audio CD range is gradually being replaced with games & DVD/BluRays, which is very sad.

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Black MIM Telecaster Standard with 3-saddle bridge
Vintage V100 Les Paul (flamed honeyburst)
Stagg A4006 electro-acoustic
Korg ToneWorks AX3000G effects
Marshall Valvestate 8080 amp

All Yamaha and my Tundra with top...what more do you want?...lol