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Topic: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over (Read 54003 times) previous topic - next topic
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Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #25
And it's true that classical music lovers were the most enthusiastic early adopters but the main reasons mentioned at the time were a lower noise floor and the ability to play a complete work without having to turn over rather than sound quality itself (though you might consider lower noise a quality improvement). Having said that I'm sure there were many lured by the promised improvements in sound quality
Posterior generated "fact" or baseless opinion?
Only the tiny audiophool fringe bubble talking among themselves missed the audio improvements of CD vs snap crackle pop
Loudspeaker manufacturer

Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #26
Although an obvious strawman, are you seriously suggesting that $500,000 is going to spent by (mostly) kids on recordings they will never play? On its face, that sounds pretty ludicrous. Do you have any evidence for that?

http://www.bbc.com/news/video_and_audio/headlines/36040746/silent-vinyl-buying-records-without-a-record-player

Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #27
Other than musical instruments, which is really an area that shares a lot with high end audio, what else is there but a few esoteric tubes for broadcasting, radar and the like? Even most of those application have gone over to "The Dark Side". ;-)

I'm pretty sure that every microwave oven still contains a magnetron tube.


Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #29
Although an obvious strawman, are you seriously suggesting that $500,000 is going to spent by (mostly) kids on recordings they will never play? On its face, that sounds pretty ludicrous. Do you have any evidence for that?

http://www.bbc.com/news/video_and_audio/headlines/36040746/silent-vinyl-buying-records-without-a-record-player


You might expect that they are looking for a turntable on craigslist of suitable quality. A friend on mine collected LPs for years before he finally bought a high end machine.

This seems as good a place as any to drop this link:

http://brooklynradio.com/vinyl-recorder-t560/

If the LP were really on the way out, seems unlikely that a product like this would exist.

Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #30
Although an obvious strawman, are you seriously suggesting that $500,000 is going to spent by (mostly) kids on recordings they will never play? On its face, that sounds pretty ludicrous. Do you have any evidence for that?

http://www.bbc.com/news/video_and_audio/headlines/36040746/silent-vinyl-buying-records-without-a-record-player


You might expect that they are looking for a turntable on craigslist of suitable quality. A friend on mine collected LPs for years before he finally bought a high end machine.

This seems as good a place as any to drop this link:

http://brooklynradio.com/vinyl-recorder-t560/

If the LP were really on the way out, seems unlikely that a product like this would exist.
Quote
...But maybe now’s the ‘moment’ for this previously-outlandish market niche.
Well, maybe it is, maybe it isn't. It's an obscure toy, which I accept would probably give its owners lots of pleasure.

Vinyl on the way out.

On a scale of ubiquitous to Museum Piece, then, where would you place "vinyl" now? Very much closer to the latter than the former. Just try, today, to find a street with a turntable in the living room of every music listener who lives there.

OK, so it is not dead and gone yet. It, and its associated equipment, has a following that is going to keep it alive for a while yet. But, give or take a bit of waxing and waning, it is never again going to be a mainstay of the mass music market. I don't know why some of its enthusiasts have a need to "prove" otherwise. Who cares how many albums and turntables were sold last year, this year... it is not even a particularly interesting statistic to people who buy albums and turntables.

Yes, LP/Vinyl is on the way out. And yes, there may be years to go before it finally ceases to exist, and even then, some hobbyist somewhere will be producing some niche item and people will still be listening to existing collections on existing equipmet. More power to their pick-up arms. It's great fun, playing LPs, to those who can still be bothered.

But enough of the album sales double stuff. Who cares. Vinyl is on the way out... One day.
The most important audio cables are the ones in the brain


Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #32

http://brooklynradio.com/vinyl-recorder-t560/

If the LP were really on the way out, seems unlikely that a product like this would exist.

If the LP were a boutique item, that is exactly the kind of device and pricing ($4,000 plus thousands of dollars worth of supporting products that must be obtained elsewhere),  that we might expect. BTW at that lofty price, you still have the Mission Impossible problem of finding time in a vinyl stamping mill.

Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #33
And it's true that classical music lovers were the most enthusiastic early adopters but the main reasons mentioned at the time were a lower noise floor and the ability to play a complete work without having to turn over rather than sound quality itself (though you might consider lower noise a quality improvement). Having said that I'm sure there were many lured by the promised improvements in sound quality
Posterior generated "fact" or baseless opinion?
Only the tiny audiophool fringe bubble talking among themselves missed the audio improvements of CD vs snap crackle pop

Baseless opinon that is contradicted by statistics from the day. As with LPs, the bulk of the sales of CD were popular and contemporary music of the day.  The overwhelming majority of consumers wanted their new music on CDs, and were actually setting aside their existing LPs and replacing them with CDs.

Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #34
Other than musical instruments, which is really an area that shares a lot with high end audio, what else is there but a few esoteric tubes for broadcasting, radar and the like? Even most of those application have gone over to "The Dark Side". ;-)

I'm pretty sure that every microwave oven still contains a magnetron tube.

The original brand  name of the microwave oven was "RadarRange" I was an early adopter, and my father before me. RadaRanges were made by Amana under license from Raytheon, of military radar fame. So, it was already included in the phrase "...tubes for broadcasting, radar and the like?"

Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #35
musical instruments [...] shares a lot with high end audio
Feel free to elaborate.

Often musical instruments sell for high prices for not a heck of a lot of hardware, based on sonic advantages for which no standard objective tests are used to quantify. 

I am told that the audio for performances and the musical instrument market taken together sum up to be  about the same size in dollars and customers as high end audio.

Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #36
Hey, it may have generated more revenue than free streaming services, though!

LOL

Kinda did:
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/dec/06/tables-turned-as-vinyl-records-outsell-digital-in-uk-for-first-time

Quote
BTW at that lofty price, you still have the Mission Impossible problem of finding time in a vinyl stamping mill.

While it is true that it takes 6 months or so in the US, a recent project we did for a local label got pressed in about 4 weeks from a plant in the Netherlands. They had the tests back to us in the same week.

Quote
OK, so it is not dead and gone yet. It, and its associated equipment, has a following that is going to keep it alive for a while yet. But, give or take a bit of waxing and waning, it is never again going to be a mainstay of the mass music market. I don't know why some of its enthusiasts have a need to "prove" otherwise. Who cares how many albums and turntables were sold last year, this year... it is not even a particularly interesting statistic to people who buy albums and turntables.

Very true! About the only use for such statistics and links is in forum threads like this  :)




Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #37
Why do people in this forum erroneously assume that vacuum tubes are only made for audiophile products?

Other than musical instruments, which is really an area that shares a lot with high end audio, what else is there but a few esoteric tubes for broadcasting, radar and the like? Even most of those application have gone over to "The Dark Side". ;-)

 We used to be able to point at CRTs, but those are now getting carried out to the trash by the dumpster-full, even as I type.

Amateur radio operators commonly use tubes for high power transmission on the high frequency bands.  Admittedly there ain't many of them, though the hobby itself has been expanding, but mainly into VHF and UHF.
Ed Seedhouse
VA7SDH

Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #38
based on sonic advantages for which no standard objective tests are used to quantify.
Hi-fi is an attempt at transparent reproduction of a recording.  Musical instruments are to create music, hopefully in new and unique ways.  I should hope there is no objective standard to grade a Les Paul, a Stratocaster, a JTM45 or Deluxe Reverb.

I am told
I get to read third-hand anecdotal information from a non-musician about stuff with which I have been well versed for decades, yay!

Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #39
based on sonic advantages for which no standard objective tests are used to quantify.
Hi-fi is an attempt at transparent reproduction of a recording. 

That is pretty much the book answer. I've probably said something like it myself.

While it may be a truism, it is not always true.

I would clarify it today, by saying:  "Hi-fi  for the mainstream is an attempt at transparent reproduction of a recording. "  I might add  that with high end audio, there are two kinds of high end audio:

(1) Attempts at accurate reproduction with high costs not being a stopper.  For example, IB subwoofers composed of relatively large numbers of SOTA subwoofers and power amplifiers.

(2) Attempts to obtain bragging rights with sound quality and good technology being secondary and tertiary considerations.

Quote
Musical instruments are to create music, hopefully in new and unique ways.

Historic goals and means with sentimental attachments seem to be big part of the business.

Quote
I should hope there is no objective standard to grade a Les Paul, a Stratocaster, a JTM45 or Deluxe Reverb.

But there are. Talk to many who buy and sell them for a business.  Google "guitar grading system".

It seems like even with art, it is hard to get away from that objectivity thing.


Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #40
Just to address the reasons for CD taking over from vinyl one that is usually overlooked is the power and influence of record company accountants. Faced with out-dated equipment needing replacing and an old factory in a desirable area one UK major simply shut down its vinyl manufacturing and sold the site. 

Then of course there's the zeitgeist - CD came along at the right time and was well promoted by Philips and Sony. And it's true that classical music lovers were the most enthusiastic early adopters but the main reasons mentioned at the time were a lower noise floor and the ability to play a complete work without having to turn over rather than sound quality itself (though you might consider lower noise a quality improvement). Having said that I'm sure there were many lured by the promised improvements in sound quality

Having been there at the time, I see the above as an obfuscation of the fact that the CD fully addressed many longstanding technical failings of the LP, almost too many to list.


 People in the industly who had been fighting bravely for decades with with the audible and obvious failings of the LP knew full well that there was no way to address the failings of the LP without starting over from pretty close to scratch.

For example, the technical and business implosion of RCA's Selectavision showed that not only was a fresh piece of paper required, it was an absolute necessity and even the paper had to be dramatically changed.

The path to the CD was beaten out by the overwhelming technical and business success of digital telephone switches about 10 years earlier. As I have pointed out in another post, even the production of LPs was becoming more and more digitally-based.

If it was not for a brilliant hate/slander/lies campaign of the usual suspects in the murky world of high end audio, this thread might not even exist.  They saw digital audio as an existential threat, and geared up their propaganda mills.

I was also there at the time and was involved (albeit in a small way) with the launch of CD in theUK. I stand by what I say

Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #41
And it's true that classical music lovers were the most enthusiastic early adopters but the main reasons mentioned at the time were a lower noise floor and the ability to play a complete work without having to turn over rather than sound quality itself (though you might consider lower noise a quality improvement). Having said that I'm sure there were many lured by the promised improvements in sound quality

I was also there at the time and was involved (albeit in a small way) with the launch of CD in theUK. I stand by what I say
Right, baseless, factless opinion from the bubble fringe.
Loudspeaker manufacturer

Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #42
And it's true that classical music lovers were the most enthusiastic early adopters but the main reasons mentioned at the time were a lower noise floor and the ability to play a complete work without having to turn over rather than sound quality itself (though you might consider lower noise a quality improvement). Having said that I'm sure there were many lured by the promised improvements in sound quality

I was also there at the time and was involved (albeit in a small way) with the launch of CD in theUK. I stand by what I say
Right, baseless, factless opinion from the bubble fringe.


Nope. Based on market research undertaken in the first year after launch

I'm not sure what you're trying to say. I was trying to add some background that might be of interest to some people.

There seems to be an underlying opinion that CD took over from vinyl purely because of sound quality improvement whereas there were all sorts of other reasons mainly commercially driven.

Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #43
And it's true that classical music lovers were the most enthusiastic early adopters but the main reasons mentioned at the time were a lower noise floor and the ability to play a complete work without having to turn over rather than sound quality itself (though you might consider lower noise a quality improvement). Having said that I'm sure there were many lured by the promised improvements in sound quality

Based on market research undertaken in the first year after launch
Lets see it.
Loudspeaker manufacturer

Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #44
The research is owned by the company that commissioned it so sorry, but it's not mine to show.

Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #45
And it's true that classical music lovers were the most enthusiastic early adopters but the main reasons mentioned at the time were a lower noise floor and the ability to play a complete work without having to turn over rather than sound quality itself (though you might consider lower noise a quality improvement). Having said that I'm sure there were many lured by the promised improvements in sound quality

Based on market research undertaken in the first year after launch
Lets see it.

You can put 2 and 2 together:

Here is some historic sales data by format:

http://www.businessinsider.com/recorded-music-sales-by-format-2015-12

And  here is some sales data by genre:

https://datamarket.com/data/set/28ny/us-music-sales-by-genre#!ds=28ny!2rsw=7&display=line

For example, you can see that classical sales were about 3.5  million per year in 1989, and more like 2.3 million  since 2004. The trend seems to be pretty smooth, so future trends and past behavior might be inferred from this data with reasonable reliability.

The information about formats points out that the period of format replacement in terms of CD sales extended from 1989 to 1999 and peaked at about 13 million units per year in 2002-2003.

In 1999 for example, total classical sales were about 3.2 million, and total CD sales were about 13 million.  How classical sales could have been the majority of CD sales seems problematical, to say the least. 

CD sales have exceeded classical sales since around 1991.

In terms of availability, in the early 1980s one could see a store's entire CD collection in a glace, and my recollection that the classical titles were as a rule less than 20% of what I saw.

It stands to reason that the far more conservative classical purchasers were likely to be late adopters of technological change. 

Media purchasing trends are known to vary strongly between the US and UK for example, but since the whole UK is only the size (geographic, population, economics) of one of our larger states of which we have 50, US sales are always the 500 pound gorilla in the room.




Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #46
The research is owned by the company that commissioned it so sorry, but it's not mine to show.
The question was rhetorical. You can quit waving your hands now.
Loudspeaker manufacturer

Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #47
And it's true that classical music lovers were the most enthusiastic early adopters but the main reasons mentioned at the time were a lower noise floor and the ability to play a complete work without having to turn over rather than sound quality itself (though you might consider lower noise a quality improvement). Having said that I'm sure there were many lured by the promised improvements in sound quality

Based on market research undertaken in the first year after launch
Lets see it.

You can put 2 and 2 together:

Here is some historic sales data by format:

http://www.businessinsider.com/recorded-music-sales-by-format-2015-12

And  here is some sales data by genre:

https://datamarket.com/data/set/28ny/us-music-sales-by-genre#!ds=28ny!2rsw=7&display=line

For example, you can see that classical sales were about 3.5  million per year in 1989, and more like 2.3 million  since 2004. The trend seems to be pretty smooth, so future trends and past behavior might be inferred from this data with reasonable reliability.

The information about formats points out that the period of format replacement in terms of CD sales extended from 1989 to 1999 and peaked at about 13 million units per year in 2002-2003.

In 1999 for example, total classical sales were about 3.2 million, and total CD sales were about 13 million.  How classical sales could have been the majority of CD sales seems problematical, to say the least. 

CD sales have exceeded classical sales since around 1991.

In terms of availability, in the early 1980s one could see a store's entire CD collection in a glace, and my recollection that the classical titles were as a rule less than 20% of what I saw.

It stands to reason that the far more conservative classical purchasers were likely to be late adopters of technological change. 

Media purchasing trends are known to vary strongly between the US and UK for example, but since the whole UK is only the size (geographic, population, economics) of one of our larger states of which we have 50, US sales are always the 500 pound gorilla in the room.





Thanks. However, I was talking about early adopters. So the data from 1983 is what we need. I was also talking about the UK market which may have handled the launch differently


Re: WSJ asks Why Vinyls Boom Is Over

Reply #49
FWIW, and this is purely anecdotal...

When I started using CDs around 1985, I bought classical on CD and continued buying rock on vinyl. I did this for pretty much exactly the reasons botface describes: the ability to hear a complete work without having to change sides/LPs, and for the lower noise floor.

I finally switched to buying rock on CD when I became exasperated at having to return too many faulty vinyl pressings, not for sound quality reasons per se. That said, I guess you could argue that a pressing fault - ie. big clicks and pops - is the ultimate example of poor sound quality.