While I agree that the money issue is part of the equation, I think Marc, Richard etl. al. hit the nail on the head.
We've tended to (at least since around the 1950's, if not before) as a collective tended to value and choose convenience over quality. Smaller, lighter, cheaper, easier gets chosen over larger, heavier, overengineered, more expensive in 9 of 10 cases.
Also, whereas things in many cases used to be designed to do more than claimed (i.e. overengineered), and could be repaired, upgraded, and lasted, today most things are designed to last as long as the warantee. The bar has sunk from satisfying the more demanding among us, to being 'good enough' for the average (or even under average) user. (Almost) no one needs or wants 'best' anymore, they want 'good enough'. A corollary is that as people grow up with lesser quality, they expect less and never know how good quality could be.
Music is an excellent example of this, where most people today have never heard acoustic unamplified music, and the benckmark standard is lossy compressed (with artifacts) MP3 made from already hypercompressed (and often clipped) 16 bit sources. A vinyl record will sound positively amazing in comparison, never mind the master tape. Both vinyl and CD have the potential to deliver amazing quality, enough to satisfy the most demanding listener. But that's up to the engineer doing the recording, the mastering, pressing and all else involved. Unfortunately, early CD's sounded harsh (poor converters and brickwall filters) and later ones largely fell prey to hypercompression. There are excellent recordings of fantastic music on both mediums, you just have to look for it.
There's still a market for quality, but it's rapidly diminishing. Funny enough, in my mind this applies to almost everything, from the food we eat to the cameras we shoot and the music we listen to.
Manufacturers prefer cheap and convenient, because that means you have to upgrade or replace worn out gear more often. It isn't built to last, or be maintained, or upgraded. It's built to be used and discarded. That keeps them in business. It also fills our planet with rubbish as we deplete natural resources in order to make the next model (to be bought, used and thrown away.....in a never ending cycle). It's good that more and more focus is being given recycling, I just hope it's not too little too late.
Anyway, that was my rant for this morning. Next please.... Cheers, Thor On 4. mars. 2009, at 03.46, Marc James Small wrote:
At 09:27 PM 3/3/2009, Robert Lilley wrote:Actually, yes Peter I own and regularly play a Victoria VV VI. The acoustic fidelity is quite good.It is interesting to note why vinyl LPs disappeared rapidly during the mid 80's. It wasn't because CD were better. They were not. It wasn't because vinyl was an old, outdated media. It is argued that like film vs. digital pictures, vinyl LP's have more data than the average CD and certainly more than MP3 files. It was because LP's cost more to produce than CDs and the record industry found they could make more money selling CDs. What the industry did was to refuse unsold LP returns while allowing returns of CDs. Seemingly overnight, the record stores switched over to CDs and vinyl was relegated to those like myself who remember how good music used to sound.Its not how much better something is that causes change - its how much money somebody can make if it does.That is perhaps a marginal stretch but not totally untrue. I am speaking as a guy who invested in a really nice linear-tracking turntable in 1985. Still have it, and it still works great. Never have had to replace the cartridge or needle. It just keeps on keeping on. But it was expired technology when I bought it, though I did not realize that, anymore than the folks buying the current production of 2.8FX's realize that they are buying "expired technology".CD's won primarily because of convenience and the reality that, with electronic gear, prices plummet as volume goes up. By 1989, a quality CD player cost substantially less than did a turntable, and was a hell of a lot easier to use. That was the prime reason.The second reason is one to which you speak. Small recording studios were able to get into a vast archive of older music -- rock-'n'- roll, country, classical, jazz, blue grass, ethnic, and remaster it and then produce it on CD's you could buy for $6.99. I used to pay $15 or more for a 45-rpm from 1960 but, by 1980, I could find the tune on SMASH HITS OF 1960 from K-Tel or Groove Records or whoever.Still, a quality vinyl album on a quality turntable and amp and system will give you a much richer sound with vastly greater frequency response than will the best commercial CD rig. I do not have the ear to appreciate this save in a few quiet places -- on vinyl, you can sometimes hear the musicians flipping over their scores during a pause, and that sort of detail just is absent from CD.This is much like film versus digital. Digital is convenient but, for years to come, film will produce better quality even if we are not capable of recognizing the distinction. But, to me, it is important that I am producing something that is the very best possible.Marc msmall@xxxxxxxxxxxx Cha robh bàs fir gun ghràs fir! --- Rollei List - Post to rollei_list@xxxxxxxxxxxxx - Subscribe at rollei_list-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with 'subscribe' in the subject field OR by logging into www.freelists.org - Unsubscribe at rollei_list-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with'unsubscribe' in the subject field OR by logging into www.freelists.org- Online, searchable archives are available at //www.freelists.org/archives/rollei_list
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