The Compact Disc (1982) [video](youtube.com)
youtube.com
The Compact Disc (1982) [video]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISILksWz7N0
42 comments
Pay attention to how clearly information was presented in those days. I've not come across any media today that can present information in systematic and concise manner without trying hard to grab my attention, perhaps a handful of YT channels are an exception.
A bit of survivorship bias here, if I may... the really crappy stuff from any non-current era does not get posted and reposted periodically here.
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I don't think so.
My father taught English, and had a long-standing rant about how universities since about the 80s or so produced writers that were amazingly talented at using a thousand words to say absolutely nothing.
My father taught English, and had a long-standing rant about how universities since about the 80s or so produced writers that were amazingly talented at using a thousand words to say absolutely nothing.
Right, consider the thousands of hours of online technical training content on Udemy, etc. Much of that is very clear, well-paced, and precise. Conversely, watching any number of peppy newsreels on e.g. British Pathe[1]. They're just as blaring and superficial as any contemporary correlate.
[1]https://www.britishpathe.com/
[1]https://www.britishpathe.com/
It’s unfair to compare a college course to traditional TV media. College courses in the 80’s were similar to Coursera too.
I urge you to watch news channels from the 80s. Literally every TV media was degraded from Discovery channel to History channel.
I urge you to watch news channels from the 80s. Literally every TV media was degraded from Discovery channel to History channel.
40s naval engineering videos are the peak pedagogical value. It's ELI5 yet describing analog computing or sophisticated mechanical engineering devices. Then there's US college videos about waves and impedance.. another piece of beauty.
Wow, that laser looks enormous by today's standards! We take tiny, dirt cheap, diode lasers for granted now, but it really casts some perspective on how ambitious the format was in 1982.
I do gain some wry amusement from all the business about "scratch-proof" and the way he said "it doesn't matter how much I manhandle the disk, it will continue to give very good quality" - while holding it gingerly from the edges! Of course we all know now that CDs must be treated with essentially the same care as vinyl records. Tape cassettes were the real durable format. (Bonus chuckle: the lady presenter at the end who has obviously taken "fingerprint-proof" at face value, holding up an absolutely filthy disc...)
Very prescient prediction at the end; the obsolescence of the compact disc was indeed precipitated by the development of solid-state storage, over 20 years later. "Don't laugh!" she assures us. Indeed...
I do gain some wry amusement from all the business about "scratch-proof" and the way he said "it doesn't matter how much I manhandle the disk, it will continue to give very good quality" - while holding it gingerly from the edges! Of course we all know now that CDs must be treated with essentially the same care as vinyl records. Tape cassettes were the real durable format. (Bonus chuckle: the lady presenter at the end who has obviously taken "fingerprint-proof" at face value, holding up an absolutely filthy disc...)
Very prescient prediction at the end; the obsolescence of the compact disc was indeed precipitated by the development of solid-state storage, over 20 years later. "Don't laugh!" she assures us. Indeed...
That all depends on the player.
I has a SONY car changer for a decade or so. It was made in the 90's.
It played everything near perfectly. Seriously. I took scotch brite to a promo disc once, and it still played, the only difference being about a 2x buffer time to get started and a bit more sensitivity to road bumps.
I have never owned anything as good.
It played discs I could not rip a track from.
In my view, and based on that experience, the format was way more robust than most of us experienced in practice.
Cost cutting on the error correction and laser handling had a negative impact on overall robustness to a fault.
That SONY was so good, I could go to the street market and buy discs a few for a buck and nearly all of them played well. I got asked how I was playing them regularly by the vendors selling me a lot of cheap, too scratched to work discs.
I has a SONY car changer for a decade or so. It was made in the 90's.
It played everything near perfectly. Seriously. I took scotch brite to a promo disc once, and it still played, the only difference being about a 2x buffer time to get started and a bit more sensitivity to road bumps.
I have never owned anything as good.
It played discs I could not rip a track from.
In my view, and based on that experience, the format was way more robust than most of us experienced in practice.
Cost cutting on the error correction and laser handling had a negative impact on overall robustness to a fault.
That SONY was so good, I could go to the street market and buy discs a few for a buck and nearly all of them played well. I got asked how I was playing them regularly by the vendors selling me a lot of cheap, too scratched to work discs.
CDs are actually fairly resilient... on the bottom. Unfortunately the reflective data layer is very close to the label on the top, so it’s pretty easy to damage them from that direction. Label-side damage is visible as the little pinpricks of light shining all the way through the now-damaged reflective layer when held up to a light. This is why taking a CD out of something and setting it upside down to “protect it” while it’s not in its case is actually the most dangerous thing you can do. This is also why “all-over print” discs are more resilient than discs with simple lettering printed on to the silver disc top surface, e.g. Japanese PSX games vs American ones.
> Of course we all know now that CDs must be treated with essentially the same care as vinyl records
Not really. There is really a magnitude of improvement here. It doesn't matter how many fingerprints you leave on the CD, just wipe them off with cloth (and particularly almost any cloth, since I don't know of many cloth types than can scratch plastic -- unless they are full of dirt+sand to begin with). If you put your fingers on a vinyl, the oil in your fingers is already degrading the data permanently. And if you try to wipe it off with cloth, likely you will only mess it even further.
And if you ever have a real problem with tape, good luck.
With all due respect, for a medium that has no fixed protective case, CD is almost indestructible. (For nitpickers: In comparison to everything else. It is obviously not truly indestructible. )
Not really. There is really a magnitude of improvement here. It doesn't matter how many fingerprints you leave on the CD, just wipe them off with cloth (and particularly almost any cloth, since I don't know of many cloth types than can scratch plastic -- unless they are full of dirt+sand to begin with). If you put your fingers on a vinyl, the oil in your fingers is already degrading the data permanently. And if you try to wipe it off with cloth, likely you will only mess it even further.
And if you ever have a real problem with tape, good luck.
With all due respect, for a medium that has no fixed protective case, CD is almost indestructible. (For nitpickers: In comparison to everything else. It is obviously not truly indestructible. )
If you play a vinyl record you’re damaging it permanently.
minidiscs were also quite rugged.. a real pity that this format never blossomed
My favourite medium ever. Still rocking one in my car, one in my home studio and one in my lounge entertainment unit. Only ceased production in 2019. I’m hoping it has a comeback like vinyl did! Haha but we all know that any medium that had a record function was killed my American music labels ;:
I still have my old minidisc player. Exquisite piece of hardware mechanical engineering from Sony.
I always enjoyed hearing that satisfying sound of inserting in the minidisc, and closing the door as the internal mechanisms aligns the media and prepares it for playback. Now that’s nostalgia.
I always enjoyed hearing that satisfying sound of inserting in the minidisc, and closing the door as the internal mechanisms aligns the media and prepares it for playback. Now that’s nostalgia.
Also DAT. (F the RIAA.)
In production, ADAT using S-VHS tapes.
In production, ADAT using S-VHS tapes.
Yeah, I miss the minidisc. But I always thought the sliding door mechanism was a possible point of failure on the units.
And then, they were also rather expensive. Costing about $15 per unit.
And then, there’s data density. It didn’t seem like it could hold enough data. Or transfer it fast enough.
But, can modern day flash drives ever become as cheap as minidiscs?
I always have a concern that flash drives can easily become damaged or corrupted, since you’re actively plugging it directly into an electrical source. I once got my flash drive fried, and the USB port was also fried. I never trusted them again.
So I tend to buy SD Cards, and treat them sorta like minidiscs, for my stale cold storage needs.
And then, they were also rather expensive. Costing about $15 per unit.
And then, there’s data density. It didn’t seem like it could hold enough data. Or transfer it fast enough.
But, can modern day flash drives ever become as cheap as minidiscs?
I always have a concern that flash drives can easily become damaged or corrupted, since you’re actively plugging it directly into an electrical source. I once got my flash drive fried, and the USB port was also fried. I never trusted them again.
So I tend to buy SD Cards, and treat them sorta like minidiscs, for my stale cold storage needs.
I think they meant it more as in how FM radio quality is also better than AM, until it doesn't
I clearly remember burning CDs up until around 2010, but I never realized that the technology was already around 30 years earlier.
I still have rose-colored glasses nostalgia of the days of PC games in large cardboard boxes containing multi-CD jewel cases and elaborate manuals.
I bet you the CD will come back as a vintage retro format in about 10-15 years when the kids who never grew up with them learn to treat it as a cool hipster format. Just like my generation did with vinyl, which I never experienced myself back in the day, having arrived too late on the scene.
Friendly plug for LGR and 8 Bit Guy channels on Youtube who often dive back into these antique devices.
I still have rose-colored glasses nostalgia of the days of PC games in large cardboard boxes containing multi-CD jewel cases and elaborate manuals.
I bet you the CD will come back as a vintage retro format in about 10-15 years when the kids who never grew up with them learn to treat it as a cool hipster format. Just like my generation did with vinyl, which I never experienced myself back in the day, having arrived too late on the scene.
Friendly plug for LGR and 8 Bit Guy channels on Youtube who often dive back into these antique devices.
I was similarly amazed to learn that a couple of years ago, after borrowing a concert recording CD from a library marked "Recorded in West Germany ©1983." One that the disc was in such great condition after 3 decades, and two that I had modern devices still able to read it. The same could not be said for many other types of digital or analog media...
8 Bit Guy is very cool.
I'm saddened to hear the CD called a "retro format". Next you'll tell me the DVD is not the cool new thing from the future :(
(Seriously though, I have a hard time dealing with people calling the CD retro. To me not even the audio tape is really old... I grew up listening to music on tapes, the CD was the new thing!)
I'm saddened to hear the CD called a "retro format". Next you'll tell me the DVD is not the cool new thing from the future :(
(Seriously though, I have a hard time dealing with people calling the CD retro. To me not even the audio tape is really old... I grew up listening to music on tapes, the CD was the new thing!)
I guess I'd say CD is and isn't retro. It's looking close to being the ultimate physical digital medium for music, with vinyl being the ultimate analog medium. It's really only retro in the sense that there isn't much reason to keep physical copies.
It contains the uncompressed original audio stream! Where else can you get that?
The interesting thing about vinyl compared to any other format is that not only is it analog, it’s also mechanical! I think that gives the technology an aesthetic that can’t be matched by other analog formats, it also works without electricity! The whole idea of engraving sound into a physics object is a still pretty wild and something that’s been going on for over 100 years!
You should see how tiny the MicroLine diamond is on my Audio-Technica MM cartridge. 90% of the cost is in that replaceable, fragile part of an MM cartridge: the stylus.
MC cartridges typically don't have replaceable styluses. Bust an AT-ART9XA, and get ready to lay-out 1.3k clams.
MC cartridges typically don't have replaceable styluses. Bust an AT-ART9XA, and get ready to lay-out 1.3k clams.
Is the AT-ART9XA the MM stylus?
I’ve heard a bit about the MM stylus, though never used one myself. Just getting into vinyl gear for DJing soon, but will be starting lower end. Especially at 1.3k! What makes that stylus so good?
I also think perhaps we over estimate how "digital" CD playback is.
I repaired a CD player recently and learned that the control system which guides and powers the laser is entirely analogue. Only the audio pickup was a digital signal.
I'm sure designs vary, but it made a great deal of sense when you consider a design from the 70s and 80s.
A CD is digital, but a CD _player_ is a surprisingly analogue device.
I repaired a CD player recently and learned that the control system which guides and powers the laser is entirely analogue. Only the audio pickup was a digital signal.
I'm sure designs vary, but it made a great deal of sense when you consider a design from the 70s and 80s.
A CD is digital, but a CD _player_ is a surprisingly analogue device.
I think people put too much value on the "digital" vs "analog" distinction. Note for example:
> The whole idea of engraving sound into a physics object is a still pretty wild
Yeah that's exactly what it is, "analog" or "digital".
> The whole idea of engraving sound into a physics object is a still pretty wild
Yeah that's exactly what it is, "analog" or "digital".
I have a theory that fashion (set design, clothes, makeup, UX) progresses as fast as the audio/video media begins to show age. Pictures are clearly dated by the media itself, which means the contents of the pictures are also inevitably dated.
Fashion seemed to progress quickly during the 70s/80s and then begin to decelerate from the 90s onwards.
It is more difficult now to date recordings from the 90s based only the audio/video quality which means it takes longer before it "feels old".
Fashion seemed to progress quickly during the 70s/80s and then begin to decelerate from the 90s onwards.
It is more difficult now to date recordings from the 90s based only the audio/video quality which means it takes longer before it "feels old".
Full version (including history of sound recording devices) https://youtu.be/_Tx6TYnPat8
It’s fascinating to me that the CD didn’t enter my household until the mid-90s. It speaks to exactly what the woman in the video said about cartridges and tapes. I can’t say that I know why it took more than a decade for CDs to become common place, but I do find it fascinating.
Well they were expensive... like 30€ a disk. cassettes were easy to duplicate and cheaper.
I hated CDs. Too big to be carried in a pocket. Read-only, until CD-R
came out. Single use, until CD-RW came out. Required careful handling,
to avoid getting fingerprints on the read-side etc.
In some ways not unlike vinyl, in its proneness to damage. Lastly,
I had terrible luck with CD players and CD drives; they'd wear out after
a couple years of heavy use.
For me, CD was a step backward, lacking the robustness and convenience of cassette.
As a medium of information exchange between computers, I can make a similar comparison between the CD and the 3.5-inch floppy. Aside from their limited space, I much preferred the floppy to the CD.
For me, CD was a step backward, lacking the robustness and convenience of cassette.
As a medium of information exchange between computers, I can make a similar comparison between the CD and the 3.5-inch floppy. Aside from their limited space, I much preferred the floppy to the CD.
Those are nitpicks. The capacity (450x) and speed jumps (20% more at just 1X, to 7 MiB/s at 48X) from floppies to CDs was enormous. Vinyl doesn't have ECC, while most kinds of CD tracks do.
CD-R was partially muti-use if not closed and adding another session.
I never had a CD stand-alone player or computer CD writer or player wear-out. Sony Discman and Plextor burners. I was doing daily, multi-disc (9-10) backups to media and never had a problem. You must've been using cheap drives or unbalanced media at too high of a speed.
CD-R was partially muti-use if not closed and adding another session.
I never had a CD stand-alone player or computer CD writer or player wear-out. Sony Discman and Plextor burners. I was doing daily, multi-disc (9-10) backups to media and never had a problem. You must've been using cheap drives or unbalanced media at too high of a speed.
> Aside from their limited space, I much preferred the floppy to the CD.
The use cases where each of those would be more convenient than the other are largely different. The CD had a capacity that you couldn't even begin to approach with any reasonable amount of floppies, and the read or write speeds of floppies would have made handling larger files rather cumbersome even if they had the capacity.
If you had a 20 kilobyte Word file or perhaps even a few smallish image files that you wanted to transfer, a floppy would of course be much, much more convenient than going through all the trouble of burning a CD.
The use cases where each of those would be more convenient than the other are largely different. The CD had a capacity that you couldn't even begin to approach with any reasonable amount of floppies, and the read or write speeds of floppies would have made handling larger files rather cumbersome even if they had the capacity.
If you had a 20 kilobyte Word file or perhaps even a few smallish image files that you wanted to transfer, a floppy would of course be much, much more convenient than going through all the trouble of burning a CD.
>If you had a 20 kilobyte Word file or perhaps even a few smallish image files that you wanted to transfer, a floppy would of course be much, much more convenient than going through all the trouble of burning a CD.
Well, later there was DVD-RAM which was essentially random-writable block device DVD. Orignally they even had floppy-like caddies: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/43/DVD-RAM_...
Well, later there was DVD-RAM which was essentially random-writable block device DVD. Orignally they even had floppy-like caddies: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/43/DVD-RAM_...
Diffraction gratings made optical laser disc media possible.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diffraction_grating#Examples
https://electronics.howstuffworks.com/cd.htm
http://physics.randolphcollege.edu/lab/106_116lab/Laser/CD.h...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diffraction_grating#Examples
https://electronics.howstuffworks.com/cd.htm
http://physics.randolphcollege.edu/lab/106_116lab/Laser/CD.h...
Pretty impressive to see a 40-year-old technology still around with modern, popular devices still being shipped that can read the discs. Future technologies like DVD and Bluray using the same form factor was a huge reason, and despite what Neil Young would have you believe, 16 bits and 44kHz really is good enough for human perception.
Especially worth watching the quote right at the end.
Indeed, so prescient at the end but also at the end, for contrast, too newb to not keep their fingerprints off the read side of the disc!