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CD sales growth outpaced vinyl in the first half of 2026

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Re: CD sales growth outpaced vinyl in the first half of 2026

#111

Post by _jackdk_ »

q7xvh97o2pDhNrh wrote: post #39
throw0101d wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The real problem was almost no one had a CD player not even in their car! And here I am driving a 2003 Golf with a tape deck (and CD player).

> And here I am driving a 2003 Golf with a tape deck (and CD player). That sounds wonderful. There was a brief, magical moment in history when cars would come with AM/FM radio, a tape deck, a CD player, and an aux port so that you could plug in audio from every other device that humanity would invent for the rest of time. It feels like the most fleeting of moments, and it was so long ago. Maybe it was just one summer…

Perhaps coincidentally, it was also around the same brief beautiful moment in time where one could talk with all of one's friends using a single messaging client, possibly even over federated XMPP.

Re: CD sales growth outpaced vinyl in the first half of 2026

#114

Post by iamben »

herrh wrote: post #107

In order to make my kids (2 and 4) be able to play music on their own without having to use a smart device or screen i bought an old boombox for like 10 dollars a couple of years ago. We buy a lot of records, though exclusively in goodwill-like stores, and they love it. They have a lot of audiobooks for kids but also cd:s with music. A favourite right now is Aquas debut album Aquarium (the one with Barbie Girl) I thi…

One of my absolute favourite things as an impressionable teen getting into music was reading through the liner notes in the CD booklets.

You'd read the lyrics, see some pictures, and best you'd scour through the thank you section and those would be the bands you'd look for next time you were in the record shop. Great times.

Re: CD sales growth outpaced vinyl in the first half of 2026

#115

Post by grishka »

kalleboo wrote: post #72
shimman wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there a reason why or is it just the quality of the materials?

CD-Rs use an organic dye which fades (or in the worst case the bonds holding it on can delaminate). They hold up much better if stored in a dark place. A spindle on a shelf that sees sunlight is the worst case and they can become unreadable in years.

Also don't CD-Rs need a more sensitive detector in the drive to read? I remember seeing somewhere that early drives have trouble with them

Re: CD sales growth outpaced vinyl in the first half of 2026

#116

Post by danshipt »

helterskelter wrote: post #14

Kids these days want CD's, ipods and the original apple headphones. They call it "retro".

I think it’s because they are more convenient: CDs are cheap, you own your music. With iPods you save hundreds of dollars per year, and you get to keep your music (and the iPod shuffle is perfect for working out).

Re: CD sales growth outpaced vinyl in the first half of 2026

#117

Post by account42 »

ColdStream wrote: post #58
smelendez wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The most common CD players around now are probably video game consoles.

And even then I think it is only up to the 360/Ps3 generation. After that they only play DVD's/Blu Ray as it is a cheaper laser component.

Wait really? How much can the second laser possibly add to the BOM of a mass produced device? Now I'm wondering if there are also PC drives that cheap out like that - can't say I have tried a CD yet in the one I have right now.

Re: CD sales growth outpaced vinyl in the first half of 2026

#118

Post by maccard »

dylan604 wrote: post #49
cdrnsf wrote: post #18

Buy CDs, buy vinyl, buy merch, go see shows — support artists instead of platforms and middlemen wherever you can. This is a welcome trend.

There's a couple of artists that I would absolutely buy their vinyl except the shipping is more expensive than the vinyl. I've done it a couple of times for artists I really like and appreciate, but it is most definitely cost prohibitive. So it's pay their bandcamp prices for the digitals and streaming, but the physical media is just made in too limited quantities to be affordable by anyone but FAANG employees

I've not seen a case where shipping was more expensive than vinyl but;

I made an album and sell the vinyl on our website. The sleeve to ship the vinyl safely in was somewhere between £0.5 and £1 depending on where we bought it from. Actually shipping it cost £5. So the £30 vinyl came with £6 in shipping fees. Lots of people complained to us that it was expensive, but that's just what it cost.

Re: CD sales growth outpaced vinyl in the first half of 2026

#119

Post by maccard »

helterskelter wrote: post #15
threetonesun wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Vinyl is just more cumbersome to make and ship and store, there's no way the price goes down. As someone who only likes vinyl for the art size I'd almost wish CD longboxes or something similar would come back.

Most (all?) new vinyls these days were originally digital files anyways. I like the big album covers though, and the ritual of turning them over in the middle.

I had my album printed on vinyl a while back. We had very specific instructions on how to prepare it, but it was effectively two files, one for side A and one for side B, and we were told the padding margins for start/end to leave. All vinyl has likely passed through some digital format for the last 45 years.

We mastered specifically for vinyl as a format though, the difference between the spotify masters and the vinyl masters is quite significant.

Re: CD sales growth outpaced vinyl in the first half of 2026

#120

Post by specproc »

l72 wrote: post #16

A friend in his 40s had a 90s birthday party so I burned some mix CDs as party favors. Those CDrs were 20 years old and have been sitting in a hot, humid attic for the last 10+ years, but still recorded fine. The real problem was almost no one had a CD player not even in their car! Also, I don’t think k3b or any of the other software i tried has been updated since 2005, but it all still worked great! Most importantly…

I did the same for a friend's birthday recently: put together a bunch of mix CDs as a present. My concession to the fact he probably doesn't use a CD player much was a QR code, with a link to a matching Spotify playlist.
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