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Has iTunes, etc. impacted your listening habits?

Long before there was MP3, or at least long before I knew about it, my only real choice for music was to pick a disc out of the collection, throw it into my player of choice at that moment, and press play. Want to hear something else? Take the old disc out, put in the new one, etc.

But since I've burned my entire collection (minus non-hybrid SACDs) into my computer, I find it's just so damned EASY to press play and hear it through the mediocre desktop system. No changing discs, file through every range of song, artist, genre, etc.

Now, I don't have those lovely audiophile listening sessions on the big rig quite as often. And when I do, I'm listening to those non-hybrid SACDs that aren't on the computer.

Solution? Upgrades, baby! Get that main system back to where it's just so thoroughly compelling that the little ol' Dell just won't cut it any more.

I suppose I could have invested in wireless solutions to beam those wireless tracks to the big rig, but somehow I'm not covinced that it's a fully matured tachnology/too expensive right now/limited capability/I can't totally give up the 5 1/4" discs/whatever the hell else I'm worried about.

Has anyone else had their listening habits impacted by the MP3/iTunes revolution?

--Brian
thedautch
riffer
362 posts
 
No.

I'm not a technophobe either. I build my own computers and have a nice setup for computer audio.

I just can't see spending money on low resolution audio. Even if I was interested in playing audio on my computer, I would buy the CD and rip it to flac. If an LP is available, I will go for that first.
schipo
1,267 posts
 
My question to all who have so called ripped your cds to a pc system, are you getting rid of your software after you have performed this ritual,or are you holding on to your cds in case of lost files because of a possible crash.
kublakhan
717 posts
 
schipo, i'm holding onto the cds in case of who know what...but as far as a computer crash, not worried about it. I have a spare hard drive back up. hard drives are cheap these days. i keep other stuff backed up on it as well
schipo
1,267 posts
 
And the sound quality would you say it was up to par compared to your existing cd and sacd players,or is it just a convienance?
artmaltman
769 posts
 
I listen to a lot more music at the gym, travel, etc, because it's so easy to rip cds with iTunes and sync to my iPod. I still don't use it at home though. But, this may be temporary.

I just came from the Head-Fi convention in San Jose, and what I saw there (in addition to trying out the best new in-ear cans!) lead me to believe that computer-based music is the future. Lot's of energy is going into high quality external DAC's and means to get the bits out of iTunes into that DAC.

Then I went to the Apple Store and low and behold, there is the new Apple TV capturing music and movies wirelessly from a computer to a a TV....

Like the initiator of this thread suggests - it is so damn easy to change albums, build playlists, etc... It's a revolution.

The next medium for music is the hard disk.

Art
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