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MacBH928

macrumors G3
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May 17, 2008
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In a world where Bluray is fighting for its life, not sure how DVD is still making it, I wonder is the CD-R still around?

You still can find it, but seriously, who uses it and for what?
 
In a world where Bluray is fighting for its life, not sure how DVD is still making it, I wonder is the CD-R still around?

You still can find it, but seriously, who uses it and for what?

I do, but I prefer to use CD-RW, rather than CD-R. But I have used both, yes.

I buy CDs, - real ones, 'rip' them, 'burn' them, and I prepare playlists which I give to friends and relatives.

In fact, this very week, I bought several boxes of CD-RWs.

So, yes, to answer your question(s):

1) They still exist, although not everywhere.

2) Some of us still use them, shall continue to use them, and value the fact that they exist.
 
In a world where Bluray is fighting for its life, not sure how DVD is still making it, I wonder is the CD-R still around?

You still can find it, but seriously, who uses it and for what?
They also have a place in business. We send monthly software updates on them.
And before you list twenty other ways we could do it, this customer has hundreds of workstations not connected to the internet.
National security and all that.
 
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I still have a 50 CDR pack that I got for Xmas sometime around 2007 or so that I never touched. I may start burning discs again. I recently bought a used Accord and I like the way it displays the CD info on the stereos screen. I bought a 2012 non retina MBP last summer just so I could still have a computer with a CD/DVD drive for the future.
 
I still have a 50 CDR pack that I got for Xmas sometime around 2007 or so that I never touched. I may start burning discs again. I recently bought a used Accord and I like the way it displays the CD info on the stereos screen. I bought a 2012 non retina MBP last summer just so I could still have a computer with a CD/DVD drive for the future.
A SuperDrive would have been cheaper!
 
A SuperDrive would have been cheaper!

Yes, but with an internal drive, somehow, it may be thought to work better., as it was thought to have been more intimately integrated with the computer's systems.

My old MBP had an internal drive (used a lot by me); these days, as I have a MBA, obviously, I have a Superdrive to hand at all times, as I use them.
 
A SuperDrive would have been cheaper!
I didn't want a superdrive. I wanted the to get the 2012 MBP with the drive built in. I bought the 2012 for about $700 at BestBuy in July of 2015 when they had the Christmas in July sale so I knew I would not get a new 2012 at a better price.

Yes, I have a 2015 MBP and a 2012 Mini but I don't want anything hanging off of those.
 
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What is "dead"?

One word posts? (With a redundant exclamation mark).

CDs? CD-Rs? CD-RWs? The world that gave rise to them, and the market that drove them?

Would you care to elaborate further?

In any case, as several earlier posts have explained, neither the technology nor the demand has 'died'.

Nor, - as is so often the caee, too - is it is case of one technology replacing another. Rather, it is more usual to find several technologies existing simultaneously, as they each fulfil different needs.
 
What is "dead"?

One word posts? (With a redundant exclamation mark).

CDs? CD-Rs? CD-RWs? The world that gave rise to them, and the market that drove them?

Would you care to elaborate further?

In any case, as several earlier posts have explained, neither the technology nor the demand has 'died'.

Nor, - as is so often the caee, too - is it is case of one technology replacing another. Rather, it is more usual to find several technologies existing simultaneously, as they each fulfil different needs.
It's not the go to media it was 10 years ago but it still has it's place in technology. For music purposes sure it's dead, but not for data.
 
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I have a small stack of them probably more then 10 years, CD-R and RW, but I rarely if ever use them and when I do it's to back up important files. I wonder in what quantity you'll find them at the local Best Buy?
 
It's not the go to media it was 10 years ago but it still has it's place in technology. For music purposes sure it's dead, but not for data.

I am a happy buyer of CDs (audio) and Blue Ray discs (movies, concerts) and also (when the price is right) I get some 96/24 audio from HDtracks via web. I know many others who do similar and some remain steady buyers of DVD movies (something I do not do). None of these formats are dead and may remain for several years to come.

What I have seen is some discs cannibalizing the market of other discs tradtionally known for that media.

CDs often now contain compressed music such as MP3 and AAC.
DVDs also containing MP3 and AAC as well as other formats that can be read from DVD players and car stereos
DVDS also being used to contain media data such as both VOB and M2TS files converted to MP4 and MKV etc.

Some folks who like audio books make copies to use in their cars so as not to damage the originals.

When I hit the local brick and mortar stores, audio CDs continue to sell.

On a side note - I'll just say that whatever Apple says about disc media, just know they want you to buy/rent/stream from their on line service and also got rid of the optical disc because it got in the way of their godly mission of THIN above anything else in design and function.
 
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It's not the go to media it was 10 years ago but it still has it's place in technology. For music purposes sure it's dead, but not for data.

I think that it is 'dead' for the youngsters, certainly, - they use, and define themselves by the use of other media - but not for those of us who are ambling through the long golden glades of our middle years.

I have been given gifts of CDs - even personal, private playlist CDs, and I prepare them as gifts, too.

Now, granted, neither the giving or receiving comes from anybody in the first flush of youth, this is true. But, for middle aged music lovers, the CD, CD-R, and CD-RW still has a lot of relevance and resonance.
 
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Is bluray fighting for its life? Most of my friends are tech savvy, and myself, but we still buy them for films we really like.

I haven't burned a CD in a while. I don't think they've got much use with their limited capacity. I still buy DVD's too if they're under £1 and it was something that looked interesting or I once liked. Just the other day our internet was down and I put on Beverly Hills Cop on DVD :) and it was on a TV so far from the router that streaming is just awful.

But yeah. Love blurays, especially the quality of them.
 
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I haven't used a CD-R in 12+ years, I still have a few 50 count packs of them somewhere. I was a _way_ early user of writable optical media (my shop had a couple of $1000 writers in the mid-90s).
 
Since I'm a Macintosh collector, I make frequent use of CD-Rs along with other obsolete media(ZIP, floppy). I use CD-Rs by far and away the most often, though.

My car doesn't have aux inputs, so I burn CDs for it.

I also use them to distribute photos and the like to others.

BTW, I've never really bothered with RWs. Plain CD-Rs and DVD-Rs are cheap enough now to not bother with rewriting.
 
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Its a pretty intense decline in popularity. You're talking about most users being those who are using aging computer hardware that will also soon be replaced. As often as people replace a computer these days I would say the day are more than numbered.
 
I have a ten-year-old car with a CD player and I alternate between buying an album on iTunes and burning it to CD with my SuperDrive so that I can play it in the car or buying an album on CD in the store, bringing it home and immediately putting it into my iTunes library (again using the SuperDrive) so that I'll have it available no matter which way I want to listen to it, and then taking the CD back out to the car to enjoy it there...... If a new album by a favorite artist happens to have bonus tracks available only when buying the CD, that's the route I'll take; otherwise I usually buy my music in iTunes and burn favorites to CD for on-the-road listening.
 
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In a world where Bluray is fighting for its life, not sure how DVD is still making it, I wonder is the CD-R still around?

You still can find it, but seriously, who uses it and for what?


What's better for cheap home long-term archiving?
 
Its a pretty intense decline in popularity. You're talking about most users being those who are using aging computer hardware that will also soon be replaced. As often as people replace a computer these days I would say the day are more than numbered.

Hm.

The current MBA will certainly play (and rip and burn) CDs with the aid of a Superdrive.

And the rMB - allowing for the inevitable hub, will also be able to accommodate a Superdrive. So, no, its days aren't numbered, rather, this is no longer as popular as it was.

I carve, on these threads at the assumption that the development, or evolution, of a brand new form of media, or technology, will result in the demise of everything else.

That is not how it works; the more usual outcome is for some of the older forms of media to exist, - to co-exist, simultaneously, with the newer forms, even if they are satisfying an increasingly niche market.

Many older users, who prize quality of recording (which is less good with he streaming models) and equally - value the older models of purchase, where, when you purchased a CD, you owned it as log as you dd not seek to make a profit from it, disdain the rentier model of the Cloud, and will never embrace it.
 
What's better for cheap home long-term archiving?

There are a couple of makers out there that still offer true archival CD and DVD writable discs. I don't believe they will be around for much longer (1-3 years) on the market. There are alternatives ranging from drives, to cloud and even thumb drives (though I don't trust those just yet).

Here is an old item (2013) but its worth a read... http://adterrasperaspera.com/blog/2006/10/30/how-to-choose-cddvd-archival-media/
 
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