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Old 3rd Feb 2023, 11:29 pm   #21
Richard_FM
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Default Re: On This Day In 1983 Phillips Launched The CD.

My Dad waited until late 1988 before buying a CD player.

It was part of a Pioneer stereo system, the CD player died about 12 years ago but I still have the Amplifier, tape deck & tuner.

At the late 1980s CD prices had come down, especially for compilations of older music.
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Old 3rd Feb 2023, 11:50 pm   #22
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Default Re: On This Day In 1983 Phillips Launched The CD.

Ah, happy days i bought at some considerable expense the cd100, worked very well, gave it to my brother in law, wish I'd kept it, seems to be a collectors item, a colleague unloaded a cd104 onto me with the usual eyelet problems, quickly sorted which i still have.
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Old 3rd Feb 2023, 11:52 pm   #23
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Default Re: On This Day In 1983 Phillips Launched The CD.

I bought a Philips CD350, the full width version of the more diminutive 14 bit CD150. Can't remember where from, possibly Sheffield Sound Centre?

After a year or two, replaced that with an ex service stock 16 bit CD650 I bought cheap from Boots in Doncaster. It later developed treble distortion, turned out to be more SMD ceramic caps failing around the DAC - I found some had been replaced previously by fat green mylar caps soldered to the underside of the pcb.

I still have the CD650, though it's had a few repairs now.


Does anyone remember their first CD purchases? I bought Queen - 'The Works', and Joan Armatrading's 'Sleight of Hand' from W H Smith, so I had a choice
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Old 4th Feb 2023, 12:09 am   #24
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Default Re: On This Day In 1983 Phillips Launched The CD.

My first CD player was a Phillips CD104, bought mid 84 I guess for about £330. I still have it though it needs a bit of TLC.

I know a previous post mentions that its 14 bit resolution sounded 'fatiguing' but I have to say that I never found it so. It's also worth saying that these old CD104's are pretty highly regarded - the transport is reputedly one of the best ever built and a lot of folk out there are modifying them and claim to get excellent sound. The 14 bit thing doesn't seem to deter them at all.

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Old 4th Feb 2023, 12:22 am   #25
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Default Re: On This Day In 1983 Phillips Launched The CD.

My first girlfriend and my best mate were both early adopters, equipped with a Philips CD100 and a Sony CDP-101 respectively, before I knew either of them. In 1986, I suddenly had to catch up, and actually jumped ahead technologically into the realm of 16-bit 4x oversampling, with my very own CD650 that I received as a present (and that was quite a sumptuous present for a teenager.) I'm still using it, and my mate is still using his CDP-101. I've repaired both machines once each.

One of the novel features of the CD650 was FTS - Favourite Track Selection, that stores any user track and time program in non-volatile memory associated with a specific disc for future recall. With the player came a sheet of 150 or so stickers to put on the jewel case spines to identify the FTS program. Apparently, my first CD bought during ownership of the player was the Autobiography of Supertramp, which still sports its 'FTS001' sticker today.

As fond as I am of the CD650 that has served me well for 36 years, I have to concede that the functionally basic B & O CD-X (their re-work of the CD104) that sat on my parents' sideboard for a few years beat it for looks. That is currently inop and sat in my to do pile, probably with open-circuit griplets like so many CD104s.

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Old 4th Feb 2023, 12:59 am   #26
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Default Re: On This Day In 1983 Phillips Launched The CD.

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One of the novel features of the CD650 was FTS - Favourite Track Selection, that stores any user track and time program in non-volatile memory associated with a specific disc for future recall. With the player came a sheet of 150 or so stickers to put on the jewel case spines to identify the FTS program. Apparently, my first CD bought during ownership of the player was the Autobiography of Supertramp, which still sports its 'FTS001' sticker today.
I still have the unused sheet of stickers that came with mine, kept them with the user manual and have remained untouched.
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Old 4th Feb 2023, 1:41 am   #27
jamesperrett
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Default Re: On This Day In 1983 Phillips Launched The CD.

While the early Philips players used 14 bit D/A convertors, they were oversampled at 4X which gave the machine the equivalent of 16 bit performance. Nowadays we use convertors with far fewer bits but oversampled at a much higher rate to give even better performance.

My first player was a Sentra 880 and sold by Rumbelows for under £200 in 1985. I seem to remember it used Philips convertors with Japanese control chips and the reviews in the hifi mags were reasonably good. It still sort of worked last time I tried it but the laser carriage seemed very sticky.
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Old 4th Feb 2023, 1:42 am   #28
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I know a previous post mentions that its 14 bit resolution sounded 'fatiguing' but I have to say that I never found it so.
Nor me, I've always preferred the sound of the 4x oversampling players to the 16 bit and bitstream players, even before you start modding.
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Old 4th Feb 2023, 1:20 pm   #29
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Default Re: On This Day In 1983 Phillips Launched The CD.

(I'm hoping my memory is not playing tricks on me...)

The thing I never understood about CDs was why then came in such a tall/long box. This might have just been a US thing though because a lot of CDs I have were purchased in US shops like Tower Records. They didn't follow the UK norm of wanting the equivaletn of 20 pounds for the same music people mostly had already.
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Old 4th Feb 2023, 1:31 pm   #30
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Default Re: On This Day In 1983 Phillips Launched The CD.

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The thing I never understood about CDs was why then came in such a tall/long box.
That's new to me, aside from a very few releases presented in a book-like format usually with numerous pages. DVDs, on the other hand...

Paul
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Old 4th Feb 2023, 1:37 pm   #31
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Default Re: On This Day In 1983 Phillips Launched The CD.

My first machine was the ubiquitous Philips CD100, bought at a reduced price of £225 as newer models were being introduced - it was fair amount of money in 1984.

I regret selling it in the early 90s, but CDs were being introduced with more tracks than the programming buttons the CD100 could cope with. Hence I bought the CD373 with a favourite tracks facility. Only now do people rave about the build quality of those early Philips machines.
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Old 4th Feb 2023, 1:40 pm   #32
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Default Re: On This Day In 1983 Phillips Launched The CD.

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Quote:
Originally Posted by wireman View Post
The thing I never understood about CDs was why then came in such a tall/long box.
That's new to me, aside from a very few releases presented in a book-like format usually with numerous pages. DVDs, on the other hand...

Paul
Seems it was a US thing...

https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/...ig-early-1990s
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Old 4th Feb 2023, 8:39 pm   #33
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Default Re: On This Day In 1983 Phillips Launched The CD.

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Does anyone remember their first CD purchases? I bought Queen - 'The Works', and Joan Armatrading's 'Sleight of Hand' from W H Smith, so I had a choice
Yes, the day I bought my CD207 from the Philips staff shop I also bought 'Eric Clapton's Rainbow Concert' and 'Ultravox' from the same place. The staff shop was a tad limited for CD choice since they mainly sold any from the Phonogram group (Philips owned). So any artistes on Pye, Philips, Vertigo, Polygram.....I did manage to find an import of 'The Who Sell Out' so added that to my first three CD's. I'm sure I still have those first purchases....
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Old 4th Feb 2023, 11:30 pm   #34
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Default Re: On This Day In 1983 Phillips Launched The CD.

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Paul_RK View Post
Quote:
Originally Posted by wireman View Post
The thing I never understood about CDs was why then came in such a tall/long box.
That's new to me, aside from a very few releases presented in a book-like format usually with numerous pages. DVDs, on the other hand...

Paul
Seems it was a US thing...

https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/...ig-early-1990s
I heard it was so record shops could still use their existing racks which had previously held 12" vinyl.

When I visited Florida in 1998 one shop had standard boxed CDs displayed with clip on plastic legs so they could be displayed in old racking.
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Old 5th Feb 2023, 12:07 am   #35
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Default Re: On This Day In 1983 Philips Launched The CD.

We were very late to the CD party, my dad decided to get a CD player sometime around 1991, and so we went out to Dixons in Milton Keynes, and bought a Matsui CDS1000, ex display model. Nothing exciting! I do remember my dad having to go back because the remote control was the wrong one… our first CD was rather embarrassing, Shakespeare sister, Hormonally yours! The player was used with a late 80’s Panasonic music centre, I still have both, and the CD player does still work! It looked like it used a Philips mech, similar to the Philips CD104. I was only 6 or 7 years old round that time. Not long after my Dad bought me my very own CD player, in the form of a Samsung boombox, and my first CD for that was Queen, The works, which I also still have! And it also still works!

I have always had a liking for CD players, and have ended up with a fair pile of them, amongst them are a few early ones, a CD104 that I got from a junk shop for £12, Sony’s first Discman, and a B&O Beogram CD50. Still can’t beat the older players for ease of use and speed of operation. Some newer players are really slow! The worst being a Hitachi that’s actually a DVD player dressed up as a CD player, and also a Cambridge audio one that’s just really slow, the old Matsui has read the TOC, and started playing before the Cambridge Audio one has even read the TOC!

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Old 5th Feb 2023, 1:01 am   #36
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And just five years later I equipped myself to play them, because the releases I wanted to hear were starting to happen on CD only.
I remember asking my dad to buy a CD player in 1985. He said he wouldn't be bothering, he could remember the introduction of LPs and then cassette, so didn't see the point in anything else. He bought a CD player in 1986
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Old 5th Feb 2023, 1:35 am   #37
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John Dunn for those who haven’t heard of him was an excellent presenter, very much missed.
Lovely bloke, thoroughly professional, too. He started off as a Studio Manager before crossing the footlights, and was very easy to work with.
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Old 5th Feb 2023, 1:44 am   #38
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Default Re: On This Day In 1983 Phillips Launched The CD.

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In the early 1990s BBC Music Magazine launched with a cover CD. I stopped by at a Post Office/newsagent in a not particularly salubrious part of town to post a packet and was rather surprised to see what was edition no. 1 on the shelf. I have every edition since and a bookcase full of CDs. These expanded my listening experience greatly and exposed me to music I would never have considered buying; and I enjoy browsing the shelves to pick something out to play and reading the sleeve notes.
Agreed, excellent series. They're threatening to ditch the CD (again), in which case it's goodbye from me - what's left is not worth the price of admission.
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Old 5th Feb 2023, 2:28 am   #39
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Default Re: On This Day In 1983 Philips Launched The CD.

Just a side note on the topic;

A couple of years later when CD’s came out, info was sometimes included on the disc about how the programme music on the CD disc was produced, the recording process, mastering then obviously the disc itself. DDD, or ADD.

Back then in the late 80’s and early 90’s, I think a lot of (in my own opinion) digitally recorded music lacked and sounded thin due to early A/D, D/A converter technology in the recording studio and mastering, that’s not the case any more. I think Jimi Page done an absolute remarkable job remastering the Led Zeppelin tapes to CD.
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Old 5th Feb 2023, 2:34 am   #40
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Default Re: On This Day In 1983 Philips Launched The CD.

I was also not in a hurry to get into CDs. They were significantly more expensive than LPs or cassettes, both of which seemed good enough for me. I was also somewhat cynical - I thought CDs were a con by the record companies to make people pay more money for the same piece of music.

When I finally caved in and got a CD player, some budget-priced CDs had started to appear in record shops for less than £3, so it was more affordable to get into. The cheaper discs were mostly older, less popular music, sometimes re-recorded for CD. This actually made me more cynical. If CDs could be made and sold at a profit for £3, why does a chart CD cost more than £10? It seemed like a rip-off. To put this into perspective, in the early 1990s I was working in a low-paid job earning £3.20 per hour. A chart CD was therefore about 3 or 4 hours' work, so I didn't buy many of them.

As the years went by, the price of new CDs remained fairly constant, but I earned a lot more money so I didn't worry about the cost so much. In the last few years, used CDs can be picked up for pennies. It's been great - I've collected hundreds of discs that I could never have afforded back in the day. And the sound quality is still as good as when they were made. Some of them date from the 1980s.

The compact disc has been hugely successful, with billions sold and new ones still being produced after 40 years. The technology is not completely infallible, though. Bad scratches can make a CD unplayable, but a disc can quite often be repaired by polishing out the scratches. A more serious problem: I've come across some CDs marked "MADE IN U.K. BY PDO" on their inner ring where the silver surface has changed to a bronze / gold colour over time. The disc then becomes unplayable - there is no cure. PDO admitted it was a manufacturing defect and offered to replace affected discs for free. Unfortunately this offer has now finished. I found out too late and am stuck with a number of duff discs. On the whole, pre-recorded CDs are very durable if looked after properly. The jury's still out on CD-R discs. I have some over 20 years old. A few have gone bad, all from the same batch.
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