Len:

>I.e., to my ears it's irrelevant, and it's certainly not worth the cost
>of replacing my collection of nearly 5000 CDs.  I did it once for LPs,
>because it was worth it, but I have no intention of doing it again.  I'll
>buy hybrid SACDs if I have to, but the day the CD becomes "obsolete" is
>probably the day I stop buying recordings.

First of all, regarding cost.  If I recall correctly, in 1983 CDs
cost $22.  I *may* be wrong here, but in the '73 premium Lp's cost what,
$8.99?  How much is *this* in today's dollars?  Now in 2004 an SACD with
3 layers--CD, SACD stereo, and SACD surround* cost between $12.99,
(Naxos), $14.99, (Sony and RCA), and $22, (Hyperion and Chandos).  Hmmm.
Is the cost of an SACD really that outrageous?

(*Yes quadraphonia fizzled out like chest hair, but count how many houses
*now* have surround already in place for movies.  And why not DVD-A?
I've read--and it's silly--that psychologically, people in America don't
like mixing their video system with audio, and they equate DVD with bad
sound.)

Believe me, this was a hard decision to make.  While one can live with
Lp's and CDs because both do different things very well, living with the
two new formats, CD and SACD, in which the later beats the former in
every way *is* kinda weird, and it took me a long time to stop being
irrational and just do it, as SACDs give one almost the whole soundwave
in numbers, rather than 1 out of every 4 numbers, or bits, as the CD
does.  I finally understand what vinyl enthusiasts have been lamenting
about for the last 20 years.  But I don't intend to sell my entire CD
collection.  No one has to.  If you like large-scale orchestral music,
and have a stereo system @$1000+, set up correctly in for stereo or
surround, and you listen to music as an event, (you sit in a chair
triangulated with your speakers), you'll hear a difference.

It is the obsolescence of CDs that has caused me to actually *buy*
music again.  Was there really much left to buy in the old format?  We
have competing recordings of 2nd, 3rd, and even 4th-rate composers and
the posthumous torsos of Cui, completed by....  You get the idea.  Maybe
the switch is easier for me because, evolution willing, I have a good
50 years still to collect and listen, and I haven't lived through and
lost money on endless new format offerings.  But please--and I direct
this to all dissenters--don't call the introduction of *one* technological
advancement in 20+ years nothing more than a devious way to squeeze money
out of people.  This is silly.

John Smyth
Sac, CA USA