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Why on Earth are Car Radios still equipped with CD's

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1kyle

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Hi all

For the life of me I can't see why Car Radios are STILL being manufactured which play CD's. Almost every radio I've ever seen recently incorporates a CD player - something I've NEVER used in a Car.

Apart from the bulk of the CD's and the usually not so good stability problems even a unit playing a FLASH DRIVE or USB connected card reader would be better --and it should be made a CAPITAL OFFENCE (or at least deserving a public a FLOOGING ) not to provide an easy FRONT ACCESS AUX IN on the front panel.

I never did like CD's in Car radios --the silly changer units you had to have in the boot / trunk of you car and the whole idea of

loading up a number of CD's in the boot before you started your journey to me was a total NO-NO.

MD would have been 100% perfect for Car Radios. --Luckily I still have my old kenwood but only SP/LP2/LP4. I'd have loved a HI-MD unit but that doesn't seem to be appearing.

A flash card reader unit or at least an AUX IN would be fine --forget about CD's for cars -- Dinosaur Technology.

I wonder --do any of the people who design Car Radios actually ever drive.

Cheers

-K

Edited by 1kyle
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People are lazy. They buy a medium and want to be able to play it directly without conversion. Have you seen music been sold on MD or flash lately?

Many CD radios can play mp3 (CDs), some of them even have flash card and/or USB slots, which make them useful even for the "geeks" IMO.

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Hi all

For the life of me I can't see why Car Radios are STILL being manufactured which play CD's.

I can. There are billions out there. Millions sold each year. Costs cents to burn one on the PC. Makes sense. It's the world's most popular music carrier with many posers trying to take it over, but failing. Also the most easily shared with that reassuring "no problemo" wink and a smile.

...and it does lossless...as god intended.

Stability is just fine with a little care, particularly premastered discs.

As for standard connections on the front panel not being made available, I'm all for that public flogging.

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I'm definitely with you on the aux-part... but

I'm a fan of my in-car CD-player! My girlfriend and I will never agree on radio stations (I like the alternative one better and she's into commercial 80's stuff...) but we do have a few CD's that we both can agree on, but only ten of them or so. No need to keep a whole stash of CD's in my car cause when I have to ride for long(er) stretches, my girlfriend is with me and she just loves acting as a lazy DJ giving all those mutual CD's a bit of playtime according to her state of mind and when I'm alone I mostly only need my car for a relatively short distance and I just love to put on my one favorite CD of the moment / turn to the one radio station I can stand / scan the radio freqs and enjoy myself nagging about the rubbish they dare to air... so yes, I would've loved an aux, and to a lesser degree MP3 CD in my car, but as I got a decent Sony CD/tuner system with my second-hand car I won't complain at all

HiMD would be ok, but really not even necessary and I don't think I would spend money on it...but I would definitely resell...uhm, throw out a legacy MD-player as I do not feel the need at all to create special in-car legacy discs. I'd rather enjoy the time outside my car with great quality music and the time in my car with my eyes/ears focused on the road (saw just too many car-crashes from lack of attention recently... some involving very close friends and not their lack of attention either)

Edited by The Low Volta
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  • 2 weeks later...

Simple answer is, as big as MP3 is now, CD is STILL the most popular medium for listening to music. More people still have collections of CDs, more than any other format.

The CD format was invented in the late 70s (albeit a crappy version) and took about ten years to become the most-used medium, such is the slow pace of populations to catch on (prices/markets allowing).

I predict that in ten years time, MP3 or some other compressed format will have become the most popular for cars (as it is now for walkmans), with SACD or DVD-Audio being standard for the home.

Who knows - maybe later generations of compressed formats will be looking to emulate the likes of SACD - although, to be fair, I doubt it, as the real cream of high quality can't really be appreciated in outdoor/travel environments.

But I digress!

Edited by KanakoAndTheNumbSkulls
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I'm still using cassettes! I have a Cassette adapter which I plug my MP3/HiMD into.

CASSETTES! How DARE you! :punish: I won't hear such talk. Horrible things. Even pre-CD I would never touch the things, always favoured vinyl (you should get one of those in-car vinyl record decks. Ok, I made that up.)

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  • 2 weeks later...

There was an in-car vinyl record player in the Chrysler line in the late 50's.

I solve the "no way to play MD's in my car problem" by uploading them to my PC and burning them to CD-RW discs. Works just fine, as it does for playing commercial CD's. As for changers, why?? I can burn an MP3 CD-RW or CD-R with all the varied stuff I want to hear for 8 - 11 hours of music. Usually longer than I am going to drive. Pretty simple. If I want more music, I burn more discs. B)

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CASSETTES! How DARE you! :punish: I won't hear such talk. Horrible things. Even pre-CD I would never touch the things, always favoured vinyl (you should get one of those in-car vinyl record decks. Ok, I made that up.)

Meant to reply to this.

I have Pioneer CD/MP3 in the other car and to be honest it leaves me cold. The EQ is either too bassy or two much treble and it just sounds clinical. Even with the custom EQ I struggle to get a decent sound out of it. Only Pop sounds decent on it. Classical is hopeless. Rock is just ok. The controls/ergonomics are a nightmare too. Whereas the cassette player has a much better sound all round and has a lovely EQ which I rarely use unless to remove some of the excess bass which you get on a lot of music these days.

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