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your first CD

P

pcm

pfm Member
Do you remember your reaction on hearing your very first CD if all you were used to up till then was tapes and LPs?
 
I was underwhelmed. It was at a demo at a HiFi show just after the format's release, and the person demonstrating decided to use an ABBA CD to demonstrate the medium's capabilities - in fairness that was probably all he could get his hands on. Later demonstrations were much more positive, and I bought a Marantz unit not too long afterwards.
 
pcm said:
Do you remember your reaction on hearing your very first CD if all you were used to up till then was tapes and LPs?
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My first CD listening experience came from a Mission PCM7000. Until then, I had only LPs spun on an LP12/Ittok.

Frankly, I was very disappointed. It sounded like nails on a blackboard. It was on-sold fairly quickly and I didn't buy another CD-P for quite a few years. I'd sooner put up with pops and crackles than that horrid hash I heard mimicking as music.

The PCM7000 is digital crap of the highest order. I know this to be true because the very same CDs I kept from the late 1980s sound sublime on my Densen B-400XS. It was an unfortunate start for me, but alls well that ends well.
 
Yes, I was 15 and an early-adopter mate had worked the summer on his Dad's farm to buy a Phillips CDP. It was The Future and it sounded fantastic after his Dual CS 505. No scratches. Perfect sound forever. We believed it, same as we believed that the LP12 was The Best Record Player In The World And Always Will Be. It said so in the mags, didn't it?
 
I bought a Philips CD104 - the one with the drawer which took 5 minutes to come out, along with 4 CDs from someone who'd obviously tried and given up. The CDs were Rumours, Suzanne Vega, Hounds of Love and Belladonna by Stevie Nicks - all of which I liked at the time. Subsequently bought a number of early classical CDs which sounded fine (alongside the LP12/Ittok I had). Amazingly I got great sounds from this ancient machine through a 42/110 into Kans!
 
stevec67 said:
Yes, I was 15 and an early-adopter mate had worked the summer on his Dad's farm to buy a Phillips CDP. It was The Future and it sounded fantastic after his Dual CS 505. No scratches. Perfect sound forever. We believed it, same as we believed that the LP12 was The Best Record Player In The World And Always Will Be. It said so in the mags, didn't it?
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My first cdp was a Toshiba my brother bought me. We unpacked it plugged it in next to my Dual 505 and it actually sounded worse than the Dual ( now that takes some doing). You should have seen his face! He actually agreed it sounded worse. First dic was Karajan,BPO, Ma Vlast.
 
Enigma 2 - I didnt have a cd player at the time except on a computer. It had a nice logo printed on it. I tried listening to some remastered Hendrix on an officially sanctioned release.

That Hendrix put me off cd for nearly 10 years whilst the medium matured into streaming and I bought a Planet in the hope it did bring analogue sensibilities to cd sound

Then I discovered playing cd's into valves sorts them out for me and then cd's began to decline - many here seem to have bought their last cd too
 
Yep, it was the very first Meridian player, based on the Philips 14 bit x4 tech of the time.

Ho-hum. Upgraded my turntable.
 
Hugely impressed! No hiss or crackle and pop, no wow, one hour playing time and no wear.

I first heard CD in 1978/9 when I worked for Philips and couldn't wait for the commercial release. Even the 32k sampled 14 bit prototypes were better than anything short of the master tapes, and better even than analogue master tapes. Superb in every way.

S
 
I don't remember my first CD, but I do the player, it was a Denon DCD 1000 (i think), I had a Thorens TD 160 BC MKII at the time and always felt the record player sounded better.

Not much has changed in all that time.
 
I was used to listening to pre-recorded cassettes and the occasional record on a cheap all in one deck, when heard the CD version of some songs I was used to it, I couldn't believe the pitch stability, lack of hiss, crackle and pops, and instant track access.
 
I'm surprised Brother In Arms hasn't been mentioned yet. I really can't remember the first CD I bought, but do remember that the Dire Straits album was instrumental in selling the new technology to the masses.
 
My cousin one Xmas had a Sony CD player and I was amazed at the fact you could instantly skip between tracks using a remote. A couple of days later my dads friend got a 5 disc Sony player which was even more impressive to me, must've been late 80's. My dad soon after got a Saisho (!) CD player from dixons but it had neither a remote nor 5 disc capability.

My first player was a Trichord Genesis many years later which twice had to have its laser replaced at great expense before I gave up and bought a less exotic Arcam Alpha 8 which is still going strong with no problems 15 years later after being given to my dad.
 
I bought Brothers In Arms on vinyl the week it came out. It was just as crap in that format as on a CD. I still have it nearly 30 years on, still don't much like it. The preceding albums are great, though.
 
ian r said:
Then I discovered playing cd's into valves sorts them out for me ...
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Interestingly, my second CD-P featured a pair of triodes in its output stage, which made it sound more mellifluous, if not entirely better than vinyl.
 
First CD player was a Marantz CD73 (?) the gold one with a drawer that opened up. First CD was I think Neil Young's Harvest.

Had a LP12/LVV - Though that they were in all honesty pretty similar sounding, the Marantz was mellow to a fault. Problem was that there were almost no CD's at the time, I mean, who wanted Barclay James Harvest?

Sold it after a few years and went back to vinyl. Still have the LP12 though few of the original parts remain.
 
I bought a broken Yamaha CDP for 50 quid in 1986, turned out to be the earth lead had come off the drawer mechanism so when eject was pressed the drawer would open and the close straight away. 1st CD was Camel - Music inspired bt The Snow Goose. I still have it.

TT at the time and still is my Rock II.
 
First CD player I heard was at a show, it was a Technics playing through all Technics equipment, the rock music they were playing sounded great. The next was an early Philips player with Quad amps and KEF speakers, this time the CDs being played were string quartets and I was shocked at how bad they sounded, stainless steel violins, (and this through Quad and KEF!) it put me off for a long time till things slowly improved.
I could not believe it when Karajan said "all else is gaslight" he must have coined a huge fee.
Eventually it was a Meridian player that finally persuaded me to buy.
Errol.
 
I remember my first CD and CD-player.

It was this CD, played on a Philips CD150, somewehere in 1986 or so:

The-Shadows-Moonlight-Shadows-232868.jpg

(I recall getting back to the CD-store to complain about some hiss I heard on a few tracks...CD's weren't supposed to do that! :D )
 
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