#portable music players

[bastionofbibliophiles]

A CD player skipping when bumped is annoying, but it's really amazing that they can play as well as they do.

Data on a CD is stored as a series of "pits" (indentations) and "lands" (non-indented sections) in a single track that spirals from the inside to the outside. Each pit is only 500 nanometers wide, 100 nanometers deep, and between 850 and 3,500 nanometers long, and the center-to-center distance between successive loops of the track is only 1,600 nanometers. That means there are 15,875 loops per inch or 6,250 loops per centimeter. For reference, a typical E. coli bacterium is a tiny tube between 250 and 1,000 nanometers in diameter and about 2,000 nanometers long. To top it off, when played a CD is spun between 200 and 500 times per minute.

A CD is read with a tiny laser that bounces off of the "pits" and "lands" into a photodiode that converts the laser light into an electrical signal. That laser needs to be accurately aimed at something the size of a single bacterium whizzing by at up to 1.4 meters per second, and it has to be able to move to follow the entire spiraling track. And CDs are inexpensive, mass-produced pieces of plastic — they may be slightly thicker or thinner in some places, or they may be slightly warped, or the center hole might not be perfectly centered. Which means they can wobble as they're spun, both side-to-side and up-and-down, even if the CD player is rock-solid. And the laser needs to track all of that motion perfectly or else data will be missed.

With a vinyl record you at least have a physical needle riding inside a continuous groove, with the walls of the groove keeping the needle on-track even with significant vibration or physical shocks. A tiny laser focused through a tiny lens doesn't even have that benefit to stability.

Once you start putting CD players in things that move, like cars, you can't rely on assuming the player is rock-solid. Truly portable players like the Discman or Walkman make that even worse. Anti-skip technology is really almost miraculous, despite not being perfect. There are multiple types, ranging from software tricks (like reading ahead, storing the data in a rolling buffer, and playing on a delay; if a skip is detected and the new position is within the buffer, it can fix the problem without affecting the playback at all) to physical tricks (like building the spindle and the laser-and-lens assembly on floating mounts that insulate them from external vibrations, preventing skips entirely). Buffering especially became more effective as digital memory got smaller and cheaper, but that is what ultimately killed the CD player: storing entire songs, then entire albums, then entire libraries in digital memory that fits in your pocket.

Anyway, CDs are awesome. Buy CDs of your favorite albums, rip the audio to WAV files for convenient playback on your computer/phone, and store the physical CDs in a cool, dry, dark box as a backup.

If you have a digital library already and want to go physical, you can burn it to CD-Rs (write once, permanently) or CD-RWs (write and re-write and even erase if you want, like modern computer memory), but these can be less stable than read-only pressed-in-the-factory CDs because they use color-changing dyes or metal layers instead of the 3D pits of read-only CDs. If you have any CD-Rs or CD-RWs, back them up to a more long-term digital or physical medium as soon as possible, or you risk losing their contents to disc rot.

What was your first source of portable music? Walkman? CD player with headphones? MP3 Player? iPod? Phone? 

[hair-spray-fumes]

Sears Xmas wishlist catalog ad - portable cassette players - 1987

[megadusa]

retro portable player - source ۪ 𝆕

[wikipediapictures]

Sansa Fuze

[t1mmytim]

I had an iPod with random albums from animes my dad liked, and 2 WHOLE MOVIES. (Tangled and Hoodwinked respectively.) :-)

Stealing this idea from the last post I reblogged since it was from the pre-poll days

As always, reblog this so we can get better data

[stone-cold-groove]

The perfect music-listening setup.

[thisisrealy2kok]

Sony MZ-NHF800 Hi-MD Minidisc Walkman Portable Music Player

[europa6502]

Thought it’d be fun to show off my primary device I use for listening to music :3

Aiwa personal stereo: got this last year, works well enough for listening to tapes even if the belts do seem to be on their way out

Panasonic portable CD player: also got this last year. Absolutely love it and is the primary way I listen to CDs

PlayStation Portable: loaded up with MP3s, I love this thing. It’s probably my favorite way to listen to MP3s, especially if I’m trying to be stylish

iPod Classic (in leather case): another stylish way to listen to MP3s, it’s the 120GB model that I got new back in 2012 or so (a few years after release)

iPhone 5S: great for using to listen to downloaded Spotify playlists. I have the Wi-Fi off most of the time to save battery life. This is also what I use to film my YouTube videos

[passmeby]

merry christmas y’all. this thing is amazing

[tranquilitybasehotelcasino]

i smile and kick my feet every time i look at my cd and vinyl collection especially whenever i get an album i love every song of with all my heart

[lumioluna]

they are so cool and hilarious and fun to listen to (cock pushups - tenacious d)

[wonderbutch]

another thing added to my physical media collection: a portable cd player! got this for $12 in perfect working order!

[amethystsoda]

shifting my space story into a game format like stardew or mistria has given me so many more ideas + ways to interact with the universe i’ve been dreaming about.

Everything becomes more feasible and I can actually use all the characters and locales I want 😈

[hair-spray-fumes]

Sharp ad - Sears Christmas wishlist catalog - 1986

[suave-hogan]

The cool thing about having one of those portable CD players is that you can just hold it in your hands and feel the soft hum of the disc’s rotation as you listen to the music

[asiminthering]

IF FOUND: RETURN TO SPIDER-PUNK (AFTER LISTENING)

You know who has never made a fanmix and doesn't know how they work? Me. You know who made one? Also me.

Imagined as a C60 cassette tape, A side 30 minutes/12 songs, B side 30 minutes/11 songs Because. A side is more solidly just punk music (esp older stuff), B side has some more alternative rock-ish stuff, newer stuff, etc Because.

Listen here on Spotify, OR if you are into the old-fashioned fanmix things, you can download it here (mostly with shitty 192 bitrates but whatever) with the album art, divided into 2 "discs" (A side/B side), etc. There was also one specific version of one song Spotify didn't have so the uploaded version has the correct one but the version Spotify does have is. Fine.

Disclaimer: I haven't been really into punk music for 15 years or so, aside from a few favorites that are in the regular rotation, but it was a chance to listen to a lot of different stuff incl new stuff and pick some songs so uh anyway I had fun.

Tracklist & album art credits below the cut (warning for uh. language in band names and track titles? It's punk music.)

A side:

Punk Is Dead - Crass

C.I.D. - UK Subs

Rebel Girl - Bikini Kill

Should I Stay Or Should I Go - The Clash

Attitude - Bad Brains

International News - National Wake

17 Years Of Hell - The Partisans

Gimme Gimme Gimme - Black Flag

Shitlist - L7

Wankers - The Exploited

Rancid - Roots Radical

Hard Action - Pure Hell

B side:

Don't Follow Me - Rebelmatic

Coming Down to Beijing - Brain Failure

Criminal - Generacion Suicida

Black Union Jack - Half/Time

Uraraka - Amano Tsukiko

Provoke You - Sihasin

Crudo Soy - Los Crudos

Voice of Memphis - Negro Terror

Fly - Cherry Filter

Rock-N-Roll Victim - Death

Fuck These Fucking Fascists - The Muslims

Album Art Credits:

Expose42 "Checkers" Textures (I cannot find these specific textures anymore - they were apparently downloaded in 2011 - but my credit file says they're by Expose42)

Miss Minn - Bleeding Love Tutorial Textures (I apparently downloaded these in 2007 and can't seem to find this person anymore, if anyone has a current link for them, let me know)

Official Hobie Brown/Spider Art

Kyle's Brushes

Sony Cassette Tape (product image from yahoo search)