Has CD Quality actually gone down lately?

[ShutterX]

I was wondering if the actual quality of recording in CD has actually gone down of late. I listen to my dads old CDs from the late 80's and 90's and they really sound good.

I recently bought an old favourite from amazon, played a track on Media Monkey and the same track on Spotify. A and B comparison showed the Spotify stream to be better. I find this pretty alarming. My transport is normal DVD rom of the PC.

Is there way to make sure the CD is actually of the 'CD quality' we talk of?

 

[slash1814]

Batch recordings vary. My consistent observation is that older pressings had a good bass with normalized treble response. However "Re-Mastered" ed. have a little (a little) pronounced treble response, in some cases bottom end is also enhanced marginally.

For example, I have 3 versions of michael jacksons Bad (1987,2001,2012) & Thriller (1982,2001,2008)

 

[all4music]

i experienced this in Bollywood/Indian music CDs.

1. recently purchased Tere Naam movie audio CD from Amazon [T series]. audio sounds shrill in some songs - in comparison mp3 songs on my PC sound much better [Muse DAc->HiVi M1080 MKII stereo monitors]

2. probably this is an extreme case - couple of months back i could finally locate and buy Roja Tamil movie audio CD. this has pathetic sound quality. sounds more like a 98kbps mp3. it was from Lahiri recrodings i think.

 

[quad_core]

i experienced this in Bollywood/Indian music CDs.

1. recently purchased Tere Naam movie audio CD from Amazon [T series]. audio sounds shrill in some songs - in comparison mp3 songs on my PC sound much better [Muse DAc->HiVi M1080 MKII stereo monitors]

2. probably this is an extreme case - couple of months back i could finally locate and buy Roja Tamil movie audio CD. this has pathetic sound quality. sounds more like a 98kbps mp3. it was from Lahiri recrodings i think.

I agree . I bought Aashiqui(1991) audio cd from amazon for rs 42. Its shrill and lacking all details as compared to the 320kbps MP3 which I had got from FlipKart Flyte. But Other T series audio cds bought at Rs 42 sound fine.
Other Bollywood audio cds also, the quality has come down, I have bought a lot of original audio cds from amazon.in recently, (TIPS, T-SERIES, UNIVERSAL and worst is SaReGaMa) . They kind of lack body and are too thin sounding, in my opinion. The less we say about SaReGaMa audio cds the better . 1942 audio cd is so pathetic, may be that's because of source.

 

[ShutterX]

All CDs are recorded off master discs. Those are larger glass discs in the factory. Thats where that true digital music data comes from. But i dont know about these newer CDs. Maybe they are just mass recorded from other sources, maybe even compressed music. There is no telling.

 

[quad_core]

All CDs are recorded off master discs. Those are larger glass discs in the factory. Thats where that true digital music data comes from. But i dont know about these newer CDs. Maybe they are just mass recorded from other sources, maybe even compressed music. There is no telling.

Well, all newer CDs are not as bad as compressed 128bit MP3s . Just some are bad, esp SaReGaMa. Others like Tips/universal/Venus are okay. Venus too I found bit too shrill.

 

[spirovious]

I agree . I bought Aashiqui(1991) audio cd from amazon for rs 42. Its shrill and lacking all details

I had bought CD in local market and agree with your thought.Its just the technology I guess which is cheap quality or for that price compromise on sound.Also in 1991,may digital recording was not best here.May be that's why Ashiqui 2 sounds better .

 

[ShutterX]

I had bought CD in local market and agree with your thought.Its just the technology I guess which is cheap quality or for that price compromise on sound.Also in 1991,may digital recording was not best here.May be that's why Ashiqui 2 sounds better .

I would doubt that. Music recording was more or less the same back then. And obviously the CD you bought now wasnt made back in the 90's but recently. So, where they recorded it from is what you should question.