this post was submitted on 17 Aug 2025
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Hardware

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[–] cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

I knew they were from the 80s. I did not think they came out before '88-'89 though.

I remember when the CD was relatively new. And they were still writing the standards for it. Red Book is the standard for CDs. Philips, Sony, and the others went to the record companies and they negotiated quality vs storage amounts. The quality the music industry demanded would have allowed about 8 minutes per disc. The compromise got that up to 80 minutes. Now, CDs have pretty good quality audio. For a while we said "CD quality audio" and that meant something, largely in gaming, but also in streaming later to differentiate from lossy audio (that, to most of us, sounded the same). Later we'd surpass "CD quality audio" (e.g. Dolby Atmos on Apple Music... though, not everyone agrees spatial audio is an improvement) but for a decade or two, it meant something.

Anyway, my first CDs were "Bat Out of Hell II: Back Into Hell" by Meat Loaf, and yes, I understand what he won't do for love. I don't know why this was ever questioned. Certainly not by anyone who listened to the song. He said he wouldn't move on after she died. Because the fictional version of him talking was this immortal type, like a benign vampire or something. She made him promise that when she died, he'd move on and find someone else. That was where he drew the line. It's literally right there in the lyrics and it isn't hard to understand. The others were the Bodyguard soundtrack (so, mostly Whitney Houston), and "No More Tears" by Ozzy Osbourne. So, early 1990s. CDs had been out for a while, but I was happy with tapes for some years before I got a CD player. And, fun fact, I at least had the Meat Loaf CD for a while before I got my first CD player. I just kept it in a drawer until I could play it.

[–] Alphane_Moon@lemmy.world 2 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

I also associate CDs with the 90s. My first portable audio player (what an archaic concept) was one of the last popular Walkman models.

Parents soon got me a Discman, which seemed liked a massive upgrade.

[–] cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

I don't think I ever had a Discman until I bought myself the $150 Philips model that also played MP3 CDs. It was a fine CD player with good anti-skip, but you "only" had 80 minutes per disc.

With MP3 CDs, you could have several albums up there and the quality seemed to be about the same. The organisation was not so great and it was hit or miss what album number your albums would be (and I think it could change from day to day, so it wasn't like you could Sharpie it on the disc), but the anti-skip became nearly perfect as most of the song would be played from the buffer. I think (but I'm not sure) that made it spin less and thus, saved battery life. Makes sense anyway.

[–] Alphane_Moon@lemmy.world 1 points 3 hours ago

MP3 CDs (and later iRiver DAPs) were definitely a bigger jump than cassettes to CDs, but CDs were also pretty impressive (you skips between tracks relatively quickly, quality was noticeable better).

[–] Alexstarfire@lemmy.world 16 points 1 day ago (1 children)

And a few of them weren't AOL.

[–] tal@lemmy.today 2 points 19 hours ago (1 children)

Prior to CDs, AOL shipped 3.5" microfloppies. These sometimes got erased and used as free storage.

kagis

Apparently people are still selling them, decades later. Honestly, I don't even know if, in 2025, you can read a 3.5" microfloppy that was last written in the 1990s.

kagis

https://www.arcserve.com/blog/data-storage-lifespans-how-long-will-media-really-last

Some manufacturers claimed the lifespan of floppy disks was three to five years, while others said they could last ten to twenty years. Of course, since floppy disks utilize magnetic storage (not unlike tape), it’s safe to say that eventually, the magnetism will wear out around the same time a tape would (ten to twenty years).

I'm kind of surprised that I'm not turning up harder information on longevity, but that sounds plausible to me. Note that they aren't mentioning the capacity that the disk was initialized for


it was possible to, given a drive and disk that supported a higher capacity, to initialize for lower capacity. I don't know if doing that might extend longevity. But I'd be a little skeptical that the actual contents of the disk are readable today.

[–] Alexstarfire@lemmy.world 4 points 19 hours ago (3 children)

I've never heard anyone call 3.5" discs, microfloppies. They are just floppies, despite not being the original size or even floppy anymore.

[–] tal@lemmy.today 4 points 15 hours ago* (last edited 15 hours ago)

Get off my lawn, whippersnappers. shakes fist

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floppy_disk

In 1984, IBM introduced with its PC/AT the 1.2 MB (1,228,800 bytes) dual-sided 5¼-inch floppy disk, but it never became very popular. IBM started using the 720 KB double density 3½-inch microfloppy disk on its Convertible laptop computer in 1986 and the 1.44 MB (1,474,560 bytes) high-density version with the IBM Personal System/2 (PS/2) line in 1987. These disk drives could be added to older PC models.

[–] steal_your_face@lemmy.ml 2 points 14 hours ago (1 children)

My gf calls me a 3.5" microfloppy :/

[–] Alexstarfire@lemmy.world 2 points 7 hours ago

Yea, but that's warranted.

[–] ayyy@sh.itjust.works 2 points 14 hours ago

Duh, everyone knows they’re called save icons.

[–] NaibofTabr@infosec.pub 7 points 1 day ago

"I want a number four, number six, and throw in a plastic doughnut..."

[–] Alphane_Moon@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago (7 children)

I wish I remembered what my first CD was.

I think my first computer CD was a collection of DOS game ("50 in 1" pirate CDs with DOS games from 1990 to 1995 or so).

[–] ellieficent@reddthat.com 1 points 1 hour ago

Talking Heads: Stop Making Sense

Still a banger.

[–] over_clox@lemmy.world 2 points 23 hours ago

My first CD was Aerosmith, the one with their nipples on the cover LOL!

Good CD, though I forget the album title right now..

[–] orbituary@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 1 day ago

My parents bought an Eric Clapton CD as their first one. I can't remember what my first CD was, though. However, I do remember exploiting the shit out of Columbia Music for free CDs.

[–] NigelFrobisher@aussie.zone 1 points 20 hours ago

Mine was Suede by Suede.

[–] lunarul@lemmy.world 1 points 22 hours ago

My dad used to make those types of CDs. I remember one with 200 games on it. The first time I saw a non-pirated CD was MK Tilogy and I thought what a waste to use up a whole CD for just one 30MB game.

[–] Nougat@fedia.io 2 points 1 day ago

Robyn Hitchcock, Globe of Frogs

[–] shalafi@lemmy.world 1 points 23 hours ago

Mine was Crowded House.

[–] AreolaGrundle@lemmy.world 1 points 22 hours ago

Marquee Moon rules, love that album