Making the Switch to Digital
Posted by Andy Rush on 28 Apr 2006 at 09:11 am | Tagged as: News & Commentary

SearsWishbook.1983EC.P408
Originally uploaded by Sears Wishbook.
Thanks to Digg I found this bit o’ history at the Flickr website. It looks to me like the word awesome was coming into its own about the time that the word digital was. I love how they relate the workings of the CD to the old technology. “Wow and flutter” that is almost imperceptible. There’s a laser diode and a beam splitter reading those awesome “musical information pits”. Laser is such an awesome word.
When is the last time you saw the word laser on a CD or DVD player. I love technology history.

![Elbow - One Day Like This: Video : Music video by Elbow performing One Day Like This: Videowith Craig Potter [Producer], Rigan Ledwidge [Video Director], Sally Humphries [Video Producer](C) 2008 Polydor Ltd. (UK) (Tags: Elbow One Day Like This Alternative Fiction Craig Potter [Producer] Rigan Ledwidge [Video Director] Sally Humphries Producer]) (381278 views, rated 4.58)](http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/hooPU2mdsH4/default.jpg)


Here’s my first permanent CD player, purchased in January of 1994 (I took back the Sony I had bought just before Christmas):
http://www.lacieg2s.ca/w3terra/ols/magnavox.htm
I still have it. Alice wouldn’t let me get rid of it. I replaced it after five years when it began to sound as if the DAC was giving up the ghost. Maybe I should send it in to Philips for service and see what happens.
Since we seem to be in full-out geek mode, here is a picture of my first CD player - the very first multi-disk player made by Pioneer - the PD-M6. And yes, I still have it and it works just fine.
http://shop.vendio.com/stanh/item/822653675/?s=1147082402
I used to feed machines like that Pioneer when I worked at a satellite uplink company in North Carolina (Microspace). Not a DJ job per se, but I was feeding music to thousands of shopping centers and offices via huge C-Band uplink dishes. kUband was just coming in….