Audio Systems: About CD alternative, cheap dvd players, playback systems

Question
Hi Cleggsan,

I am chandan from India and i have a question regarding a audio solution.

At the moment I am using a cheap DVD player (very downmarket) as my source. I do not have too many CD or DVD infact most of my music is in my computer. My question is there any device that can be placed on my existing DVD player (like a CD player or a pre-amp)that can contain all my songs in computer? Some sort of iPOD or anything that can store songs and which can be upgraded? It should be able to perfom as good as a dedicated CD player

Regards,
Chandan.

Answer
Not sure I understand the question.

Music on CD is a non-compressed format.  Music (usually) stored in the computer (from online sources) are usually a compressed format such as MP3.  They can be converted from one to the other, but the sound quality is compromised when compressed.

You can, for example, store many hours of MP3 music on one CD-R and you can rip and record them on your pc.  Most even cheap dvd players will play back MP3 music from a cd.  So, in this scenario you could record via the pc onto cd-r discs many hours of MP3 music; then play them back through the dvd/cd player.  Is that what you are looking for?

You can google for how to rip and record; there are many sites and software for this purpose.

Also, you can store many song titles on an MP3 player.

But, as stated above, MP3 format is a compressed form of audio and the sound quality is compromised. It is good for headphone and low-fidelity listening, such as on PC speakers, but many find that MP3 does not sound very good on full-range high fidelity playback systems.

Hoping this will help you in your planning.

C

PS: See this for an idea of how many hours of MP3 you can put on one CD-R:

http://www.juneberry78s.com/mp3coop/datacdmp3.html