So, the reason behind this thread is since the dawn of my music acquiring days I have gotten the physical version of the tape or cd. I have always ripped my cds to my computer once I started that for archival purposes for listening to them on the computer, making mix cds, and if a disc ever did manage to get damaged, having the ability re-burn it instead of re-buy it was nice.

Two developments in the last year have kind of started to really work against my methodology here: 1) Windows Media Player going the way of the dodo (whatever....it worked for me and user interface and its abilities was sufficient for me) and 2) places like Best Buy and the like not carrying cds at all online or in-store.

I prefer cd listening because the sound quality of mp3 albums that I have heard seem very lacking to me versus the cd for comparison's sake. I do have the audio gear at home and in the car that those differences do become apparent.

I've had people bring up to me Spotify... based on where I listen to music, a streaming service like theirs seems to not fit me. Also, if I can't rip the tunes to my hard drive and thus theoretically create a backup cd of the material, what happens when they pull an artist or an album?

With WMP getting no real future support from Mircrosoft for updates, what is a good equivalent program that will pull artist, song titles, cover art, and what not? I've had FOOBAR recommended to me by several people in my own looking into it I have seen it looks to me like you need a whole lot of add ons and mods from the freeware version to get what I want.

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So, after that long exposition, how do you guys handle it?

Stream?
Physical?
Mix of...?

What would you use for ripping software?

Heck, to go further down the road with this,

How do you find out your favorite artist has a new album out?
--I almost have to check amazon monthly for all the artists I like to see if something has it. This process sucks though because I find out stuff too late.

How do you find out about new stuff you might like?
--I've become dependent on youtube reaction channels LOL.