Discs of data
Back in 1991 my parents shelled out what was probably a month’s wages between them for a brand new CD player. It was our first step into a brave new digital era —a Pioneer PD–M450 multi–play compact disc player— and it was cool as hell. It took six discs at a time loaded into an odd–looking “shuttle”, where the discs were set face down and slotted into the machine. Thirteen years later, after a few thousand CDs and a few million tracks, it still runs; and it’s still the primary CD player in the house. At the time I would’ve much preferred a computer to a CD player… but I digress.
What’s unique about this player (aside from the button labeled “Random”, whereas every other CD player in existence uses the term “Shuffle”) is the face–down loading and the shuttle. From a user’s perspective this is a massive pain in the ass; to change a single disc you must stop the music and eject all the discs, then pull CDs out of their little compartments, one by one, and flip them over to inspect which disc it is you might be replacing. There’s no “quick glance” way of checking which discs are loaded already, and there’s no quick way to change discs once you’ve decided which to swap out, but from the technology’s perspective this is the best way to handle it. Why? Longevity.
Using a shuttle ensures our grubby fingers are never inside the CD player. We touch the CDs, we touch the shuttle, we touch the buttons on the front of the player, but we’re never inside it. Thus, the insides are not exposed to danger, dust, or dirt; and given the market for things like VHS head cleaners, CD laser lens cleaners, and DVD laser lens cleaners, this can only be a good thing. Loading the CDs in to the shuttle face down means one simple thing: the data side of the disc is face up. With the data face up, the laser that reads the data is obviously facing down… making it that much less of a dust receptacle.
By comparison, the DVD player my parents bought four years ago for $800 (after Mum won $1000 on the radio and we bullied her into buying a DVD player) recently shat itself. It was a Sony, a reputable brand by all accounts, but in the last few months it started rejecting discs left and right… skipping scenes and sometimes “freezing” unexpectedly. There is nothing wrong with the DVDs it rejects (they play admirably in both my Macs and in anybody else’s DVD player) but it rejects them all the same. After a while it stopped being able to recognize that there was even a disc in the tray, and the “lens cleaner” DVD we bought (basically a DVD with a little brush stuck on it… weird) wouldn’t play either. It was officially fucked. Last week it was replaced with a no–name brand DVD player my mother picked up from the supermarket for $80. This is where technology goes… stupid fucking computer laws.
In a world where consumer electronics are increasingly disposable, where I don’t even bother with “protective covers” for my phone or my iPod because I know I’ll have a new one within the next two years, longevity isn’t the kind of thing you find “built in” anymore. Maybe the 1991 datestamp on this story is an indicator of “old school” production values, maybe not, but the ass–pain–inducing usability issues inherent in the PD–M450’s design have actually had a net positive effect for everyone using it. It’s yet to require replacement, it’s never needed servicing, and it’s lasted longer than the average family pet. I’m not sure there’s a lesson to be learned there… but it’s an interesting way of thinking about the tradeoffs made during the industrial design process.