A week without mp3s

Tomorrow I'm going to start an experiment, probably the least scientific experiment in history granted. I'm going to stop listening to mp3's for a week. Now regular readers (hello) will know my feelings towards music delivered in this format. It swings from ambivalence at best, to hostility at worst. However, and thanks to the ubiquity of the format, they are a hard thing not to have, especially if, like me, you are a music fan. I'm as guilty as everyone else, ripping music (albeit at 320kps) to play via my PC. And in the process collecting thousands of the bloody things. 

I spend a lot of time in front of my PC (too much to be honest). I use it as a glorified jukebox. If my PC is on then I'll be playing music from it. So I have music playing all day, everyday. Yes I know 

Now just to give you an idea of my set up. I have my PC connected directly to my hi-fi (a Yamaha DSP-AX630SE cinema amp and a pair of Mission M34 speakers). As of tomorrow I'll be disconnecting my PC and using my (admittedly crap, but it plays SACD and DVDA) Pioneer DV-565 DVD player through my old faithful Rotel RA820BX2 amp (a pure Stan Curtis design no tone controls etc) and the same speakers to listen to CDs. The only time in the next week I intend listening to mp3's is in the car. Now if I was to quantify my hi-fi I'd say that while it isn't the best kit in the world, it's still probably much better than what 95% of the population listens to music through.  Upgrading it (the hi-fi that is) is something I intend doing as soon as I get a job (I've always had a hankering for Cyrus or Naim stuff), but that's for the future. 

Now I'm going to lay my cards fully out on the table here. I fully expect that when the week is over I'll report that I miss the convenience of having a jukebox of thousands of mp3's just a button away and not much else. I'm also pretty confident that when I go back to mp3's I'll want to poke my ears out with a stick because they sound that bad.

Let the experiment commence.