Sound recording and reproduction
The compact disc (CD) medium was developed in the 1980s as a new way to bring digital recordings of music to the market. Except for the introduction of the CD-ROM and several kinds of recordable CD, the CD has not changed much since then. Like DAT, it is a data medium rather than a way of recording vibrations directly. It was introduced to provide music in a way that is cheap for manufacturers but relatively high-quality, but it has since been adapted to meet many data-storage needs. Like DAT, the CD requires computer technology to record and to play.