Among the many updates in the latest beta version of Windows 11, there is also one that seems to have arrived at least one decade too late. In this version, the media player regains the capability it lost somewhere in 2012: copying songs (RIPs) from CDs to digital files stored on a computer.
Yes, it’s a feature that was an integral part of the “classic” version of the media player, before Microsoft for some reason decided to replace it with the Groove music service in Windows 8. The service itself was long abandoned, but only now has Microsoft decided to restore the ability to copy songs from CDs. And save them in one of four different formats: AAC, WMA which provide relatively high quality compression, and FLAC and ALAC which ensure compression without any quality meeting (Lossless).
One format that was available in 2012 but has not yet returned to the list: MP3. Indeed, this is a relatively old compression technology and certainly not the highest quality on the market, but there are still quite a few users who choose it out of habit, and will now have to adopt new formats.
Cynicism aside, Microsoft seems to be responding to what appears to be the beginning of an impressive comeback to the compact disc format. In 2021, the music industry reported a jump of no less than 48 percent in CD sales, after more than a decade of decline. In total, CD sales account for about 14 percent of the U.S. music industry, a small percentage compared to popular streaming services such as Spotify and Apple Music, but it is still too early to say that the old format has been definitively eliminated.