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Audio Equipment

Audio equipment includes the material devices involved in the processes of recording, processing, diffusing, and reproducing sounds and music. Developed after the invention of sound recording in 1877, 20th-century audio equipment has proliferated in many societal contexts in the form of a wide variety of devices such as microphones, recorders, players, mixers, amplifiers, loudspeakers, and sound editors. In the 21st century, audio equipment is used, and consequently discarded, in a wide range of social contexts, from professional fields (such as music production, medical diagnosis, or transport communication) to leisure activities (such as music and media consumption). A distinguishing feature of audio equipment waste is that the technology is subject to rapid and selective innovation cycles, making older equipment obsolete and in need of replacement.

Early History

Audio recording and reproduction are relatively recent activities in human history. It was only at the end of the 19th century that sound started to be recorded and reproduced. Media sociologist Jonathan Sterne noted that before that time, other kinds of audio equipment existed and were almost exclusively used in professions such as healthcare (where the binaural stethoscope had been in use since the middle of the century) and communication (where the telegraph mechanism was based on the Morse code). However, a larger diffusion of audio equipment took place only after Thomas A. Edison's invention of the phonograph, in 1877, and Isaac Berliner's development of the gramophone after 1888. Since then, the social diffusion of this equipment and its impact on culture and consumption has been highly relevant and subject to change following, as pointed out by media historian Patrice Flichy, the development of more general consumption patterns of the developing bourgeois family. Before the middle of the century, audio equipment became a common feature of leisure activities, contributing, as philosopher Walter Benjamin recognized, to the development of arts in the “age of mechanical reproduction.”

The availability of sound recording equipment opened up new possibilities in many professional fields, communication, and art. Its impact on culture and consumer society became even more evident with further innovations introduced before World War II, especially with the diffusion of the radio and the introduction of electric sound recording devices. In the 1930s, the radio became the first great means of communication in modern society, establishing audio equipment as a common home appliance in modern houses. The use of electric reproducing devices became common in the 1940s, setting new sound quality standards, favoring the development of home high-fidelity systems, and becoming the basis for further innovations and transformations of technologies of sound recording.

Developments during and after World War II

During World War II, a variety of new equipment had been developed by military engineers, such as magnetic tape, which was mainly used in the coding and decoding of military communication and in SOund Navigation And Ranging (SONAR), which became an indispensable tool in naval transportation. In healthcare, audio equipment also had a crucial role in treating deafness and hearing impairment as well as in many diagnostic tests. Audio equipment became relevant in many fields: from automobile and air transport to industry and design, from work in organizations and commerce to political life. Composer Murray Schafer pointed out that the huge diffusion of audio equipment produced a radical change in the modern “soundscape” and an increase in the noise level in the contemporary world.

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