I can remember when I purchased my first major electronic device...a Sanyo 21" colour TV. WOW! Previously, it was black and white.
I don't watch any TV in black and white these days. Come to think of it, I hardly watch any TV at all. I prefer to run my toy trains and to hear the sounds they make.
Sometime soon, I will turn off all my sound and run engines around the layout. I expect it will be weird.
From the far, far reaches of the wild, wild west I am: rtpoteet
I've got over thirty diesel engines, & only three have sound. I'll never buy another silent engine again, I PROMISE ! Yes it is easy to get hooked on sound and it really brings your railroad to life. I cannot run any trains unless I have sound, It just makes everything so real. Well time to go listen to 8-40c start up.
Who wants my Athearn RTR's?
No sound, nor potential for sound in the future.
I'll probably never run them again except as helpers in a consist if I can figure how to speed match them with my QSI BLI's.
Ted M.
got trains?™
See my photos at: http://tedmarshall.rrpicturearchives.net/
Yea, the recent advent of sound into individual locomotives is pretty neat technology. But DCC - by far - is waaaaaay better in my book. I probably only run sound about 30% of the time I'm operating on my layout.
To me, DCC is like cake and sound is like icing. Eating cake without icing is still very delicious. But icing by itself? It's only tasty in smaller doses.
Tom
https://tstage9.wixsite.com/nyc-modeling
Time...It marches on...without ever turning around to see if anyone is even keeping in step.
OK, late Saturday night philosophy...
I was at my LHS today, and we were talking about how sound had changed the experience for us. Both Gerry at Maine Trains an myself are avid sound fans. From the moment I put my first sound engine, a P2K 0-6-0, on the tracks, I was hooked. My non-sound-equipped engines don't get around much anymore.
Being a sentimental sort, I "feel bad" for my other engines, and I've already retrofitted an Alco RS-3 with sound. Next, I'll probably take on the P2K Geep twins. These are perfectly good, DCC-equipped engines, but they are just waa-aay to quiet for my tastes. Yeah, my spare parts box already has one perfectly good, but silent, decoder in it.
The first time I hooked up my DCC system, I was 12 years old again, thrilling to that child-like excitement of running trains. (I was 58 at the time.) When I toot the whistle or ring the bell now, I still get that old jolt that takes me back to my Lionel days.
How do you feel about sound on your layout?
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.