Future Lossy Compression?

MP3 can only support 44.1/16 audio, so it won't work with SACD or DVD-A...

I'm sure there will eventually be new lossy compression schemes that will support higher sampling rates/resolution, and they may even sound better than CD's do today. However, i think it will really be a long time before these will catch on. Record lables will do anything to prevent a repeat of MP3, and they will sue anyone that tries to develop a new codec. Sony won't release anything for SACD (or let anyone develop anything), unless its for a replacement for Minidisc...Even if a new format was to be developed, it would be very costly to implement because so little equipment have DAC's that can support the higher sampling rates. I'd say it'll be at least 10 years before lossy compressionw will happen for dvd-A or SACD....

But in those 10 years, lossy compression for CD will continue to improve. MP3 has reached its full potential, and i don't think it can be improved much farther. 320k/sec MP3s come quite close to Cd, but they still sound a little lifeless.

New formats, such as AAC or MP3 Pro should correct the problem, and sound better and/or use less space... In a few years, 192 or even 160k/sec compressed files may sound as good as 320k MP3s...However, all processing will make errors that degrade the sound slightly, and i don't think they will ever sound [i]Exactly[i] identical to CD's...

And by the time these efficient algorithms are developed, storage capacity will be so large that i doubt lossy compression will be needed... In 5 years, 50gig HD based players will probably be a common sight, and who needs to store music at 192k or 160 if they have so much storage capacity...The Internet will also be much faster, and most people will have brodband access, making small filesizes less important...

yeah, i guess lossy compression will still be important for people that need totally shock-proof solid-state players... Flash memory will always need to be used with lossy compression... But for most other uses, i don't see much point in lossy compression...

What scares me is that I've seen on some big websites that sell CDs, that they also sell individual tracks from CDs for which they claim "All our downloadable files are CD quality" but you can see that the sizes are only a couple of megabytes. MP3's or WMV's obviously. The scary part is that they dare to claim "CD quality". Imagine future where only available music will be secure, lossy-compressed, badly engineered and recorded files. Yuck!

yeah, I guess dumbbass's who listen to pop mp3's on their nike players will grow accustomed to the lousy quality, and most recordings will be crap(ier than today's recordings, if that's possibe) They will download all their music from the net, and CD's will become "niche items".

Then, the audiophiles like us will be screwed over, as record companies charge more and more for decent recordings on discs. And they know that we'll continue to buy, no matter how much they charge...

keep in mind though, with the way technology's going we might not have to worry about compression at all. Computer will store terabytes upon terabytes of information and you could store hundreds or thousands of CD's in perfect, pristine, uncompressed wav format. But then again, by that time chances are CD's will be obsolete in terms of sound quality. But them again, it probably won't be too long before they do get to that level of technology. But then again, when we do get to that level of technology, it would be very plausible that we will have an improved type of media. But then again...

personally, i don't see much point in SSACDs... Sure, they'll capture ALL the musical detail out there, and i'm sure Sony will be able to back it up with some crazy claims like "captures frequencies as high as 1mhz therefore it is better than Cd's which max out at a pathetic 22.05 khz, resulting in a better soundstage, clearer highs, tighter bass. It will sound like a veil was lifted from over your speakers that was always blocking your enjoyment of music"....

For hardcore audiophiles, this may be important, but for the average consumer, who has a $100 "class T" amplifier and Bose speakers, would they be able to hear any difference at all? I don't think so. Jan Meier said that anything beyond 20 bits is useless because resistor noise is far greater than the resolution of the system. SO even audiophiles will not notice a difference with anything beyond SACD, though they will never admit it

What's my point? well, computers will keep on evolving, but audio technology is pretty much stuck. That means that we will have terabyte HD's and holographic data storage, but the audio it'll hold won't be much more than 192/24.... We could easily cram in all the music ever recorded, at amazing quality, without using compression...

EPIC BUMP!

 

From the future:  A decade later and almost 95% of what's written on this thread has come true.

wow epic bump indeed. I thought there was something weird about this thread until I looked at the post dates lol

Oh yeah, SACD really took off.

Yeah, you can throw SACDs in the 5% that didn't come true.  

 

I was referring mainly to TB HDs, mainstream portable DAPs (ipod launched 4 months after this thread), the reference point in audio quality for most people becoming mp3s, CD's being niche and online music stores.