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Can You Tell The Difference Between WMA Lossless and 320k MP3?

post #1 of 21
3/2/09 at 7:16pm
Thread Starter 
I currently have most of my music on my Zune 80g/W3's as either 320k mp3 or 160/192 wma, but wondered if I ripped my cd's as wma lossless, would I notice much/any difference in the quality?

Cheers
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post #2 of 21
3/2/09 at 7:40pm
I cannot. Not even close. I am just guessing at that point and am usually wrong anyway. My source gear is not that great though.
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post #3 of 21
3/2/09 at 7:54pm
I can with my home rig, but it depends on how good the recording is. With a portable rig in a less than quiet area, almost certainly not.
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post #4 of 21
3/2/09 at 8:06pm
I can with my MacBook connected to my IE8's, but it's really tiny details.
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post #5 of 21
3/2/09 at 8:19pm
Thread Starter 
Thanks for the replies, looks like I'd be no better off really and would lose a lot of space on the Zune, so I might as well stay as I am.

Cheers.
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post #6 of 21
3/3/09 at 9:49am
I can tell a difference, high ends are more consistent and the low ends goes lower over all it just sounds more solid. So now all I use on my zune is WMA lossless I upgraded my Zune30 to a 100GB hard drive and have 300 cd's in full cd quality on it.
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post #7 of 21
3/3/09 at 12:11pm
http://www.head-fi.org/forums/f15/ca...-setup-408879/
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post #8 of 21
3/3/09 at 12:32pm
in terms of "could I pass an ABX test with a good score": not even close

in terms of "does some music probably sound a bit better to me straight from the CD for various reasons": yes

for a portable player, I always stick to 320k or lower, mostly because of space (I'd rather have a ton of music at good quality, than a bit of music at insane quality (that isn't really noticably better anyways))

you might also wanna consider the codec package being used:
Windows Media Audio - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

WMA usually performs better with lossier compression (contrasted to mp3 and whatnot, ATRAC is probably a bit better, but lets not go there)
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post #9 of 21
3/3/09 at 12:37pm
Errr haven't this topic been discussed to death before?.....

anyway, the difference between a 320kbps and lossless will only be apparent once your rig become resolving enough. IMO, no stock DAP in circulation today can really benefit from lossless.

If I were to use a zune and ER-4P, 224kbps WMA will do fine.

But I am no longer on that path and my rather complex portable rig will sound like crap with lossy files.

So what are the differences? most apparent will be the decay quality, then the dynamics (they have more solid body), then the bass (the texture are becoming more apparent) - and most importantly, the upper registers will be not as glaring. BUT then, I repeat yet again, this depends on how resolving is your rig
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post #10 of 21
3/3/09 at 12:44pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by EFN View Post
Errr haven't this topic been discussed to death before?.....

anyway, the difference between a 320kbps and lossless will only be apparent once your rig become resolving enough. IMO, no stock DAP in circulation today can really benefit from lossless.

If I were to use a zune and ER-4P, 224kbps WMA will do fine.

But I am no longer on that path and my rather complex portable rig will sound like crap with lossy files.

So what are the differences? most apparent will be the decay quality, then the dynamics (they have more solid body), then the bass (the texture are becoming more apparent) - and most importantly, the upper registers will be not as glaring. BUT then, I repeat yet again, this depends on how resolving is your rig

see, I call BS on that, because I've heard "evil lossy encoded music" through some pretty resolving equipment, so either you're trying to sell me on a $200,000 system, or I just don't care enough about the "evils" of lossy encoding
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post #11 of 21
3/3/09 at 1:39pm
No idea really!
Cause I have never heard or owned a WMA Lossless file.

I have ABX'ed PCM and 320Kbps MP3 (LAME) in the past though, which might be comparable. Especially depending on which MP3 encoder you use.
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post #12 of 21
3/3/09 at 5:55pm
What percentage is considered "good" in an ABX test?

I did a trial and it was very very hard with HD 555.

320k vs lossless.

After about 30 answers, it estimated the possibility of me guessing at 4%

I was using Dave Matthew's #41, it's pretty well recorded. Also tried Phish's You Enjoy Myself. Some Eric Clapton Unplugged might work well too.

Have to say though, I could probably tell on my D2/px100's, theres always a huge difference in the tone and decay of symbols/rides, that's what I look for, the rest sounds slightly different.
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post #13 of 21
3/3/09 at 6:10pm
Easy, the MP3 has a smaller filesize.
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post #14 of 21
3/3/09 at 6:11pm
I haven't tried WMA Lossless, but assuming all lossless is the same, I DO hear a difference between FLAC and 320kbps. However, in a blind test, I am unable to tell which one is which, and one particular format is not inherently better than the other. I suppose the FLAC is 'better', mostly because it has a greater range of dynamics. The 320kbps sounds like something that has been slightly processed to sound louder.
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post #15 of 21
3/3/09 at 7:00pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by nauxolo View Post
I DO hear a difference between FLAC and 320kbps. However, in a blind test, I am unable to tell which one is which
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