I dont agree with the manner in which woem made his opinion on this subject heard, but i do agree with his point.

I think in a double blind situation, all of these subjective differences people are experiencing would vanish and just the music would remain.

Guys, let's cool it. We don't want the forum to be a hostile arena.

Jon L,
I believe there is no difference in the 2 output formats. As Woem correctly pointed out, there is no quality lost in the when you encode files in lossless formats, thus the name Lossless. Take a good listen again, blind test yourself.

Woem,
The other forumers are right - you need to add some tact into your words. This is no way to treat a fellow forumer, ignorant or deluded he may be. A polite rebuttal would have made reading this thread much more pleasant. Courtesy certainly go a long way.

We're all learning and enjoying the forums, let's not make it such an ugly experience. Cheers.

Woem, you've totally missed the point made (to you) that the OP was listening to different playback mechanisms - via CD-rom and via hard-drive. You are also completely out of line being so rude. Get a clue. Happy Christmas.

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He is actually doing two different comparisons, one including .wav and .alac both straight from harddrive. I wonder if this thread was inspired by the "CD sounds better than wav" -thread. I don't remember if Foobar plays Apple Lossless or not, but if it does, the threadstarter should use it's abx comparator to remove any placebo effect. He can also use the bitcomparator to save precious time

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Crucial questions have not been answered.

Learn to read an entire thread, Woem.

-Ed

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Not sure how you normally behave where you come from, but around here we are --civil--. This is not some teenage overclocking forum. Suggest you take some time off, reassess your approach, then try again. Try a few smilies, both in your text and on your face.

-coma

P.S. I also second the vote for Woem's posts becoming a sticky on how not to get started on Head-Fi. Sheesh.

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tyrion, did you come along my thread?
http://www6.head-fi.org/forums/showt...=1#post1137863

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Maybe they should get emailed to all new members, as part of the "Welcome" email?

It seems like things such as tact, civility, and just plain good manners aren't taught in the home anymore

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I got a good alternative, maybe we should invite him to outside thread
edit: anyone wanna bet how long will he last in outside

Whoa... I missed the show.

First, there's one question that hasn't been answered - were you using the same audio player for the WAV and ALAC files? You mention something about Foobar not being able to play WAV files for you, so I'm not sure.

If you were using seperate programs, there's a chance you were actually hearing some difference. Depending on DSPs that may be set up (with or without your knowledge) , output plugins, (for instance, if one is using Kernel Streaming/ASIO and the other waveOut) and the like, there may be a difference, however slight. Personally, I've yet to hear a difference between KS/ASIO and waveOut, but I'm not going to discount other's opinions.

As for CDs vs. WAV, yes, there can be a difference there. When reading from a CD, there's jitter, offsets, and possibly a poor quality ADC (if you're not using DAE as the playback method) to deal with. Always rip music for best quality.

Woem... I await the war

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LOL, in that case he should be banned from all forums EXCEPT Outside.

-Ed

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Hahaha. Last week, I was testing an alcoholic patient and asked him, "do you see that purple elephant in front of you?" He promptly answered, "yes, what huge nose he has!" This is a standard test question for patients with severe alcohol brain damage.

The point is, the patient did really see the purple elephant. He wasn't lying.

Since I'm not a drinker (much), and I do hear a difference, there must be a difference of some kind somewhere. It is possible i'm imagining things, and I invite you to believe so. However, I've done this sort of A-B comparisons for hundreds of equipments, tests, parts, etc, and have been an anal-retentive audiophile for many years. Many times, there is no difference; but sometimes it's there, and if you are lucky, others in the room agree. In this instance, I do hear a difference, and I believe my ears WAY more than "bits are bits" argument. Believe me, I'm lazy and it kills me that I'm looking at re-ripping my CD's into .wav. Wouldn't do it if I had a shadow of doubt as to what I hear.

Just for clarification, the 3 versions under test were:

1) Store-bought redbook CD playing in CDR drive via iTunes.

2) Same CD, ripped into .wav via iTunes ripper, playing via iTunes.

3) Same CD, ripped into Apple Lossless via iTunes ripper, playing via iTunes.

Ideally one should be comparing two files now:

• one converted from PCM (WAV or whatnot) to ALAC and back to PCM and
• the original file

If the raw PCM data is not identical in both cases (ideally, both files should be identical), the format is apparently not lossless. If it is, one can only speculate - perhaps ALAC playback supports ReplayGain or can modify volume in some other way, which would mean you may not get exactly the same output as with PCM playback. If the player only does an ALAC -> PCM conversion and plays back the PCM stream like any other, there should not be a difference. Maybe asking an iTunes coder would bring some clarification.
Alternatively, one could repeat the test with FLAC'd (or treated with whatever lossless codec you like) files (encoded with ReplayGain disabled) and see whether there's any difference to be heard here.

BTW, can you hear a difference between MP3s encoded with LAME using --alt-preset extreme (or even constant 320 kbps) and the corresponding WAV?

Even if you re-rip to wav you're still not safe, according to this link:
.wav files versus CD - can you tell a difference?

Even wav files aren't completely sound, according to the above link - it's time to simply forget about using the PC as a transport because lossless isn't lossless and a wav isn't an exact digital copy of the compact disc. Don’t forget that green marker and aluminum cap, fellas!

My point is this: you may trust your own ears and disregard science, but placebo is a very powerful force (and this is coming from a guy who believes in power cords, interconnects, burn-in and power regeneration). I'm not trying to offend anyone, but this thread and the one I linked are treading a path to crystal healing.

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I'd be interested in seeing some ABX results... The data sent to the soundcard when playing Apple Lossless and the original wav is absolutely identical.