[003]

No, I can't. To be honest I have not actually tried, but anybody that cares about this sort of thing needs to sit down and take a long time to rethink why they are here.

I can tell the difference between headphones, tubes and pads. Really, even that is trivial though. I just keep my music in lossless for backup reasons and "just in case", if you will. The only thing that matters to me is the music and the reason I stepped down from the K1000 to the RS-2 is because I thought I was heading down a road I didn't want to take.

 

[Cid]

Quote:

Originally Posted by 003 /img/forum/go_quote.gif No, I can't. To be honest I have not actually tried, but anybody that cares about this sort of thing needs to sit down and take a long time to rethink why they are here.

You care about the quality of your headphones? What's wrong with us caring about the quality of our music? ktnxbai.

 

[003]

Didn't say I don't care. I keep my music lossless and just forget about it.

 

[EnOYiN]

Quote:

Originally Posted by 003 /img/forum/go_quote.gif No, I can't. To be honest I have not actually tried, but anybody that cares about this sort of thing needs to sit down and take a long time to rethink why they are here. I can tell the difference between headphones, tubes and pads. Really, even that is trivial though. I just keep my music in lossless for backup reasons and "just in case", if you will. The only thing that matters to me is the music and the reason I stepped down from the K1000 to the RS-2 is because I thought I was heading down a road I didn't want to take.

I am not forcing you to do ABX tests. Not at all. If you do not want to do them it's fine by me. But the thing with this is that there are a lot of people who are telling me that they can hear the difference when they haven't actually tried ABXing. I thought it would be fun to start a thread to be able to see how many people actually can discern the two and provide an ABX result to go with it. It's kinda recalcitrant, but I think it's just fun.

I think this is important to be able to tell the difference to a certain degree because this will improve codecs. Codecs are not flawless. They contain artifacts which can be heard. LAME became this good by using ABXing a lot. So much in fact that no one could discern between 320 CBR and V0.

I can still enjoy the songs coming out of my alarm-clock radio standing next to my bed. It doesn't mean I hate music coming out of crappy speakers.

I think everyone who is buying a headphone which can feed a few poor african children for more than a year should sit down and take a long time to reconsider. ( not that I think that you shouldn't) You don't really need that. You can just listen to music coming out of whatever secondhand speakers for less than $10. I would never be able to hear the difference between lossless and lossy if I was still listening to my cheap logitech speakers, but now that I can I think it's interesting to take it to the limit and see what I can hear and what I can't hear.

P.S. I am not trying to offend you and I hope you will not take this the wrong way.

 

[Digitalbath3737]

I know that I can't. I pretty happy about that as well. I do save all my music in lossless just incase a Super lossless format comes out that's the size of todays mp3s.

 

[RollsDownWindowsManually]

I can't tell the difference between Lame V2 or 192kbps AAC and lossless either. I am really curious to what specifically you guys that can tell the differences are looking for, nothing is obvious to me in any of the tests I've done, and I'd like to think I'm using decent equipment (av-710, faith amp, ER-4S).

 

[EnOYiN]

Quote:

Originally Posted by RollsDownWindowsManually /img/forum/go_quote.gif I can't tell the difference between Lame V2 or 192kbps AAC and lossless either. I am really curious to what specifically you guys that can tell the differences are looking for, nothing is obvious to me in any of the tests I've done, and I'd like to think I'm using decent equipment (av-710, faith amp, ER-4S).

I am listening for artifacts. These artifacts are the easiest to be able to tell the difference. You can learn about these artifacts by going to the website I linked to in the original post or you can go to the webpage of the encoder. Most of the times they've got a small page with flaws that are still in the program.

I also noticed that some of you people voted "YES", but somehow managed to not post a ABX test result. I am confident that those people still will post something else than a "yes, I can". ( I hope you guys will because else it would defeat the idea of this thread, don't you think? )

 

[db597]

I can't hear a difference. This is on my Audigy2 ZS (ASIO), HeadFive and K701 - pretty decent equipment if you ask me.

@EnOYiN: You need 1 more poll - Can you hear the difference between lossless and CD. I bet some people will still answer "yes"

 

[EnOYiN]

Quote:

Originally Posted by db597 /img/forum/go_quote.gif I can't hear a difference. This is on my Audigy2 ZS (ASIO), HeadFive and K701 - pretty decent equipment if you ask me. @EnOYiN: You need 1 more poll - Can you hear the difference between lossless and CD. I bet some people will still answer "yes"

Your setup should do the trick.

I still want some ABX test results from the people who voted yes. Kinda lame not to do so when I specifically asked for it. Oh well. This thread is going nowhere...

 

[lordgibbness]

Quote:

Originally Posted by EnOYiN /img/forum/go_quote.gif Your setup should do the trick. I still want some ABX test results from the people who voted yes. Kinda lame not to do so when I specifically asked for it. Oh well. This thread is going nowhere...

That's because those guys probably aren't willing to perform an ABX test just in case they fail it...

Last time I did a test I couldn't tell the difference. I wasn't looking for artifacts at the time however (probaby because I don't want to get to the stage where I am examining the sound and not enjoying the music).

I like good quality music files (EAC CD rips, LAME V2 mp3s) and good hifi equipment, but I don't want to become too anal about how I listen to music if possible.

I might just give it another go at the weekend when I have some free time to find out once and for all...

I agree with you though, many people will say they know the difference when simply playing back the FLAC or MP3, but there's the whole expectations/pride/money spent on equipment issue.

 

[EnOYiN]

I can't agree with you more.

For the part of being able to recognise artifacts. I can't recommend anyone to learn how to do it unless you are going to use your skills to improve audio-codecs etc. I think you should try to appreciate your 128 kbps mp3 for as long as you can.

 

[uraflit]

if it takes THAT much concentration to just discern the differences between lossless and -v 0... O_O

 

[db597]

-v0 is not 320kbps by the way... it's around 250kbps. So if you can't hear a difference at -v0, then 320kbps would be even harder to distinguish from lossless.

 

[Febs]

Quote:

Originally Posted by db597 /img/forum/go_quote.gif -v0 is not 320kbps by the way... it's around 250kbps. So if you can't hear a difference at -v0, then 320kbps would be even harder to distinguish from lossless.

That is not necessarily true. -V0 uses bitrates of up to 320kbps for frames that need it. Artifacts that are audible at -V0 tend to be exist at 320kbps CBR as well; there is not a big quality difference between -V0 and 320kbps CBR. That is why it makes little sense to use 320kbps rather than -V0. The files are substantially bigger, but without a corresponding increase in quality.

 

[cooperpwc]

I didn't bother testing myself since I already failed a FLAC V2 test. Intrigued though the you passed the test with the DT880s and a Headphonia. I'll have DT880s soon and they are indeed detailed. I shall revisit my tin ears at that time.