[Ableza]

   
Because you can only tell so much from sound clips and its nice to have information when buying things?

If that's important to you then fine, to each his own.  Me, I only care about how it sounds.  If it sounds good then I could not care less about where it comes from or if there's something "better" out there or if a particular copy is blessed by a great Zen master.  It's music.  All that matters is how it sounds.  At least that's all that SHOULD matter, IMO.

 

[RRod]

  If that's important to you then fine, to each his own.  Me, I only care about how it sounds.  If it sounds good then I could not care less about where it comes from or if there's something "better" out there or if a particular copy is blessed by a great Zen master.  It's music.  All that matters is how it sounds.  At least that's all that SHOULD matter, IMO.

 
I didn't say otherwise. I said that I don't like trusting sound off of just track clips**, and knowing where the master came from would give me more assurance of the sound I do hear from the clips.
 
**It's easy to make track clips sound good: make them loud and pick a part that isn't clipping or otherwise distorted.

 

[tgdinamo]

  Ok, I looked at the Tera website. That guy is a dadaist, surely.  If you've fallen for this scam, more fool you.
 
Love that statement he makes:
 
WWorld's best price performance ratio: The Tera-Player delivers infinite performance at an unbeatable price!
 
Infinite performance! Too funny. The thing costs €3360 and doesn't even have a screen.  You really are a prize idiot if you are prepared to pay that.
 
 
 
rice performance ratio: The Tera-Player delivers infinite performance at an unbeatable price!

No question he is a character - was banned from this site and I'm not even going to defend him. You should have seen some of the arguments in those threads including his link to some outrageous German punk video which was the final straw to get him banned. But he is also incredibly skilled sound engineer - genius if you ask me. It is interesting that all the criticism you will find about Tera has to do with pricing and his attitude - you will have a very hard time finding anything less than stellar review by actual owners (I took my sweet time researching this device before I purchased).
In terms of pricing back when I bought my Tera (couple of years ago) it was 810 Euro. My plan now is to try to pick another one up (backup) for about double that (if/when he runs a sale for around that price).
However if I lost my current Tera I would without any question purchase a new one for 3360 Euro - because imho this is the best truly portable dac ever created (in terms of SQ). And Charles is the only guy making them - I don't think in my lifetime anyone will be able to improve on this device (in terms of combination of sq/portability/battery life). And also each device is hand made in Germany (so people should not be too surprised to pay premium for hand made German engineering).

 

[Sam Edwards]

  If that's important to you then fine, to each his own.  Me, I only care about how it sounds.  If it sounds good then I could not care less about where it comes from or if there's something "better" out there or if a particular copy is blessed by a great Zen master.  It's music.  All that matters is how it sounds.  At least that's all that SHOULD matter, IMO.

I come from the era where many (or course not al!) 'Original Master Recordings' sounded better than standard pressings. It would be great if Mobile Fidelity or would get into the digital download business, or maybe Neil will give similar assurances about where he's digitizing the music for Pono. 

 

[gikigill]

Provenance matters because when tracks from a CD are upsampled and sold as Hi Res, you just paid someone to upsample your existing music with no genuine benefits.

 

[miceblue]

 

Because you can only tell so much from sound clips and its nice to have information when buying things?

If that's important to you then fine, to each his own.  Me, I only care about how it sounds.  If it sounds good then I could not care less about where it comes from or if there's something "better" out there or if a particular copy is blessed by a great Zen master.  It's music.  All that matters is how it sounds.  At least that's all that SHOULD matter, IMO.

So if I rip a CD that I got from a used CD store for $5, convert it to 256 kbps LAME MP3, convert it back to WAV, upsample it to 24/192, advertise it as "HD," sell it for $25, and you think it sounds good, you're okay with that?

 

[tgdinamo]

So if I rip a CD that I got from a used CD store for $5, convert it to 256 kbps LAME MP3, convert it back to WAV, upsample it to 24/192, advertise it as "HD," sell it for $25, and you think it sounds good, you're okay with that?

 
Can you (or anyone) prove this actually happens in real world? People seem to think HDTracks does this but is there proof (and if they do was this some isolated case or pattern)? Also, to what extent can they (resellers) control what the labels are sending them to sell? Who should be responsible for verifying content quality? Does Amazon guarantee that the CD you purchased was not upsampled to CD resolution from low res MP3? If yes how can they prove this?

 

[Ableza]

So if I rip a CD that I got from a used CD store for $5, convert it to 256 kbps LAME MP3, convert it back to WAV, upsample it to 24/192, advertise it as "HD," sell it for $25, and you think it sounds good, you're okay with that?

 
If it sounds good then I am Ok with that.  And why not?  If it sounds good that's all that matters.

 

[RRod]

   
Can you (or anyone) prove this actually happens in real world? People seem to think HDTracks does this but is there proof (and if they do was this some isolated case or pattern)? Also, to what extent can they (resellers) control what the labels are sending them to sell? Who should be responsible for verifying content quality? Does Amazon guarantee that the CD you purchased was not upsampled to CD resolution from low res MP3? If yes how can they prove this?

 
That's why it was posited as a hypothetical. Amazon doesn't guarantee anything, which is why it's up to people who care about mastering to read forums, look up loudness databases, and find the right disc on something like Discogs. Heaven forbid they want to avoid such hassle for a store that ostensibly wants to offer the best master around.

 

[miceblue]

So if I rip a CD that I got from a used CD store for $5, convert it to 256 kbps LAME MP3, convert it back to WAV, upsample it to 24/192, advertise it as "HD," sell it for $25, and you think it sounds good, you're okay with that?

Can you (or anyone) prove this actually happens in real world? People seem to think HDTracks does this but is there proof (and if they do was this some isolated case or pattern)? Also, to what extent can they (resellers) control what the labels are sending them to sell? Who should be responsible for verifying content quality? Does Amazon guarantee that the CD you purchased was not upsampled to CD resolution from low res MP3? If yes how can they prove this?

Prove? I don't think it's possible unless you own the original CD master, DVD-A, Blu-Ray, and/or SACD and you do the direct comparisons yourself, which is why digital downloads without listing its provenance is problematic to me.

For example, supposedly the Carpenter's Singles album from HD Tracks comes sourced from the SACD. I have no actual way to verify this is where it came from since I don't own the SACD myself and HD Tracks doesn't list the provenance. What I do know is that the masters from HD Tracks sound identical to my CD rip of the same album upon ABX tests, and that the spectrograms confirm that what I hear on my CD is the same from the HD Tracks version. In the end, I just wasted $18 on a so-called "HD" album that sounds exactly the same as the CD when I was expecting an improvement in sound from a different master.

Anyway, I don't think ripping the audio off of a SACD is the right way to obtain that master in the first place.
AcousticSounds distributes the original DSD master that was put onto the SACD:
http://store.acousticsounds.com/d/95354/The_Carpenters-Singles_1969-1981-DSD

DSD file created by Gus Skinas from the original DSD audio used to create the existing SACD.

So you have no doubt you're getting the legitimate SACD master

 

[gikigill]

I won't be posting links but a simple google search brings up a lot of info. I personally was affected after running their files through a spectrogram and finding hi res files with the same details as a CD.

If it sounds good is not a valid reason any online seller can have for selling upsampled tracks while charging MORE for the privilege. Upsampling won't magically restore the missing information from the master track which is what I am supposedly paying for.

 

[Steven R. Rochli]

You are missing the point. Leave aside the debate about whether or not we can discern the difference between resolutions. An up sampled file cannot sound better than its source and selling such a file without disclosure is tantamount to fraud.

 
Agree that selling an upsampled file without disclosure is fraud. 'Free' upsampling has been built into CD players for decades. Thus it is akin to calling decades old Red Book CD 44.1/16-bit as 'hi-res'. Please keep an eye out as there may be a Class Action lawsuit in the future. If it comes about i'll post who to contact here on Head-Fi, Enjoy the Music.com and other discussion boards.

 

[fiascogarcia]

   
Agree that selling an upsampled file without disclosure is fraud. 'Free' upsampling has been built into CD players for decades. Thus it is akin to calling decades old Red Book CD 44.1/16-bit as 'hi-res'. Please keep an eye out as there may be a Class Action lawsuit in the future. If it comes about i'll post who to contact here on Head-Fi, Enjoy the Music.com and other discussion boards.

Best to check with a Head-Fi administrator before posting something  of that nature.

 

[Steven R. Rochli]

Thanks for the head up and will keep that in mind in the future. Apologies if someone feels a bit bent out of shape. The crux of the matter is obviously the question of what the original digitized audio file is, the mastering technique, etc and not disclosing that before consumer purchase of what they are lead to believe are higher than 16-bit/44kHz audio files. This is something many within the industry are debating. Am sure you have seen where the DEG is approving decades old 16-bit/44.1kHz as 'hi-res'.
 
So this begs the question.... Would you or anyone here call Red Book standard CD resolution as hi-res? If the Pono unit only played up to 16-bit/44kHz would you or anyone here call it a hi-res player?

 

[oneway23]

http://parttimeaudiophile.com/2014/11/19/review-pono-music-player-part-1/