I'm going to be a party pooper here and suggest that there is unlikely to be any audible advantage to LDAC. This post will make some people say this belongs in the sound science forum, which I admit it does, but hopefully I won't trigger anybody too much. So first off, in terms of bitrate, Apt X is capable of 352. Why is that important? Well, beyond a bitrate of 320 it is arguably not possible to tell the difference. About 4 years ago at a head-fi meet I organized here in Ottawa I conducted a multiple subject, multiple trial blind listening test. I took one very dynamic and well recorded song, One Trick Pony by Holy Cole and made a 320mp3 from the lossless master that I ripped from the commercial CD I own. Each user used the same equipment. Before the trials began each user was able to set the volume level they wanted. Once they indicated that they had the volume level correct for their preference, no further volume adjustment was allowed.
I had seven subjects, 6 of them under 25 years of age (one subject was in his mid 40s), so almost all young ears, and all head-fi members. They were tasked with indicating if they could hear a difference between the two files, lossless or the lossy file made from the lossless file. Each subject had at least 5 trials where both versions were played to them. I would vary the order of which file was played first per trial pairing, but the subject had no idea what file version was being played at any time. Prior to the trials two of the subjects were completely confident they could tell the difference as they had "tested" themselves using sighted tests, in other words, they knew when they were listening to lossy versus lossless. Not in my test they didn't. Guess what? Not one of the 7 subjects did better than 50% detection, in other words, completely guessing. In order to have demonstrated any reliable detection subjects would have to be at least 90% accurate, so obviously they fell well shy of that mark. My results are not unique, these results are commonplace with blind listening tests.
That isn't proof, but it is pretty suggestive that people should consider that their belief in an audible difference between a 320 and lossless file is simply an assumption until tested. I say this as the notion that LDAC and the significantly higher bitrate will sound better shouldn't just be accepted. I had a Bluetooth Apt X HD headphone (B&W PX) and my LG G6 which does Apt X HD and I couldn't hear a difference as compared with my laptop when it streamed Apt X only to the PX. You don't have to agree with me, but I do hope that people keep an open mind and at least entertain that Apt X is already capable of excellent, and transparent quality. That said, it really doesn't matter, listen to LDAC, I'm quite sure that it will sound fantastic so no harm no foul, but hopefully people don't automatically assume LDAC is superior. My experience with Bluetooth over about the last 3 years (Sony 1000XM, B&W P7, B&O H7, B&W PX, Onkyo H500BT and Definitive Technology Symphony 1) is that Bluetooth with Apt X sounds fantastic, and recently when I compare the Apt X enabled FiiO Q5 versus the USB connection to my laptop, I can't hear a difference.
Again, I can't and don't make absolute claims, I am simply trying to keep healthy, critical thought in the area. My apology if my sound science forum like post bothers anybody, I can delete it if it does.
