[Maniac]

Just wondering, does people here consider PS3 as a computer playback device or a dedicated player(more or less)?

I personally think of it as a computer playback device and it worked mostly fine except for the interference it puts out to devices close by. It is a nice option for people who want to pull music from their server, play from HDD (it seem to allow uncompress PCM storage if you pull it off a server), or for those who want to play SACD/Blu-Ray. It works either way, and even downconverts SACD to high bit rate PCM for external DAC to decode.


And it is a whole lot cheaper than computers.

With that said, I still drop my red-book CDs onto my CDP-X5000, yes it is a lot more fun seeing your disc spin through the clear top.

 

[jp11801]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hellenback /img/forum/go_quote.gif This might be a bit off topic but it applies. I just don't get how "lossless" works. If it only takes up half the room where is the other half of the information? Is there truly no information loss in "lossless conversion" and if so why don't CDs use the same format to save space? SACD and DVD audio have many times more information pressed into the discs. How does lossless preserve ALL the information?

the compact disc format is locked into a protocol that was developed by Sony and Philips almost 30 years ago lossless works much the same way a zip file works. CDs by nature are a somewhat outdated digital format based on current tech maybe someday we can get beyond the physical product and just download music in high rez.

 

[jp11801]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Maniac /img/forum/go_quote.gif Just wondering, does people here consider PS3 as a computer playback device or a dedicated player(more or less)? I personally think of it as a computer playback device and it worked mostly fine except for the interference it puts out to devices close by. It is a nice option for people who want to pull music from their server, play from HDD (it seem to allow uncompress PCM storage if you pull it off a server), or for those who want to play SACD/Blu-Ray. It works either way, and even downconverts SACD to high bit rate PCM for external DAC to decode. And it is a whole lot cheaper than computers. With that said, I still drop my red-book CDs onto my CDP-X5000, yes it is a lot more fun seeing your disc spin through the clear top.

a 60g ps3 is $50 cheaper than a mac mini on amazon but the ps3 will play blue ray while the mini + hd will store all your music. 2 nice options I can't wait until apple supports blue ray

 

[Maniac]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jp11801 /img/forum/go_quote.gif a 60g ps3 is $50 cheaper than a mac mini on amazon but the ps3 will play blue ray while the mini + hd will store all your music. 2 nice options I can't wait until apple supports blue ray

PS3 can use external HDD as well.

not to mention a lot of people have upgraded the internal HDD with ease too.

 

[Asr]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hellenback /img/forum/go_quote.gif This might be a bit off topic but it applies. I just don't get how "lossless" works. If it only takes up half the room where is the other half of the information? Is there truly no information loss in "lossless conversion" and if so why don't CDs use the same format to save space? SACD and DVD audio have many times more information pressed into the discs. How does lossless preserve ALL the information?

The information on a CD is optically written/read as PCM: Pulse-code modulation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Data on the CD is stored digitally on a computer as a WAV file, this information is still in PCM, it's just not optical anymore.

The aforementioned analogy to ZIP is the best one that can be thought of. Lossless compression is basically an implementation of an idea of how to compress data without losing any information, of course. ZIP works its magic by doing things like counting how many times a single unique character appears and where, instead of storing *all* the instances that character may appear. Lossless for audio takes a similar approach, counting how many times a specific quantity is in the PCM, instead of storing all instances of that quantity in the PCM. No data is lost, hence lossless - it can be decompressed to the full original PCM since all the important information is still there, just in a different way.

Lossy formats like MP3 probably do the same thing. MP3 manages a much higher compression ratio since it works on a much more complex algorithm, and it tosses out inaudible frequencies (>20 kHz, <20 Hz).

Another file format analogy between WAV = FLAC -> MP3 would be something like BMP = PNG -> JPG. BMP files store the data for each individual on-screen pixel in a color range up to 24-bit. PNG files store all the same data in a compressed form. JPG files, on the other hand, are very lossy, and their algorithm uses a pixel-block approximation - this is why low-quality JPGs look very blurry.

 

[nick_charles]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Asr /img/forum/go_quote.gif Lossy formats like MP3 probably do the same thing. MP3 manages a much higher compression ratio since it works on a much more complex algorithm, and it tosses out inaudible frequencies (>20 kHz, <20 Hz).

Not quite. One of the principles that MP3 uses is that we cannot hear everything even in the 20 - 20K range due to masking, this is an effect where one frequency will mask another nearby frequency if it is sufficiently more powerful. How this works is quite complex and highly frequency dependent, some frequencies can be masked by others that may be just 20db higher, masking is less effective as the two frequencies get further apart, it is fascinating really. Most MP3 encoders cut almost everything above 19K down drastically. Run a awav file through a real time spectrum analyzer (such as the one in cooledit) then do the same for an MP3 version, the difference at the higher frequencies is stark. That it (at high bit-rates) is transparent to 98% of folks is a real testament to ingenuity.

When Mp3 arrived I was a real hard core skeptic and the early encoders could be very flaky but they are really good these days.