Chesky Launches High-Resolution Download Store

[Rlynn]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NiceCans /img/forum/go_quote.gif This is definately a move in the right direction, and we need more sites like this. Unfortunately I would likely never purchase a download there as their prices are too close to the 'sale price' I can get elsewhere for the physical CD. I just feel that since there is no item to manufacture, package, warehouse, distribute, ship, or stock, that the prices should be appreciably lower than purchasing a physical CD. If I am to pay close to the same price I want to have the physical CD. Am I being short-sighted, or do others feel the same?

The Reference label downloads are at a lower price than I have seen lately. Am I missing a source? Upon reflection, I might sometimes be willing to pay the same as the best on-line price for the satisfaction of immediate listening. It would be hard to pay more for instant gratification though.

Quote:

Originally Posted by scompton /img/forum/go_quote.gif As I said in another thread, this web site looks like it's going to be expensive for me. Too much good music that I've never heard of before. I was browsing threw the Tzadik section and heard a lot I liked.

The first one in the list is of music by Bun-Ching Lam. I had her Mountain Clear Water Remote and liked it very much. Interesting music.

 

[scompton]

I haven't downloaded any music yet, but I'll probably burn it as a music CD as soon as I get it. I want the physical back up as well as having 2 copies on hard drives. One at work and one at home.

Edit: How do the Linn studio master 24bit downloads sound when converted to ALAC or AIFF. I use iTunes on a PC and don't want to go though the hassle of getting a plugin to play FLAC.

 

[Manny Calavera]

Boomkat - Your independent music specialist

Thats the site I came across.

 

[mcmurray]

Quote:

Originally Posted by scompton /img/forum/go_quote.gif Edit: How do the Linn studio master 24bit downloads sound when converted to ALAC or AIFF. I use iTunes on a PC and don't want to go though the hassle of getting a plugin to play FLAC.

The 24bit downloads will sound ok if converted to alac. You would need to use a good dithering algorithm though (i.e. Foobar). However, if your soundcard or DAC is 24bit capable, I would strongly recommend using a program such as Foobar to playback the 24bit content. I use itunes for my 16bit material, and Foobar for 24bit (plus it can play ALAC, and convert anything to WAV for importing into itunes, burning dvd's etc).

I forgot to mention that www.highdeftapetransfers.com/ has plenty of 24bit material also. This is a good thing, when Chesky gets onboard there will be 3 online stores carrying 24bit DRM free audio, not long ago there were 0.

If this keeps up then I might go ahead with my plan of designing a high-end DAP which plays 24bit audio files, with 1Tb of storage minimum.

 

[grawk]

alac does 24/96 without trouble

 

[mcmurray]

Quote:

Originally Posted by grawk /img/forum/go_quote.gif alac does 24/96 without trouble

I don't think so mate, ALAC is 16bit only.

But... I'd love to be proved wrong. What is your source on this?

 

[grawk]

 

[mcmurray]

Very interesting grawk! Now I have 4 questions;

1. Does alac handle other sampling rates i.e. 48, 88.2, 192khz?
2. Does ipod play these files?
3. Is there any way I can encode 24bit ALAC on a PC?
4. How did you rip that SACD?

 

[grawk]

1 yes dunno dunno
2 dunno
3 dunno
4 analog into my apogee duet

 

[mcmurray]

Quote:

Originally Posted by grawk /img/forum/go_quote.gif 1 yes dunno dunno 2 dunno 3 dunno 4 analog into my apogee duet

lol thanks mate. I'll do some investigating and let you guys know what I come up with.

 

[ralphp@optonline]

Quote:

Originally Posted by The Actual /img/forum/go_quote.gif My understanding is that most of the money spent creating an album is during the recording period. The actual disk, jewel case and liner notes might cost some cents or a dollar, but an extra 8-14 dollars for the artist and record label is even more important. Music is not a commodity. Every song is unique and special to the creator. I think it makes sense to charge close to the CD cost for digital downloads. Furthermore creating new infrastructure for digital stores must be expensive so it might not even be too much cheaper for the retailer to sell digital copies than CDs. That being said, I always buy physical CDs myself. I like to have the physical copy as a backup, plus the experience of opening a CD, looking at the disc art, tray art and liner notes cannot be replicated on a computer.

Please send me a PM with your address so that I can mail you a nice clean handkerchief to wipe the brown stuff off your nose. Also I have a very good, "almost like new" bridge for sale and it even comes with all the cars.

 

[grawk]

You're really invested in the "fight the power" part of stealing music. Stealing music isn't fighting any power. It's just theft.

Anyway, seeing as how the companies referenced in this thread are doing what the people who steal music say they want companies to do (releasing higher resolution no drm music), it's really not the place to attack the industry for not doing it.

 

[scompton]

The Linn site talks about using a program called Max to convert 24 bit FLAC to 24 bit ALAC. Unfortunately, it's Mac only. I contacted Linn for a suggestion and they said download WMA for Windows users, look at the FLAC site, or search the internet. So far, I've found nothing.

I'd rather not use foobar, because I like to shuffle by album in iTunes. About 1 out of every 20-30 albums, I'll actually choose what to listen to. I'll tend to forget what's not in iTunes. And I find foobar to be a PIA compared to iTunes.

One think I did find on the FLAC site is another label offering 24 bit FLAC. Grimell records has released the entire Talis Scholars discography in 5 levels of quality

Edit: Not everything is available in 24 bit, including the album I most want

Both Gimell and Linn offer test files to make sure you're system is compatible.

Here's what Gimell offers

320kbps MP3
CD Quality 16 bit - 44.1 KHz WMA or FLAC
Studio Master 24 bit - 44.1 KHz WMA or FLAC
Studio Master 24 bit - 48.0 KHz WMA or FLAC
Studio Master Pro 24 bit - 88.2 KHz WMA or FLAC
Studio Master Pro 24 bit - 96.0 KHz WMA or FLAC

 

[grawk]

dbpoweramp will convert to alac in batches. I don't know if it will do 24bit or not. Why not just try dropping 24/96 files into itunes and convert to lossless?

 

[ralphp@optonline]

Quote:

Originally Posted by grawk /img/forum/go_quote.gif You're really invested in the "fight the power" part of stealing music. Stealing music isn't fighting any power. It's just theft. Anyway, seeing as how the companies referenced in this thread are doing what the people who steal music say they want companies to do (releasing higher resolution no drm music), it's really not the place to attack the industry for not doing it.

Pray tell, just where did I say anything about stealing music? Please do not put words in my mouth or accuse me of doing something that I haven't done.

And yes you are correct, there are some companies starting to do what many people have asked for and that is a step in the right direction. But to give these companies a free pass for over charging for the downloads is really not very useful. I'll state it plainly: a downloaded file of a song or CD should cost substantially less than the physical CD. How much less, I don't know but less not more. Have you looked at the prices of some of the sites which offer full CD quality and high resolution downloads - the prices are ridiculous.

I, for one, have no problem with telling the emperor that he's missing his clothes. For years I've heard tall tales and empty promises from the music industry about the high cost of CDs and how at first CDs were so expensive to manufacture but once the CD pressing plants come online that the prices would fall - never happened. And now the industry is saying that online distribution is also expensive. As I said, that bridge is still available and at good price.

Perhaps we should focus on the time honored practice of trying to resell old music in a new format or package like all those early "remastered" CDs which we just happened to learn weren't really properly remastered, just done as quickly and cheaply as possible and have the poor sound to prove it. Or the nth repackaging of a greatest hits collection but this time with a 25 second outtake of inane studio banter added to "sweeten" the pot. Just how many different Led Zeppelin remasters does one need?

Or maybe we need to focus on the music industry's treatment of any musical genre other than popular, i.e. best selling, music. I've been a jazz fan for over 35 years and as a consumer (and yes I own, as in bought and paid for, well over 1,200 jazz CDs) I've been marginalized by the major record labels over and over again so excuse me if I don't see the need to cry any tears of regret at what might be the end of their existence.

I could go on with this list but I hope that you get my point. So yes, the music industry is in business to make money but their main source of income, the sale of CDs, appears to be drying up. Unfortunately the music industry has been slow to come up new ways of generating income and so they feel the need to over charge for any remaining or new means of selling music and I'm not buying into it.