[bigshot]

The most important thing is to balance the line levels. In iTunes a CD plays quite a bit louder than a compressed file, but when you boost the level of the compressed to match the original CD, they can sound identical, depending on the bit rate.

See ya
Steve

 

[Leo-]

(double post)

 

[Leo-]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigshot /img/forum/go_quote.gif The most important thing is to balance the line levels. In iTunes a CD plays quite a bit louder than a compressed file, but when you boost the level of the compressed to match the original CD, they can sound identical, depending on the bit rate. See ya Steve

Do they? I haven't made a rigorous test lossless x 320myself, and although 320 can sound fine most of the time, i don't think in theory they're equivalent...

 

[ingwe]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Leo- /img/forum/go_quote.gif Do they? I haven't made a rigorous test lossless x 320myself, and although 320 can sound fine most of the time, i don't think in theory they're equivalent...

Steve's correct: it is imperative to a/b with a and b volume set at the same level. With headphones, this can be difficult.

 

[bigshot]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Leo- /img/forum/go_quote.gif Do they? I haven't made a rigorous test lossless x 320myself, and although 320 can sound fine most of the time, i don't think in theory they're equivalent...

They are not equivalent in theory... just in practice.

See ya
Steve

 

[iamresumes]

Wav or CD is definitely better than MP3s, if u use good gears.

 

[ILikeMusic]

Quote:

Originally Posted by iamresumes /img/forum/go_quote.gif Wav or CD is definitely better than MP3s, if u use good gears.

<sigh>

 

[wanderman]

Quote:

Originally Posted by iamresumes /img/forum/go_quote.gif Wav or CD is definitely better than MP3s, if u use good gears.

injecting the media through a 1/4 plug drilled into your skull or consuming the media is the best way. All in the good gear in the world just interrupts the signal path. I want my music pure. Blue Magic Pure.

 

[Mweisbrod]

Quote:

Originally Posted by wanderman /img/forum/go_quote.gif I want my music pure. Blue Magic Pure.

that was a good movie.

 

[brown274]

Ok, so I now wanted to compare my wav files and my lame ( -b 320 -m j -h) 320 CBR mp3. I wanted to see if I could pick out the mp3 vs the wav on a side by side comparrision. So here we go.
I had no clue what I was listening to (mp3 or Wav)
I used ER-6i and K701's
Headsix amp with ALO LOD
Ipod Nano 8gb 2nd gen
All songs were added through Itunes

Somgs were:
Coldplay - Spies
Faith Hill - Love Ain't Like That
Hot Rize - Powwow The Indian Boy
Jimmy Buffett - Son Of A Son Of A Sailor
Van Morrison - Gloria
John Fogerty - A Hundred And Ten In The Shade
Josh Kelley - Home To Me
Norah Jones - In The Morning
Norah Jones - Be Here To Love Me

So I blind tested these tracks side by side, usually listening to them a few times back and forth. I would right down key elements like you could hear the pick hitting strings on #3 norah but not as much on #4 norah. So after listening to the tracks, I circled the ones that I thought were the mp3s. Then I opened my ipod throught Itunes, opened playlist and showed file type.

Conclusions, I could not tell a difference. Some songs I heard more detail in were mp3s and some were wav.
I guess that lame mp3 CBR 320kbps is hard to tell unless you have greater gear than me.

 

[En_R]

Go to hydrogenaudio
then come back.

Quote:

Originally Posted by brown274 /img/forum/go_quote.gif OK, the apple lossless files sounded about 10%-15% cleaner than the lame mp3s. Now the wma ripped 256kbps sounded about 35% worse than the other two above.

 

[davber]

Quote:

Originally Posted by En_R /img/forum/go_quote.gif Go to hydrogenaudio then come back.

Hey, great to be among music (and audio)loving friends, both skeptics and audiophiles!

Since I am able to hear differences between ALAC (ripped via iTunes from CD) and AAC 192 kbps (both CBR and VBR, although the latter is harder), I must be a self-deceiver and/or liar. That is given by the various ABX tests performed by professionals and communicated with great energy on the Hydrogenaudio fora.

Not only that, but since I hear it on my crappy iPhone - although I do have decent IEMs - the self-deception must be strong.

Actually, it was strong enough to penetrate a shuffled playlist - nope, I have not gone through the quasi-random algorithm used by the "iPod" music software in shuffling, so there could be a bias here

- and A/B tests.

More details:

I got my new IEMs today - a pair of Shure SE530 (with a huge dongle called a PTH...) So, I just had to setup an ABX (the double-blindness stemming from the automatic shuffler not having eyes

)

I started with iPhone as source (and unfortunately as amp as well...)

I used the song "How Insensitive" from "From This Moment On" by Diana Krall, which was ripped (without EAC or any such magic; it is fascinating to see people thinking that bits disappear all the time when files/streams happen to be audio compared to regular non-audio data...) using iTunes to ALAC and from that ALAC file, I converted - again using iTunes - to 192 kbps AAC with and without VBR, 128 kbps CBR, and (ugh) 128 kbps MP3 (nope, not Lame.) Ok, I also downloaded the 256 kbps MP3 VBR (using Lame) from Amazon store. Unfortunately, this latter rip yielded a much higher amplitude and I did not have time to re-sample it to calibrate amplitude with my own conversions. A discussion about Amazon vs iTunes Pro and their formats have to wait till next thread

So, I ended up with 5 versions of the same song - excluding the Amazon version.

These versions are put in a playlist that is shuffled. Since iPhone has this (for DAP purposes) silly touch screen, I had to cover the upper part of the screen with a piece of thin card box during the sessions.

For each session, I just compared the first two versions. I spent in total some 50 sessions - yes, my head is tired now - and spent around 60 seconds together on the two first versions of each shuffled session.

The informal results - since I did not write down the exact versions and numbers on a piece of paper - is that I could distinguish ALAC from all other versions (ALAC was one of the two first versions in around 20 sessions) except for once when I could not distinguish it from 192 AAC VBR. In general, the 192 AAC VBR was considerably better than 192 AAC CBR. I could always distinguish the 128 MP3 and all other versions. For some reason, I had a really hard time to distinguish 128 AAC and 192 AAC CBR, while I always separated 192 AAC VBR and all other lossy versions.

So, with crappy source and amp and decent IEM:s, I can clearly distinguish AAC up to 192 kbps CBR and ALAC.

I am not happy with this result, since I have converted everything (from ALAC) to 192 kbps VBR to fit at least a few dozen albums on my iPhone

Without performing a proper AB(X or not) test with 256 MP3 (Lame, from Amazon) and ALAC, I must say that it sounds pretty good. But that is with an amp-less iPhone, folks. So, I will have to throw away my 192 AAC (CBR and VBR) and convert everything to either 256 AAC or MP3 Lame at least not to get a degraded experience on my iPhone + IEM (vs ALAC.) This means very few albums in those 8 GB

I will now try with my slightly better SqueezeBox DAC+amp, and try to write down exact figures on paper to make this at least quasi-scientific

Can I go to Hydrogenaudio and be screamed at now?

Self-deceptively yours,

/David

 

[Febs]

Quote:

Originally Posted by davber /img/forum/go_quote.gif Since I am able to hear differences between ALAC (ripped via iTunes from CD) and AAC 192 kbps (both CBR and VBR, although the latter is harder), I must be a self-deceiver and/or liar. That is given by the various ABX tests performed by professionals and communicated with great energy on the Hydrogenaudio fora.

What are you babbling about?

 

[davber]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Febs /img/forum/go_quote.gif What are you babbling about?

There are a lot of threads on Hydrogenaudio claiming that it is impossible to hear the difference between 192 kbps MP3 (or AAC) and lossless, and that people who claim to do so are just deceiving themselves.

I am a skeptic, and want to have 192 kbps be sufficient, to fit the most music on my 8 GB HD. But, I do hear a difference versus lossless. That together with the aforementioned "pro-skeptic" statements make me a liar or self-deceiver. Note that I was replying to the "go to Hydrogenaudio and come back" comment, which - unless I am mistaken - meant that he should go there to realize that there is no difference between (some >= 192 kbps MP3) and lossless. Was I mistaken in that interpretation?

So, (i) I believe those referred ABX tests, which essentially show that it is hard (and sometimes impossible) to hear a difference between 192 kbps MP3 and lossless, while (ii) I do seem to hear a difference between 192 kbps AAC and ALAC. That made me confused. Sorry to hear you considered that babbling.

/David

 

[Febs]

Quote:

Originally Posted by davber /img/forum/go_quote.gif There are a lot of threads on Hydrogenaudio claiming that it is impossible to hear the difference between 192 kbps MP3 (or AAC) and lossless, and that people who claim to do so are just deceiving themselves.

I'm not aware of many threads --at least, not by people who know what they are talking about--saying that it is "impossible" to hear the difference between 192 kbps MP3 and lossless. However, Hydrogen Audio requires that you provide ABX test results showing that you can hear a difference before you post subjective opinions regarding the sound of a codec. If you go there and claim you can hear a difference without providing statistically significant ABX results to support your claim, you'll get shot down quickly.

Quote:

I am a skeptic, and want to have 192 kbps be sufficient, to fit the most music on my 8 GB HD. But, I do hear a difference versus lossless. That together with the aforementioned "pro-skeptic" statements make me a liar or self-deceiver.

No, it doesn't. It's always possible that you are in that very small minority of people who can in fact hear a difference.