Strange hiss when playing mp3's

[Paranoid Android]

Ever since I got my MS-1's I've noticed that there are some songs that have a hiss or crackles in the background. Seeing how I noticed this a couple of days after I got them, I thought I may have played them too loud and damaged the drivers. However, soon after I noticed that this only occurs in some songs, others are still very clear with no hiss or anything. I don't know if this is quality related because I've heard some songs that were 256kbps and had a hiss while others didn't have any and were only 128kbps.

Is this what they meant when they said that better headphones will bring out your music's shortcomings? Could it be my soundcard (I have an Audigy Platinum)? I never used to get irritated at things like this but these damn crackles are really pissing me off.

 

[quke]

Though your sound card isn't exactly the top of the line, if the hiss only occurs in some songs I guess it's the MP3 encoder and/or CD ripping tool. Even with high bit rates some encoders just make crap. I recommend LAME (3.90.3 is said to be the very best although I doubt the 3.96 is much worse) and EAC for ripping. Try a forum search about those two and I'm sure you come up with a good setup guide.

 

[Jahn]

ms-1s are no joke, even at $99 they are good enough to reveal the deficiencies of your source - grados are not known to be "forgiving" phones like some of the other brands are. what you hear is what you get. if it's garbage in, grados will show you garbage out, not wrap it in ribbons and tell you it's chocolate.

believe it or not i had to go thru my entire old mp3 collection and weed the hissy ones out - i can't believe i listened to 32bit encoded compressed crap and didn't notice until i got my MS-1s. but now i hear a hiss all the way up to 320aac - but now i'm happy.

 

[Paranoid Android]

Gah! I tried playing some CD's to see if quality was really the case and it seems that I was wrong. First I popped in Classic Queen and skimmed through the CD. The same pops in the sound I heard before were there. Then, thinking it might be the CD (which is about 10 years old), I tried The Wall. While the music souded GREAT, I could still catch a few pops here and there and while they're still not too loud, when the rest of the sound is so clear the smallest thing really tends to jump out at you.

 

[Permonic]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paranoid Android Gah! I tried playing some CD's to see if quality was really the case and it seems that I was wrong. First I popped in Classic Queen and skimmed through the CD. The same pops in the sound I heard before were there. Then, thinking it might be the CD (which is about 10 years old), I tried The Wall. While the music souded GREAT, I could still catch a few pops here and there and while they're still not too loud, when the rest of the sound is so clear the smallest thing really tends to jump out at you.

It's called bad recording. Regardless .wav, .ape, FLAC or even a 190 MP3, some tracks will produce some hiss or a sound distortion.

 

[Paranoid Android]

I have a feeling I'll be spending a lot of money on the better recordings in the near future..

So are you sure it's just the CD, or could it be something else like my CD-ROM/sound card as well?

 

[KyPeN]

Try a CD thats known for solid recording, such as Tool - Lateralus.

 

[Claude]

I´ve encountered MP3s which were encoded with 48kHz sampling rate (instead of 44.1kHz CD standard), by error it seems.

Some sound cards produce strange hiss when 48kHz MP3s (or wav files) are played, on other cards with a better compatibility there is no problem.

Check the sampling rate displayed in Winamp

 

[Mr.Radar]

If you haven't already, turn the master and wave volumes to 50% each. All the Audigy's are known to have clipping issues which will introduce the pops you describe. As for the hiss, if you have an original Audigy or Audigy 2 (non-ZS) use software resampling to 48KHz as that will bypass the horrible hardware resampling that the Audigy's use. For Winamp use the ASIO output plugin with TOP resampling. For Foobar2000 use the resampler DSP to 48000 Hz in slow mode (and you should also try using Strong ATH Noise Shaping dither, which increases background noise but also achieves a sound closer to 24-bit). If you have an Audigy 2 ZS use software resampling to 24/96. With Foobar2000 use the resampler DSP to 96000 Hz in slow mode and output 24-bit padded to 32-bit and no dither.

 

[Paranoid Android]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mr.Radar If you haven't already, turn the master and wave volumes to 50% each. All the Audigy's are known to have clipping issues which will introduce the pops you describe.

Ok, tried it, that's not the problem.

Quote:

As for the hiss, if you have an original Audigy or Audigy 2 (non-ZS) use software resampling to 48KHz as that will bypass the horrible hardware resampling that the Audigy's use. For Winamp use the ASIO output plugin with TOP resampling. For Foobar2000 use the resampler DSP to 48000 Hz in slow mode (and you should also try using Strong ATH Noise Shaping dither, which increases background noise but also achieves a sound closer to 24-bit).

OK, newb question: How would I go about enabling the software resampling? I'm sure this is a stupid question but I've never really messed around with my sound card settings so I don't know much about it. And I downloaded the plug-in and unzipped it into my Winamp plug-ins folder but I can't find the option to enable it. Is there something I'm not doing right?

 

[Mr.Radar]

Under the Winamp preferences, highlight ASIO plugin under the Plugins->Output options then select configure at the bottom of the window. At the bottom of the ASIO settings there should be an option to use resampling (enable it and select 48000 Hz as the Sample rate and Top as the quality).

 

[Paranoid Android]

Ok, I did it but I still hear the hissing/crackling.

I'm starting to think it's really my headphones.

EDIT: Going to try listening to the same CD's through my parents home theater tomorrow. If I still hear the same problems, it's definitely the headphones. But until then, you can post more suggestions, if you have any.

 

[ooheadsoo]

I think all of us are pretty sure here that it's not your headphones if it only happens on certain songs/cds. Your headphones are going to be a lot more revealing than you are used to if you've never heard revealng setups before, especially grados.

 

[Budley007]

My Grados are more sensitive to hiss than my Beyers. Lower impedence headphones do that sometimes I guess. The CDs are probably the culprit. I notice about 1 in 3 in my collection have a high "hiss", especially the older ones. The only way I can tolerate it is to either get used to it, or use equalization(gasp!).

 

[Paranoid Android]

Well I listened to the same Queen CD through my parents' home theater this morning and there's good news: it's probably my sound card. The quality itself sucked, practically no highs or lows but I blame that on the receiver seeing how they were there when I played the CD on my computer. However, the pops and hissing weren't there either. I suppose it could be because it's not hitting the frequencies that have caused the pops in the first place but I'm leaning towards my soundcard as the source of the problem.

So, are there any more tweaks I can perform on my soundcard that might get rid of the problem or should I just cash out for an AV-710? And if I do, is it a sure solution?

EDIT: Question about the AV-710: Does it require an amp? When skimming through the forums looking for info on the card I found a few people that said it didn't sound quite as good without one. Would this card do a good job powering my MS-1's?