MP3 vs. CD

[el jopez]

I dont know but wav format seems to be ok with me, no comprimise in

audio quality in my opinion. Sure its a HUGE file but with the

price of HD's these days, its nothing to complain about so audio

compression is out the window. 130 USD for a 300 GB HD doesnt

seem to bad to me at all!

[Zealot125]

wav format seems to be ok with me, no comprimise in

audio quality in my opinion

I would hope that everyone here shares that opinion. WAV is

uncompressed, uncompromised music, which is exactly what was on the

cd. It doesnt get any more accurate from a CD source.[] In

comparison, both FLAC and Apple Lossless are at the same quality level

as wavs, but they take up less space.

[DrWho]

ont he topic of VBRs I really dont follow your logic. The way the algorithm was explained to me, it only uses a lower bitrate when it would be impossible for the listener to discern the degradation in quality. In extemely simplified terms, it could be loosely compared to instead of recording silence in the music, telling how long that there should be silence. Not sure if that is accurate or understandable, but this chart on hydrogenaudio claims that V0 (preset --extreme) encoded with LAME are pretty much exactly the same quality as 320 kbps CBR, but takes up less space.

http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?title=LAME

ya know, they say the compression concepts behind mp3 only throw away the musical information you "don't hear" either....in other words, there is always a compromise being made. If you have a playback program that shows you the bitrate, you'll notice that the VBR is going as low as 92kbps in sections where music is playing (aka not silence). There is someone somewhere that must first decide what is inaudible and what is not....and then it is no easy task to translate that into computer language such that sacrifices are most certainly made in the process. It's ironic because just last week in class we went over compression techniques and mp3 was one that we specifically looked at.

[Zealot125]

Good point, except my bitrates rarely drop below 192 kbps, and when they do, it is silence.

[thebes]

I don't download music, too many recordings issued by artist's have a

sort of theme or approach to them and I like to experience what the

artist is trying to get at as well as the music. Of course many

recordings are simply a bunch of songs thrown together and called an

album. Downloading songs is really just cherrypicking and I think

you miss out on too much. In other words, a hit song may make me buy

the album, but it's the other songs on the album that will keep me

playing it.

So I don't have a lot of experience with mp3's but one of my

experiences led me to believe that too much is left out of the music

using mp3's.

A buddy of mine, an accomplished local guitarist, sent me a selection

of something he was noodling around with. I played it through my

desktop Promedia's and while I liked the work I thought the musici was

totatlly uninvolving. Noted pretty much the same to him in an

email and he said opps sent you mp3, here's the wave file. What a

difference, totally noticable, immediately the recording came

alive. And that's not even playing it on a good system.

That convinced me, I don't need this junk. What's the point of

building a killer system then dropping substandard sound into it.

If I want car music I'll turr on the radio or simply burn a cd and put

it on the player in the car.

Just my take on it, after all I'm just a middle-aged, overweight, bald ,white boy.

[Zealot125]

In other words, a hit song may make me buy

the album, but it's the other songs on the album that will keep me

playing it.

Couldnt have said it better myself. But dont be too quick to

judge MP3s on that one experience. You dont even know what enoder

was used, nor at what bitrate. Though I agree with uninvolving

aspect of low-quality MP3s my original objective was just to let people

know that to my virgin ears (if you will), I cannot tell the difference

between a well encoded MP3 at a high VBR, and the real thing.

[Duke Spinner]

, I cannot tell the difference

between a well encoded MP3 at a high VBR, and the real thing.

and niether can I

well, mostly......FLAC...seems to have more " Air ".and " Shimmer "..say, to cymbols ...

[maxg]

About a year or so ago I ripped my entire CD collection to MP3 at 256 Kbps. I have never regretted doing this but the reasoning is fairly complex, as follows:

1. I chose MP3 simply because it is a format that has achieved critical mass. It is the standard format for digital music and EVERY player of EVERY manufacturer of EVERY device that plays digitally recorded music other than just CD supports it.

This is not true of any other format - including variable bit rate MP3. Choose anything else and at some time you will almost certainly have to convert the format to something else whether it is Apple's format, Microsoft's format (WMA?), FLAC or other.

2. Having selected MP3 - warts and all - the question of bit rate comes up. Simply put - I tested 128, 192, 256 and 320 Kb/s. 256 seemed to me to be the best option as I could not reliably spot 320 when it was playing in comparison. That was not true for lower bitrates.

The result of the above is that I now have my entire collection on a hard disk as home - a hard disk in the office and on 6 DVD's in my living room.

Aside from that about once per week I make a selection on any one of the computers and download about 7 albums into my phone for headphone listening at odd moments (1 Gb of space on a storage card thing - actually I have a second 512 Mb card with a few albums on it too in my wallet should the need arise).

I find comparing the quality of MP3 Vs CD to be pointless on anything other than my main system. Over computer speakers and phone headphones it seems fine - hardly audiophile - but better than the radio by some margin.

Thing is - for audiophile listening sessions at home I listen to vinyl anyway so whether or not MP3 matches CD is neither here nor there for me.

MP3 is about convenience. It offers a huge amount of reasonable quality music with instant availablity - anywhere.

I am also not 100% certain that even if you can identify the difference it means the CD version is better...

[Zealot125]

This is not true of any other format - including variable bit rate MP3.

True, but my goal was only for them to work on the Ipod, which does play VBRs.

[tofu]

I don't download music, too many recordings issued by artist's have a

sort of theme or approach to them and I like to experience what the

artist is trying to get at as well as the music.

simple answer. acquire full albums and utilize the cuesheets. i think it's pretty much a standard for them to come with cue sheets these days.

i stopped downloading loose mp3's about a year ago.

[dblue]

I listen to most music in MP3 format. I have ripped my entire CD

collection to HQ LAME VBR, and I cannot tell the difference on my main

system, no matter how hard I try...in fact, I don't think anyone could

in a blind test.

MP3's are very easy to pick out when ripped at CBR 192 or below...but

above 192 CBR or at HQ VBR...I'm hard pressed to hear any difference at

any volume on any system (and I'm pretty picky..it took a lot of

testing to ensure that this would sound the same to me, and it does.)

[Duke Spinner]

that's precisely what I thought