Can you tell the difference between 320kbps mp3s and lossless?
I can't at all lol. I have Edifier S2000MKIII speakers and Sony WH-1000XM5 headphones.
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I can't at all lol. I have Edifier S2000MKIII speakers and Sony WH-1000XM5 headphones.
Yes, but only if A-B-ing. But the more I listen to lossless, the more I hear.
And it slowly builds a deeper landscape.
Same, and only on one pair of speakers and a few sets of headphones. I can’t tell on AirPod Pros or in my car; where I listen to 99% of things overall.
I still go with flac because I’m stupid and stubborn.
They so need this 320kbps/FLAC booth at some audiophile conferences. See how many heads can pick them, or if it is 50/50 guessing.
Only in how much space the songs take up
Let me share one of the best explanations of digital audio recording ever produced:
D/A and A/D | Digital Show and Tell (Monty Montgomery @ xiph.org)
The premise of the video is to address the common "stairstepping" misconception about digital audio:
But Monty goes further into explaining how bit depth affects the stored audio information and playback:
For street cred, xiph.org is the group that created the Ogg Vorbis and FLAC audio codecs - they know a little about this topic.
I recommend watching the entire demonstration. You will understand your audio files and equipment very differently.
The 44 and 16bit is CD / WAV file quality that he is showing. Mp3 at 320 is close but it still sounds muddy.
No, he is demonstrating that digitization (sampling) of any audio waveform must be reproduced as the same waveform, because there is only one possible waveform that can fit the sampled points. This is true regardless of the filetype/compression used, though at very low sampling rates (below 8 bits/second) information is noticeably lost because there aren't enough sample points in a given timeframe, and then you get distortion during playback.
I'm not sure specifically where the line is, but there are physical limits to how fast a speaker cone can vibrate to reproduce the waveform no matter how detailed it is (it would depend on the specific playback device), regardless of whether the source is analog or digital. There's a point where the level of detail of the sampled waveform doesn't matter, because there's no audio equipment in existence that can reproduce that waveform with any accuracy, and 320 kHz is definitely above that point.
It is more likely that the "muddy" quality of the MP3 files you're referring to is related to choices made while converting/compressing the file, such as the differences in dithering that he demonstrates later in the video.
Nope, mp3 can still be 44kh sample rate, but compression algorithm loses fidelity. Its not 100 % reproducible. This the name lossy compression vs lossless.
Edit To be clear: he's shown live DAC, not extraction from compressed audio. To illustrate that we can capture the wave and reproduce...but when you compress with lossy, its lost.
There is a website where a person put mp3 output back through as input multiple times till the sound gets garbled through entropy. Couldn't find the link, but this dude did the opposite and captures what the mp3 algorithm drops. So when you listen to it it is mostly quiet but a lot of sounds left behind. https://www.factmag.com/2015/02/19/listen-song-made-entirely-data-lost-compressing-suzanne-vegas-toms-diner-mp3/
Some years ago we were making a test with my friends, and for me: 128kbps to 300, lossless or cd audio - easy
128 to 192, 300 to cd, etc- only one of my friend could easily say, I was right in like 60% cases, but it was hard, so it's basically negligible in real life when you really listen to music.
Yes, we did have a good setup - not audiophile level, but quite decent stuff
My experience was the same. Especially when you're in your 30s or older, the degredation is real.
The range is falling for some people, for some it's ok I can still hear really high pitches in my 43, I could hear an ultrasound rat spooker that was installed in a supermarket bakery isle (so it was kind of a "me spooker", because the pitch is really annoying.
But speaking of listening to the music - you still can analyze the whole range, so I'm not sure it really degrades with age. I am still really picky about my headphones and speakers :)
Really? It depends on the quality of the equipment, but 128kbps sounds like absolute trash to me.
I've been to weddings where they've played a recording of Pachelbel's Canon or whatever during the service that was clearly 128kbps mp3, and it sounded absolutely atrocious.
But yeah, when you get above 192, it gets harder to tell.
Most of my listening is through Bluetooth earbuds, and the bandwidth on those would crimp any kind of quality from lossless files. 320k is good enough for me.
I'm explicitly avoiding FLAC and high-end speakers to preserve my ears' naivety.
I found once I hit 192kbits I couldnt tell any difference between it and any higher quality. Altho that is from testing over 15+ years ago, so probably not valid anymore but minor details.
Similar to when YouTube first started doing 50/60 FPS videos. I could easily tell when something was either 50 or 60fps. Now not so much.
Absolutely not. With my experience using similar prosumer grade gear, I cannot tell the difference between 128 and lossless. My ears just do not work well enough. I doubt that even top-of-the-line audiophile grade gear would make a difference to me, but I may be wrong.
Yup. I have this “gift”. Now get me a mortgage, I need another HDD.
Welcome. There are dozens of us.
It has pros and cons.
Pro:
I can take a used car on a 1 minute ride and know what needs work from the various sounds.
I can hear the faint drone of the condo neighbours ceiling fan motor.
Cons:
I can't sleep because I can hear the drone of the fan motor. (My wife can't perceive it.)
Costs. My PC is a fanless passive cool system with massive heat sink. Power supply is an over 30% load fan on system, so I over spec'd it so fan never needs to turn on. Drives are SSD because a spinning platter is bothersome.
I'm by no means an audiophile, or a music nerd. I enabled lossless on Spotify, plugged in my headset to my laptop via usb-c, picked a random song I've listened to a lot, and I heard details in the song, that I've never heard before. Excitedly picked another song I knew well and I could not hear any difference at all.
But since then, I'm always connecting my headset to my laptop via cable instead if Bluetooth, and have the settings set to lossless. I feel like I get less "tired" or saturated by the music, when I it's on lossless
Yes, I can. I can even here a difference between CD quality and Hi-Res. The jump from MP3 and lossless is bigger in terms of quality however. It's the artifacts in MP3 that I here. Once I heard it, I couldn't unhere it. OPUS, AAC 320, and AC3 are the only lossy codecs I can stand listening to. I used to listen to CD's as a teen and thought they sounded better than the 256 AAC rips I did in iTunes. Later on I realized it wasn't just my imagination.
Tried a long time ago with my sound guy when my ears were younger. Couldn't tell between setting between 200 & 320 kbps mp3, but the change for FLAC could be heard on some types of music. The most noticeable change I found was on second bad vilbel from Autechre's tri repetae++
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=zappj-P0-HE
On some tracks (classical music, brickwall compressed rock, heavily mastered pop) nothing could be noticed (but the signals are simpler).
Depends on the music too, a lot of genres don't really suffer from compression that much.
And I need to listen real careful, the differences are so miniscule that I get used to them almost immediately.
The only way I can tell is with sub-bass and "airiness", so old pre-brostep dubstep will sound muddier like the lowest notes are smeared & the reverb sounds off, 95%+ of music I'd never hear the difference cos it's more midrange focused and more heavily compressed even on the effects after mastering.
It's depends on what the speaker is for me. Coming out of the car speakers, probably not. Coming out of good headphones, yes most definitely.
I have tested it and the highest quality mp3 sounds much more like a cd and low quality sounds like a radio station broadcast
Neither compare to a vinyl on a good system. It's like the difference of seeing a picture vs being in the presence of a great view
Vinyl records only really sound good because they tend to use more dynamic masters for them. I wish we could have good masters on CD as well.
thats utter nonsense
Dark Side of the Moon has been ultra remastered even DVD audio
it still does not sound as good as an original pressing of the vinyl
As I said the quality of the master is the most important. I have a CD from 1985, the SACD, and an original Stereo LP. I can't decide if I prefer the early CD press or the original LP. Both are similar in dynamics. I haven't heard a remaster of it I liked. Most modern remasters suck imo.
Edit: If you want to hear digital audio at it's best get yourself an original CD copy of Dire Straits Brothers in Arms. One of the best sounding and most dynamic recordings i've ever heard. It destroys the LP.
When A-B listening to songs I've heard many, many tines, on my best headphones (AKG K-712 Pro), in a quiet environment. I feel 320kbps would be fine, but my sound library is miniscule compared to my visual media library either way, so it's kinda a "why not" thing.
There's also some factors that are hard to control for, e.g. whether the same mix/master was used for both. I'm also relatively young, which surely also helps.
Maybe. Most people, including myself, use some brand of wireless buds, lossless is irrelevant. Convenience > high quality when you want entertainment.
I have 450k mp3s in 320k, I can't hear the difference even on nicer bose and audio technica headsets. Most people couldn't pass a quiz to pick the 320k vs 128k.
Yes. But it’s got to be in a quiet room with decent speakers or headphones/headset. It’s in higher pitched singing or cymbals I notice it the most. The genre of music also makes a difference.
It becomes more apparent when listening via Bluetooth because lossless is only made lossy once. Starting with lossy and then using the compression on Bluetooth audio multiplies the flaws.
And I find I have more fatigue when listening to lossy compression. It’s subtly harder to hear.
I never tested it a lot – I can hear the difference between 128 and 192, but not much beyond that. I usually torrent lossless and convert to 320 for listening.
I can't tell the difference in anything above 192Kbps, and even if I could I'm usually listening to music in my car anyways, so it's a moot point.
Yes… in some. But usually not.
for the everyday public transport mp3 will do fine, but next time get something used for that speaker price. edifier always gonna sound like a card box.
You can too, probably. Grab a CD rip it at 320 mp3, then rip as WAV file. There is a difference in how the audio sounds through a good headset...not Bluetooth audio
Any kind of hardware setup differences would make any of those difference irrelevant.
If I've got my good headphones on, and am in a quiet area?
Absolutely!
If I'm working on something, there's a lot of noise around me, and I'm using even my best noise canceling ear buds? Nope. Maybe in some cases like if there's a lot of higher notes that fluxuate, I can hear a tiny bit of artifacting. Sometimes.
If I'm shuffling music in my car while driving? Not a chance in hell.
I've got a pair of Meze 99 Classics hooked up to a FiiO BTR5 (what I'm told is a reasonable quality set of headphones, and a reasonable quality DAC), and I've had hearing tests, my hearing is apparently fine. And yet, despite my best efforts including A-B testing, no, I can't tell the difference between 320kbps and lossless. Having said that, anything below 192kbps is basically unlistenable as I am able to hear 99% of the detail that's normally there; having it crunched down to something like 128kbps is just jarring, and even at 192 it's still not amazing.
320k VBR, highest quality can actualy go higher bitrate when called for.. so no.
Been using those settings for decades.
Can you provide a citation for that? According to my understanding, 320 kbps is the highest the codec can go, a 320k VBR file might drop to a lower bitrate when appropriate but as far as I'm aware it will never exceed 320k.
It's been probably like a decade (or longer. Shit) since my private music tracker days, but I know back then that V0 was the highest quality level for variable bitrate. Maybe that's what they meant?
Not sure if it ever went above 320 though in that case
It can go higher - LAME for example can encode up to 640kbps - but this is non-standard. Decoders are only required to support 320kbps maximum.
However, MP3 CBR uses a bit reservoir of max 4088 bits that can be donated from surrounding frames to encode particularly complex sounds.
320 sounds 'flat' or lacking depth. It also has a very treble 'noise' to it. Anything lower sounds like tin. Flac sounds rich, with depth, and 'full'.