Sick of the mp3 thing

[JBroll]

if all you guys arguing for lossless audio quality think it's so important, why are you arguing about digital audio files? I may be misinformed on this, but hasn't science proven that digital audio has a lower quality then analogue, in that certain frequencies are likely to be lost in the A/D conversion? Isn't that what so many gear nuts claim and pay horrendous amounts of money for? If digital audio has physical limitations and restrictions, then we can't really call any form of digital audio distribution lossless, now can we?

If I'm wrong, please tell me, this is just what I've heard.

For all practical intents and purposes you're wrong... to be fair, *everything* loses detail (even standing a few feet to the left of the band as they're playing!) but the real divide comes up when we look at mp3s cutting out 90% of what you'd find on a CD. Anyone who isn't half dog will have trouble hearing what we lose in the analog-to-CD transition, and anyone who is half-dog is an abomination against nature whose musical needs should be far less concerning to us than our impending doom at the hands of cross-breeding psychotics. (Bonus wet-noodle-lashings for using the phrase 'Hasn't science proven...')

Jeff

 

[coreysMonster]

For all practical intents and purposes you're wrong... to be fair, *everything* loses detail (even standing a few feet to the left of the band as they're playing!) but the real divide comes up when we look at mp3s cutting out 90% of what you'd find on a CD. Anyone who isn't half dog will have trouble hearing what we lose in the analog-to-CD transition, and anyone who is half-dog is an abomination against nature whose musical needs should be far less concerning to us than our impending doom at the hands of cross-breeding psychotics. (Bonus wet-noodle-lashings for using the phrase 'Hasn't science proven...')

Jeff

wait, high-quality mp3s cut out 90% of the CD audio quality? Come on, you can't be serious.

 

[egan.]

Corey, the problem is that the fidelity loss in your example is not nearly as demonstrable, far more debatable and infinitely less practical than what we're talking about.
The orginal 1/2" two track master of an all analog record may well sound superior to the same album on CD but that's just not a realistic mainstream goal at this juncture. The point everyone here is making is that we could get audio files of comparable fidelity to the original master from the mastering plant via existing channels and they simply aren't being released.

To my knowledge the major player are only releasing 256 mp3 or AAC. Perhaps 44.1/16bit PCM vs. 1bitDSD is nerd teritory but if CD (or lossless) vs. 256k MP3 is an "audiophile issue" then I give up.

 

[John_C]

wait, high-quality mp3s cut out 90% of the CD audio quality? Come on, you can't be serious.

sortof..........128kbs is less than 10% of 1411.2kbs, but the actual amount of information loss can be less than that because of the amount of lossless compression that likely goes on in the codec after the lossy stuff gets done

Also, the information loss is not indiscriminate, it's done so as to be as inaudible as possible, but there's always a limit to what you can get away with

 

[Josh Burgess]

There is nothing about 320kbs mp3s that makes me rather have FLAC files..... I think most people can't hear the difference, and those who can most likely aren't hearing any meaningful difference. Sure, low quality mp3s suck..... we all know that, but 320kbs cbr mp3s and full quality vbr mp3s are another story...

 

[JBroll]

sortof..........128kbs is less than 10% of 1411.2kbs, but the actual amount of information loss can be less than that because of the amount of lossless compression that likely goes on in the codec after the lossy stuff gets done

Also, the information loss is not indiscriminate, it's done so as to be as inaudible as possible, but there's always a limit to what you can get away with

Right, I was being more than a little bit handwavey with this... without special settings, though, a lot of high end that would be present in WAV or FLAC is yanked out of MP3s. It's hard to care after 320, in a lot of ways, but there are still other problems with the format that get annoying after a while. (For what it's worth, I use vorbis with bazillions of odd parameters - things like raising the high-end cutoff, for example - and usually don't care about the difference. The big issue that bothers me is burning CDs from live shows, where that little gap between tracks that's present with MP3 sources (but absent with a properly-made FLAC source) is enough to make me want to murder everything.)

Jeff

 

[SkybluestudiosBEN]

it would be nice if we could upgrade to like 24bit 48khz or something lol at least some type of upgrade from 16 bit 44.1 would be cool.

 

[HeadCrusher]

As far as I know Apple doesn't make that much money from the iTunes Store. They mainly use it as a Marketing tool to sell more iPods. Therefore I don't see them offering lossless files that cost more (to them and to the customer) anytime soon. Assuming they would though my main concern is that it would be in some kind of Apple-only format rather than WAV which would suck major ass imo.

The Surround thing might be a good idea but I think the market is really really small. I don't really see anybody dwelling deep into some hi-fi surround soundscape on the tube on their way to/from work.

Above all stands the main argument against it that has been posted many times already: Nobody can hear the fucking difference. Especially not on the systems that get used 90% of the time these days.

That being said I think there is hope for professional AEs because you still need a stellar sounding mix to make it work in a compressed environment.
As for those of us who can/want hear the difference as consumers: We might be fucked soon or later...

I'm curious to hear if Andy, James, Lasse etc. have an opinion/outlook/insight on this!

 

[Ermz]

From my discussions with him in the past, I think James would be on board with the sentiment in the OP. That and the fact that his control room is a giant CD rack.

 

[Donovan S.]

I try my best to rip everything in lossless. I can't believe people here would have to debate about MP3 vs. Lossless. Even with 320kbps Mp3s the difference is there.

 

[Harry Hughes]

I try my best to rip everything in lossless. I can't believe people here would have to debate about MP3 vs. Lossless. Even with 320kbps Mp3s the difference is obvious.

You gotta remember, when you have that time just for yourself to listen to music, you're putting on something you enjoy musically as that's the most important thing.
I mean yeah, cool, use that Nickelback record in lossless for a reference production when you're mixing something, but am I gonna put on a Nickelback record on when I want the music to take me? Hell fucking no.
Give me the slightly lossy, great music any day of the week.
Unless you do a back to back comparison, you're aren't going to notice squat difference just blindly putting on a 320kbp mp3 album.

Don't get me wrong, I'm very much in favor of wanting digital music distributors to sell lossless (and indeed, would prefer if more stuff could be found in a hard copy, be it CD or vinyl) because I feel it's simply the right thing to do to offer that choice, but just don't get too obsessive over that stuff either and don't let it bother you that pro-lossless supporters can also enjoy high quality MP3 files.

 

[nwright]

All you dudes are arguing from an audiophile/engineer standpoint. To an artist who perhaps wants an easier avenue with low overhead to make some money to be able to continue their craft, an mp3 release may allow them to do so more so than making physical copies.

It's ALWAYS about the artist.

I've never bought an mp3, every single piece of music I own is physical, and I have no desire to change that...But I'm not going to begrudge an artist their desires simply because my tastes may differ. While some can hear the difference between mp3's and lossless formats, if a song doesn't hit you as hard or turn you on as much in a decent quality mp3 format as it does in wav, maybe it's not the audio quality so much as it is the quality of the song that's not up to par.

 

[Donovan S.]

While some can hear the difference between mp3's and lossless formats, if a song doesn't hit you as hard or turn you on as much in a decent quality mp3 format as it does in wav, maybe it's not the audio quality so much as it is the quality of the song that's not up to par.

I respectfully disagree with this point.

I do understand that Mp3s are the most "accessible" digital media format, I just wish that the option for lossless would be there for whoever may desire it.

 

[Donovan S.]

You gotta remember, when you have that time just for yourself to listen to music, you're putting on something you enjoy musically as that's the most important thing.

I think this is a great point, but for me, I enjoy the music much more without the artifacts and the skewed low end that an Mp3 will give you. I want to bathe in the music, so-to-speak, but when the above mentioned discrepancies are present it makes for a less-enjoyable product, in my opinion.

 

[Dexter_prog]

I try my best to rip everything in lossless. I can't believe people here would have to debate about MP3 vs. Lossless. Even with 320kbps Mp3s the difference is there.

The question is if the difference is actually noticeable...

 

[Ermz]

All you dudes are arguing from an audiophile/engineer standpoint.

That's part of the argument. If wanting a 'lossless' digital audio file to be the end-format for a professional product makes you an 'audiophile', then there is obviously something wrong with the distribution industry.

Nobody is forcing these artists to print CDs if it's financially non-viable. All that's needed is to provide a lossless digital download option - exact same distribution method as the mp3s. So there's absolutely no grounds for this from a 'convenience' point of view.

I don't know about anyone else, but I didn't spend several thousand on a monitoring set-up so that I would get treated the same as the average bimbo who plonks her favourite tunes on the ipod to go treadmilling to. Certainly amongst a community of musicians and engineers, there have to be those who have a greater love for music than to be caught in the 'yeah, close enough is good enough' mentality.

Bringing songwriting into it is fairly asinine. Even the best of music will sound better when presented in a higher fidelity form. We're talking purely aesthetics here.

 

[John_C]

The fact is that although the DACs is ipods are shit, most people don't notice. Mp3 is shit, most people don't notice. Peoples' headphone/speakers suck, they don't notice. People's room acoustics suck, they don't notice.

But when you put them all together and show them the difference between all that and a 96kHz FLAC played though fantastic converters through fantastic speakers in a beautifully constructed and treated room sitting in the optimum position, they really DO notice

If you settle for second best all along the way you end up with shite at the end

 

[egan.]

As far as I know Apple doesn't make that much money from the iTunes Store. They mainly use it as a Marketing tool to sell more iPods. Therefore I don't see them offering lossless files that cost more (to them and to the customer) anytime soon.

You are right that apple is "running those a bit over break even"... So they "only" net $4 billion on the iTunes/App store in 2009. But I don't see that as an issue. Lets not forget the iTunes "LP" format and it's massive package of images and videos to accompany the same 256 AAC files. Clearly bandwidth is not the issue but general consumer will. Still, niche or not, it would behoove apple to make converts out of the holdouts and get us buying from the iTunes store-- particularly if they could get 10-20% more out of us for the privileged.

Assuming they would though my main concern is that it would be in some kind of Apple-only format rather than WAV which would suck major ass imo.

Of course they would use apple lossless but that hardly seems problematic as other players can play it (just like the m4a files they sell now). Few people are advocating for WAV's given that a good lossless encode is functionally the same and smaller.

One additional note I'd like to make is that everyone bringing up 320kps as a comparison is missing the point to a large degree as neither iTunes nor Amazon is selling them. At least to me, the issue here is commercially available 256kbs vs. CD/lossless. It simply doesn't matter how close 320kbs is to lossless b/c neither of them are on the mainstream market. I'd rather advocate for the good than the "less bad." If someone comes up with a lossy codec or format that nulls (beyond flac and AL) I'll gladly accept that too.

 

[Sacha]

Agree with the OP, it's ridiculous for a fucking reduction in quality to actually become a new standard. Aren't we proud of all our amazing technology? What a crock. I was really hoping Blu Ray audio would become the standard, imagine not having to dither and SRC your mix / master any more at the end of the process. Doesn't seem likely. But from now on I'll always be releasing my own stuff in high quality at least, for people that actually appreciate the difference, Bandcamp FTW.

 

[Pedro Teixeira]

When I first created an iTunes store account I bought an album... twas a Dennis Chambers album that I couldn't find anywhere (physical CD) so I bought on iTunes with NO INFORMATION provided by them of what I would get. I got a 128kbps album, heard one song and couldn't hear anymore.... That is literally joking with the consumer...