DacMagic 100 Bit Perfect transmission

[assault]

Hello everyone.

I have the same old question about digital music playback

My setup is the one in signature. My source is the laptop (both Spotify "not premium" and foobar2000), and... I can hear no difference between a track on Spotify and an hi res FLAC file (i.e. 24/48, 24/96 and even 24/192). When I did the setup of my hi-fi system I had some problem to install the driver of the DacMagic for ASIO playback, but now the leds on DAC switch on correctly when I play an hi resolution song, so this should be Bit Perfect transmission, right?

What is my problem? Maybe is because I live in an apartment, so the volume is not loud enough to hear differences between different format and sampling?

Thank you,

 

[abacus]

A top quality mp3 (256) will require a top system and a good pair of ears to hear a difference between it, and the original, as your equipment is entry level, this is most likely why you cannot hear a difference. (Now if you had a set of Quad ESL speakers, then you would most definitely hear a difference)

Hope this helps to put your mind as rest.

In truth mp3 (Or any lossy format) is not needed these days, as they were designed when storage space was limited and expensive, whereas these days it is cheap and plentiful.

Bill

 

[davedotco]

Basic Spotify has a limited bit rate and 'should' sound inferior to CD quality playback.

However the difference on a lot of material may not be that great, it depends a lot on all kinds of factors and in many cases the actual system setup.

As an Apple user I can not offer guidance as to your PC setup, but that is where I would start. You need to be sure that the files you are playing are what they say they are and that the PC is handling them correctly, Foobar should be able to do all this but it is important that you check.

Generally I would expect you to hear differences between Spotify and your local files, if only because you will often be listening to different versions/masters of the same song and this should be reasonably easy to hear.

The only other thought is that you are expecting to hear too much, on a lot of music the difference between CD standard and compressed is minimal, are you expecting more?

Finally, buying hi-res material is not always of any great benefit, sometimes you do get a better product but very often you do not, higher bit rates do not usually make a difference but better production often does, just be sure you are not paying extra for no discernable difference.

 

[drummerman]

Finally, buying hi-res material is not always of any great benefit, sometimes you do get a better product but very often you do not, higher bit rates do not usually make a difference but better production often does, just be sure you are not paying extra for no discernable difference.

Some of it is simply cd quality material upsampled, basically a cheat. Paul Miller does some interesting analysis in one of the magazines and HifiWorld recently reviewed a £20 windows programme which can help identify true high resolution material from others.

It's a jungle out there

 

[davedotco]

Finally, buying hi-res material is not always of any great benefit, sometimes you do get a better product but very often you do not, higher bit rates do not usually make a difference but better production often does, just be sure you are not paying extra for no discernable difference.

Some of it is simply cd quality material upsampled, basically a cheat. Paul Miller does some interesting analysis in one of the magazines and HifiWorld recently reviewed a £20 windows programme which can help identify true high resolution material from others.

It's a jungle out there

I was going to suggest this possibility but couldn't be bothered to check on what I had read elsewhere.

If you have links to Paul Millers stuff, that would be useful.

 

[drummerman]

Finally, buying hi-res material is not always of any great benefit, sometimes you do get a better product but very often you do not, higher bit rates do not usually make a difference but better production often does, just be sure you are not paying extra for no discernable difference.

Some of it is simply cd quality material upsampled, basically a cheat. Paul Miller does some interesting analysis in one of the magazines and HifiWorld recently reviewed a £20 windows programme which can help identify true high resolution material from others.

It's a jungle out there

I was going to suggest this possibility but couldn't be bothered to check on what I had read elsewhere.

If you have links to Paul Millers stuff, that would be useful.

You can subscribe to www.milleraudioresearch.com. The Magazine in question where they review (and analyze) monthly 'high res downloads' is HifiNews&Record Review.

The programme mentioned above is Musicscope Music Analyser, available from www.xivero.com for Euro 29.24. Tested in this months Hifi-World.

 

[fr0g]

A top quality mp3 (256) will require a top system and a good pair of ears to hear a difference between it, and the original, as your equipment is entry level, this is most likely why you cannot hear a difference. (Now if you had a set of Quad ESL speakers, then you would most definitely hear a difference)

Hope this helps to put your mind as rest.

In truth mp3 (Or any lossy format) is not needed these days, as they were designed when storage space was limited and expensive, whereas these days it is cheap and plentiful.

Bill

In truth MP3 and AAC and other lossy formats are extremely useful.

Storage may be cheap but many players and phones have a limit of 16 GB, most of which is not available.

Not only that but many people have a limited bandwidth for streaming and MP3 is perfect.

I for one listen mainly to Spotify and would not entertain any lossless streaming service as my home internet has a monthly limit.

Not to mention that forget low end/ high end, 99.9 % of people cannot tell a well-ripped MP3 from a 24/96 file.

Anything above 16/44.1 for "playback" is pointless and 320 Kbps MP3 or AAC is transparent.

The best system I ever tested consisted of a Lyngdorf CD player, a Classe pre/power combo, a Lyngdorf room correction unit and a pair of B&W 800D speakers.

I used MP3s ripped to CD to test it and it sounded sublime.

lossy codecs are here to stay, and not only stay, but dominate.

So to answer the OP, I am not in the least surprised you could not discern a difference between 320 Kbps Vorbis (spotify) and hi res material, as they are essentially equal in "audible" quality. At least to the vast majority of the population, regardless of the quality of your playback system.

Dave makes the most salient point...Differences are in production and many Hi res albums are recorded in a much more "audiophile" manner.

If you find one of these you can do an interesting test. Take the Hi res album, and create 320 Kbps MP3s from it. Then take the audibly inferior CD and compare. The MP3s will sound better than the CD in every case.

 

[ID.]

now the leds on DAC switch on correctly when I play an hi resolution song, so this should be Bit Perfect transmission, right?

Not really the point, but technically, not necessarily. They would also light up for a lower resolution track upsampled to higher resolution (i.e. not bit perfect).

 

[assault]

Finally, buying hi-res material is not always of any great benefit, sometimes you do get a better product but very often you do not, higher bit rates do not usually make a difference but better production often does, just be sure you are not paying extra for no discernable difference.

Some of it is simply cd quality material upsampled, basically a cheat. Paul Miller does some interesting analysis in one of the magazines and HifiWorld recently reviewed a £20 windows programme which can help identify true high resolution material from others.

It's a jungle out there

I was going to suggest this possibility but couldn't be bothered to check on what I had read elsewhere.

If you have links to Paul Millers stuff, that would be useful.

You can subscribe to www.milleraudioresearch.com. The Magazine in question where they review (and analyze) monthly 'high res downloads' is HifiNews&Record Review.

The programme mentioned above is Musicscope Music Analyser, available from www.xivero.com for Euro 29.24. Tested in this months Hifi-World.

Thank you guys for the precious info. That's really the point: I can hear much much more the good quality of the recording rather than the sampling of the file.