Streaming vs Apple Lossless vs CD

[Blacksabbath25]

There was an episode of the gadget show were they did an experiment with this you only hear a difference if it's been copied with a low bit rate and it's been compressed to much to fit more info on disc or device but even at 256 bit rate and higher you would not hear the difference between cd and the copied version it would nearly be identical as we can not pick up the lost information with our ears as we are talking about stuff that we can not hear with our ears only by special equipment the can look at the music in a specialist way it is shown up even with this lossless highest bit rate we can not hear any difference . Please do not bit my head off this was some that was reported on the show

 

[davedotco]

As in most populist programs and journals the facts are irretrievably dumbed down.

All analogue to digital and digital to analogue processing processing is imperfect however, within the limits set by recorded music, and with good modern equipment these imperfections are way beyond audibility. Multiple passes are not an issue either, this was demonstrated with multiple PCMF1s back in the early 80s. Modern equipment is much, much better.

In addition to simple A to D and D to A conversion digital processing equipment also carry out such functions as sample rate conversions, format changes, WAV to FLAC for instance, and of course the 'ripping' of the CD datastream to your preferred format. Once again these processors are imperfect, they do not all produce identical results but once again any differences should be way beyond audibility.

Once a recording has been 'ripped' to a digital file, that file can be copied, ad infinitum, with absolutely no loss of quality. As pointed out, computers simply would not work if this was not the case.

With regard to data reduced encoding, results from the better codecs at reasonable bitrates (256-320kps) are extreemly close to the full data file, so close that most people, most of the time can not hear the difference. In this case the differences are easily measured so they are present and under some circumstance can probably be heard.

This of course is a subjective evaluation, so will differ from person to person, though most hi-fi enthusiasts, many of whom insist the difference is huge, are unable to distinquish one from the other in blind tests.

 

[chebby]

There was an episode of the gadget show were they did an experiment with this you only hear a difference if it's been copied with a low bit rate and it's been compressed to much to fit more info on disc or device but even at 256 bit rate and higher you would not hear the difference between cd and the copied version it would nearly be identical as we can not pick up the lost information with our ears as we are talking about stuff that we can not hear with our ears only by special equipment the can look at the music in a specialist way it is shown up even with this lossless highest bit rate we can not hear any difference.

I would - from comparisons i've made between CD, Apple lossless and compressed files - say the threshold for me is 320k AAC but yes, I think you are right.

The exception would be purchased 256k AAC music from iTunes which tends to be very 'sat on' compared to it's equivalent ripped from CD (even when ripped at the same bitrate).

 

[iMark]

That suggests to me, rather, that there is an issue with the way the NAD C660 CD player works rather than with how digital copies normally work. I notice it has an ADC (analogue to digital converter) in it, so I wonder whether it is converting the CD to analogue using the DAC chip before converting it back to digital using the ADC chip. The manual states "conversion from analogue to digital is done without any noticeable [/b]loss of quality. "

Bolded by me. This suggests to me that there is some deterioration each time and going through the process multiple times may exacerbate this until it becomes audible. This is not how digital copies are usually made.

It would be interesting to null test files ripped from the original copies and copies of copies made by this NAD against a lossless copy taken by a computer. It may well show up these changes.

Normally, when I rip to my computer, I could take a lossless copy, then make several generations (theoretically unlimited generations) of lossless copies and a null test should show any of those copies to be exactly the same as the others.

I think this might be a trick by NAD to prevent claims for illegal copying. By introducing an extra DA-AD step, they can claim that they don't produce exact copies.

Copying CDs can be done without any loss: ripping with error correction and then burning the audio file to a CD. This will give you an exact copy of the bits that were supposed to be on the original CD. A damaged CD that gives a perfect ripped file, will actually sound worse than a copy that was made from the error corrected rip.

The error correction also explains why in many cases ripped lossless, AIFF or WAV files sound better than CD players. The errors have already been corrected in the ripped files while a CD player has to do the error correction on the fly and in real time. If your CDs are new and pristine the error correction won't make much difference because there are not a lot of errors to correct. I have some very old CDs however that have spent some time in the glove compartment of the car and played with some clicks. After ripping with error correction (which in one case took hours) the corrected files play without any hiccups.

Many years I decided to rip all our CDs to Apple Lossless files (ALAC) and stream them from the computer to the stereo via an Airport Express to a Cambridge Audio DACMagic. Our streamed files sound better than any of the standalone players that we have also connected to amp.

 

[ID.]

As in most populist programs and journals the facts are irretrievably dumbed down.

All analogue to digital and digital to analogue processing processing is imperfect however, within the limits set by recorded music, and with good modern equipment these imperfections are way beyond audibility. Multiple passes are not an issue either, this was demonstrated with multiple PCMF1s back in the early 80s. Modern equipment is much, much better.

In addition to simple A to D and D to A conversion digital processing equipment also carry out such functions as sample rate conversions, format changes, WAV to FLAC for instance, and of course the 'ripping' of the CD datastream to your preferred format. Once again these processors are imperfect, they do not all produce identical results but once again any differences should be way beyond audibility.

Once a recording has been 'ripped' to a digital file, that file can be copied, ad infinitum, with absolutely no loss of quality. As pointed out, computers simply would not work if this was not the case.

With regard to data reduced encoding, results from the better codecs at reasonable bitrates (256-320kps) are extreemly close to the full data file, so close that most people, most of the time can not hear the difference. In this case the differences are easily measured so they are present and under some circumstance can probably be heard.

This of course is a subjective evaluation, so will differ from person to person, though most hi-fi enthusiasts, many of whom insist the difference is huge, are unable to distinquish one from the other in blind tests.

The DA-AD process was the best I could come up with knowing his past behavior when confronted with concepts such as expectation bias

 

[Blacksabbath25]

i still like cds and having a collection and still will keep on buy cds but some cds are cheaper then buying from itunes . but understand that downloading is the way things are going . but as long as you look after your cds they will still sound good as i have some that i have had for 20 years or more

 

[MajorFubar]

I'm not going to quote that bilge (but if I did quote and requote and so on etc. it would still be the same bilge even after a million requotes. It would never improve).

Please, no-one bite. Hold it in Major

Use your imaginary "ignore" button and reply to one of the other contributors instead.

It's just descended to the level of 'baiting' now.

See I did exactly as you told me and it still kicked off lol! :-D

 

[davedotco]

We all do what is best for us.

For example my musucal tastes are fairly wideranging and I am not a 'favourites' kind of listener.

I can not bear to hear the music played in exactly the same way, time after time, so I really do not have a collection of discs that I play over and over again, it would drive me crackers...*crazy*

So, for me the perfect solution is online streaming, I use Spotify Connect for all my music listening, simple. The only thing it really needs is eq, at some point I shall address that separately.

 

[manicm]

Even including the maths - which I agree is not in dispute - I don't think ThompsonUXB is necessarily incorrect insofar as his ears go. In computers could it be the CD/DVD drive plays CDs better than e.g. Windows Media Player plays files? I don't think that's entirely implausible. Didn't some say iTunes is not so good for playback or ripping?

I've never owned a DAC and I'm eager to get a streamer (new house etc etc has put paid to hifi plans right now), but when I do then I'd really listen and make up my mind.

Last time I was on my laptop WMP was being continuously interrupted while playing FLAC files. Maybe a defrag or Windows update was running in the background. I have Windows 10 and generally didn't experience this before. But it has reinforced my view that I will never want to use a PC for full hifi playback as first prize.

 

[MajorFubar]

...for the various reasons you've identified and others, but with the benefit of knowing the crux of his argument from at least one past thread, that's not where he's coming from.

 

[Thompsonuxb]

...for the various reasons you've identified and others, but with the benefit of knowing the crux of his argument from at least one past thread, that's not where he's coming from.

Annnndddd the argument is turning......

I don't mean to laugh but.....

Look, as I have said on numerous occasions I have no issue with soft formats and those who are happy with it - honestly I'm happy for you.

But I'll wait for a format that offers 'BETTER THAN CD QUALITY' - maybe when the music industry offers BLU-RAY recordings as a standard.

Watching Whiplash the other day convinced me it's the way to go.

Lossless looks more and more like a con by the day - take a minute to read your riplies....whoops..... replys.....

Lol.....I'm only teasing.

Enjoy your music.

 

[tonky]

My two penn'orth - I've made copies of a cd (from laptop) - some multiple copies. Also copies of copies. No difference whatsoever in the sound quality on any of my equipment.

I listen to CDs. I have a lot of CD wav files on my hard drive. I stream them through my system. To be honest I can't tell he difference between the CD and the streamed lossless wav file. I have been told that The streamed lossless file should be better. All I can say is it sounds great and at the least it's the equivalent of the sound quality of CD.

If the file has been copied to a lower bit rate copy (128, 256 or 325 kbps) I can hear the subtle differences especially at higher volumes. 256 and 325 kbps sound good but not quite as good as wav lossless.

I copy everything in lossless

cheers tonky

 

[davedotco]

My two penn'orth - I've made copies of a cd (from laptop) - some multiple copies. Also copies of copies. No difference whatsoever in the sound quality on any of my equipment.

I listen to CDs. I have a lot of CD wav files on my hard drive. I stream them through my system. To be honest I can't tell he difference between the CD and the streamed lossless wav file. I have been told that The streamed lossless file should be better. All I can say is it sounds great and at the least it's the equivalent of the sound quality of CD.

If the file has been copied to a lower bit rate copy (128, 256 or 325 kbps) I can hear the subtle differences especially at higher volumes. 256 and 325 kbps sound good but not quite as good as wav lossless.

I copy everything in lossless

cheers tonky

To be precise, the file may sound better, but then it may not.

When copied using proprietary ripping software the lazer can scan a section of the disc multiple times in order to read bits that may, for one reason or another be quite difficult.

This may well be more accurate than a CD player that only gets one go, in real time.

Thats the theory anyway, most of the time I doubt it much matters.

 

[Al ears]

My two penn'orth - I've made copies of a cd (from laptop) - some multiple copies. Also copies of copies. No difference whatsoever in the sound quality on any of my equipment.

I listen to CDs. I have a lot of CD wav files on my hard drive. I stream them through my system. To be honest I can't tell he difference between the CD and the streamed lossless wav file. I have been told that The streamed lossless file should be better. All I can say is it sounds great and at the least it's the equivalent of the sound quality of CD.

If the file has been copied to a lower bit rate copy (128, 256 or 325 kbps) I can hear the subtle differences especially at higher volumes. 256 and 325 kbps sound good but not quite as good as wav lossless.

I copy everything in lossless

cheers tonky

To be precise, the file may sound better, but then it may not.

When copied using proprietary ripping software the lazer can scan a section of the disc multiple times in order to read bits that may, for one reason or another be quite difficult.

This may well be more accurate than a CD player that only gets one go, in real time.

Thats the theory anyway, most of the time I doubt it much matters.

It doesn't, end of.

 

[MajorFubar]

Lossless looks more and more like a con by the day

You defy words.

 

[ID.]

Hi rez looks more and more like a con by the day

Fixed it for you