Hardly going to win any sales medals, but in the interests of an open minded debate, has anyone tried them? I'm a Tom Petty fan, and Neil Young, but this is surely record company shameless marketing.
Tom Petty Hi Res Tracks
- Thread starter SteveR750
- Start date
Hesitating to answer this *biggrin*, but yeah I've got one of them in high-res: Damn the Torpedoes.
And yeah, I'm one of those idiots who thinks that (some) high res recordings are worth it, including this one.
Tip: the latest Björk in high-res. Absolute stunning record.
And yeah, I'm one of those idiots who thinks that (some) high res recordings are worth it, including this one.
Tip: the latest Björk in high-res. Absolute stunning record.
spockfish said:
I do not think that anyone with any knowledge of of this issue will deny that there is a difference between some hi-res releases and their CD standard counterparts, the question is what is causing the difference.
My view is that if the hi-res releases have the benefit of better mastering, then they will sound better, but to me this is a simple con, and implies that CD quality releases are poorly mastered, either by a general lack of interest by the record companies or even deliberate, so they can sell you the 'better' hi-res version for more money.
If you are at all technical, you can prove this for yourself.
Take a great sounding hi-res download and use your computer to downsample to 16/44.1, then compare the two, ideally using the ABX function in Foobar. No issues of different masters, the only difference is the 'resolution'.
24/96 vs 16/44.1, a real comparison.
manicm
Well-known member
So I down mastered the Fifty Shades Of Grey soundtrack from ProStudioMasters from the native 44/24 to 44/16 using MediaMonkey for use on the iPod Classic last gen (wouldn't play otherwise), obviously listened first and my down master definitely lost a bit of clarity. Was it just MediaMonkey?
The site looks good, they claim to obtain the masters straight from the labels, and the album I downloaded sounded really great at the native res. A bit pricey though at $20 for the album I bought, but was for wife.
The site looks good, they claim to obtain the masters straight from the labels, and the album I downloaded sounded really great at the native res. A bit pricey though at $20 for the album I bought, but was for wife.
The_Lhc
Well-known member
The_Lhc
Well-known member
About £12.30 according to Google, I paid £7.99 for the 24-bit version from 7Digital, only a pound more than the 16-bit version.
davedotco said:
Did that. No difference on any of my headphones.
... now you Mr Pitty? What's going on? Are they too old to be ashamed? He can't hear his own farts but just like in HD music, he can feel it.
lpv said:
Perhaps he can feel it in his wallet in potential re-purchases.
I do not believe for one second that there is a human being on this planet who can tell the difference between a hires track and the same track downsampled to "CD quality"
chebby
Well-known member
fr0g said:
Is there a human being on this planet who is not flattered that someone 'out there' is making something for their special hearing abilities?
"Yes it will be expensive - quality always is - but at least someone, finally, recognises the naturally gifted minority like me!"
chebby said:
Yeah, it's back to the "golden ears" syndrome. The inate ability for some people to imagine their auditory senses are somehow superhuman. It all falls flat of course when they don't know which source is playing. Funny that.
manicm
Well-known member
So, anyone then care to explain my downsample in my earlier post here? I had to do it and the original sounded a bit clearer definitely.
steve_1979
Well-known member
manicm said:
On the few occasions when I've tried downsampling hi-rez audio I've used Audacity (which uses LAME) and the resulting file always sounds identical to the original.
The_Lhc
Well-known member
manicm said:
What were you listening to the two tracks on? The same equipment? Did you know which track was which when listening? If you expect one to be worse, that's what you'll hear.
steve_1979 said:
Assuming you mean to downsample to 16/44.1 then LAME has nothing to do with it as it is a codec to create MP3s.
manicm said:
Download Foobar
http://www.foobar2000.org/download
and the ABX compare tool
http://www.foobar2000.org/components/view/foo_abx
then compare the 2 tracks.
You need to get this right preferably 10 times or more to be statistically relevant.
And as Steve says, download Audacity to do the downsample.
http://audacity.sourceforge.net
steve_1979
Well-known member
manicm
Well-known member
steve_1979 said:
If any of you bothered to read properly I used MediaMonkey to downsample a 44/24 album to 44/16, and the latter came out second best sonically.
manicm said:
two things... was the downsampled track in ALAC (as you said it was for an ipod) and did you try playing back in foobars abx system, or did you test the tracks knowing which one was which?
manicm
Well-known member
cheeseboy said:
No, the hires purchased album was in FLAC, which I subsequently unpacked to WAV using Flac Front-end, and then used MediaMonkey to downsample. Not only for iPod, but for car too - as wife listens there. I did not do blind testing. But maybe I will using foobar if a trial version is available.
manicm said:
sorry, I was meaning was the resulting downsampled filed alac (lossless) or mp4 (compressed). Just trying to work out possible reasons why you hearing it difference. It may be that, it may not, just throwing stuff out there as it were.
manicm said:
foobar is free, which is usually why it gets mentioned a lot. It's not the prettiest thing in the world mind, but it does the job very well. There's a video here if you are interested in doing abx testing (not saying that you should, but if you like a play, then why not) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jt7GyFW4hOI
manicm
Well-known member
manicm said:
If you check out my link earlier I pointed directly the the relevant downloads, including the ABX tool, which is not in Foobar as standard.
steve_1979
Well-known member
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