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WAV vs MP3 - I can't tell the difference!

nick12345

nick12345

Well-Known Member
Yesterday I got the idea to make a CD comparing the various quality levels of MP3 files to a CD-quality WAV file. I took Jack Johnson's "Upside Down", ripped from the original CD to a WAV file, and converted it several times to MP3 files of varying bitrates. I burned the original WAV as Track 1, with the MP3 quality progressing from 320 kbps down after that. Just now, I listened to the CD briefly, skipping between the tracks. I could not tell the difference between the 320k MP3 and the WAV at all. 256k was only marginally worse, lacking a little bit of articulation in the treble. Both the 192k and 128k tracks were still acceptable-sounding to my ears. The 128k track exhibited a minor level of compression-induced distortion in the highs, and both 192k and 128k had a bit of blandness in the sound. The sound only became of unacceptable quality at 96 kbps.

Anyway, because to my ears on my system, the 320k is indistinguishable from the original CD-ripped WAV file, I will probably discontinue the use of WAV files in my digital music library, except for a handful of tracks that might really sound their best that way. Instead, I will use either 320k MP3, which is about 1/4 the size of WAV, or 256k AAC, which is even smaller, and as I understand, roughly equivalent to 320k MP3 in sound quality.
 
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320 when done properly is a great sounding format. What kind of DAC do you have if you mind me asking?
 
Given that hard disk space is very cheap, why would you want to rip your CDs to 320kbps mp3 only? If you are concerned about storage space occupied by the WAV files, then compress them to FLAC. Then, mirror the FLAC files as 320 or 256kbps mp3 files for use on portable devices. My vortexbox installation performs the mirroring automatically.

I don't doubt the results of your hearing tests, but storage is so cheap now that I really do not see why you would restrict yourself to mp3 files only. Use a large enough drive and let it contain both the FLAC and mp3 files.
 
320 is still pretty good quality, I think I would have a hard time discerning between 320 and wav. I agree about archiving with flac, lossless and you save space vs. wav.
 
I agree. It's very, very difficult to tell the difference between .wav and 320 kbps, unless you have both a very good system and very well trained listening skills.

I would also agree that if you're going to take the time to rip cd's to a hard drive, do it using a lossless compression like FLAC. You can then listen directly from the pc, or do a compression to mp3 or other lossy compression on the fly to copy it to a portable music player. You can then have the best of both worlds...lossless on the pc, and more storage space and more songs on the portable player.
 
A lot would also depend on the quality of the CD player you're using. The JVC XL-MC334 is what ... 10 years old? Internal DACs have come a LONG way even in just the last couple years. The newer the equipment, the more noticable the difference. If you're playing back on the laptop, well ... we all know most of those suffer severe suckage when it comes to audio playback. Yours may be the exception ...

One more vote for FLAC. Not a lot smaller than WAV, but it allows tagging, which is nice for a media library. You can alway rip to a smaller lower quality file, but the opposite isn't true.

For portable music, I found a neat little program called FlashShuffler. Just point it at your media directory, tell it how large your target is (a thumb drive for instance) and hit the go button. It will randomly select files and convert them to MP3 (lame) on the target drive automatically until it's full. Great for road toons, and saves hard drive space as you don't have dual formats for your entire collection taking up space. Ready for a new set, just clear the old stuff off and spin the wheel again. Your original directory and files remain untouched.

http://www.cflashsoft.com/jbsynch.htm
 
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sKiZo, very important point on metadata/tagging. If you rip to .wav, all metadata, track titles, etc., is gone forever.

Oh, and you should always put LAME in upper case. Otherwise, you give people the wrong idea. :D
 
I did such a test with my cheap desktop speakers once. I found that 192 VBR sounded pretty good, not much different than 256 VBR. I thought 128 or 160 was not enough though. I recorded a song at 64 vbr once on a 3.5" floppy Disc. Sort of a digital version of a 45 rpm Record. I was surpsied it even worked. It didn't sound Bad either.
 
Another vote for FLAC or now that it's open source ALAC. You can convert between them with no loss. And ALAC will work with iTunes, should you choose to use it. You may also be better off going V0 instead of 320 if you aren't hearing a difference. They will probably sound as good and will be smaller.
 
nick12345 said:
Yesterday I got the idea to make a CD comparing the various quality levels of MP3 files to a CD-quality WAV file. I took Jack Johnson's "Upside Down", ripped from the original CD to a WAV file, and converted it several times to MP3 files of varying bitrates. I burned the original WAV as Track 1, with the MP3 quality progressing from 320 kbps down after that. Just now, I listened to the CD briefly, skipping between the tracks. I could not tell the difference between the 320k MP3 and the WAV at all. 256k was only marginally worse, lacking a little bit of articulation in the treble. Both the 192k and 128k tracks were still acceptable-sounding to my ears. The 128k track exhibited a minor level of compression-induced distortion in the highs, and both 192k and 128k had a bit of blandness in the sound. The sound only became of unacceptable quality at 96 kbps.

Anyway, because to my ears on my system, the 320k is indistinguishable from the original CD-ripped WAV file, I will probably discontinue the use of WAV files in my digital music library, except for a handful of tracks that might really sound their best that way. Instead, I will use either 320k MP3, which is about 1/4 the size of WAV, or 256k AAC, which is even smaller, and as I understand, roughly equivalent to 320k MP3 in sound quality.
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You should try some experiments with VBR MP3 files instead of CBR.
 
The real money in my system is CDs and this is an ongoing cost. The hardware is pretty much set. Bottom line is that I am not going to make this investment and rip them compressed.
 
My computer library consists of about 8000 mp3's mostly ripped from my CD's at 320. I started to rip them again lately in flac. After listening to them in a side by side flipping back and forth in winamp, I cannot really tell the difference in them either. As for wav files, I remember doing a comparison when I first started to rip to mp3 and the difference for me was also hard to tell. So I came to the conclusion that my older ears do not hear as well as I used to. So for me, 320 is just fine.
 
Unican_Eric said:
My computer library consists of about 8000 mp3's mostly ripped from my CD's at 320. I started to rip them again lately in flac. After listening to them in a side by side flipping back and forth in winamp, I cannot really tell the difference in them either...
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I have a hard time telling the difference between 320 kbps and the original cd as well.

Keep in mind, though, that you can't compare the sound of FLAC to anything else. FLAC is not an audio file, and cannot be "played". It is a compressed version of the file you started with, and before it can be played it must be uncompressed, back to the file you started with.

So, if you ripped CD's to 320 kbps MP3 files, and you ripped CD's in FLAC, and now you're listening to the MP3 and the FLAC side by side, you're comparing the MP3 file to the original CD.
 
All my downloaded content is at WMA320kbps as 16/48. I use a program called Wondershare Music Converter to go to 48Hz. It also does mp3 to 320kbps as well as FLAC and others.
I cannot tell the difference between these at all....I can tell the difference when I A/B between WMA320kbps and actual CD, more so using headphones but almost impossible thru my speakers. What is noticeable is the soundstage closes in some on 320kbps files.
My Zune player only holds up to 320kbps files, and thru the DAC11 via optical it sounds wonderful....so I concur that for me WMA320kbps is very good.
 
Fisherdude said:
Keep in mind, though, that you can't compare the sound of FLAC to anything else. FLAC is not an audio file, and cannot be "played". It is a compressed version of the file you started with, and before it can be played it must be uncompressed, back to the file you started with.
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Also worth mentioning ... Yes, there is an extra step involved in uncompressing a FLAC vs playing a raw WAV, but ... BOTH are converted to PCM prior to playback, and at that point they're bit for bit identical. So, you're not losing any musical information, but you are adding a bit of cpu overhead to the process. Not so much as to bother any fairly current platform.

I also did some head scratching with the FLAC recording rate, thinking 8 would be better than the default 5 setting. Come to find out, the end result is identical, but it takes longer to process at the higher setting. I believe it's more of an improved error correction thing than anything else. So, rip everything at 5 unless you run into a problem piece, then try that at 8 ...
 
I find 320 to be very good as well, but I would never use it if I had any higher-res options. (I can't tell the difference between 320 and WAV in my car)

One concern I'd have would be future listening. If you rip all your CDs to mp3, then in a few years find, for whatever reason, that the lossless reolution was valuable to you, you'd have wasted all that time ripping them lossy.

Just rip them FLAC and preserve their integrity and your own piece of mind.
 
Because I keep the original CDs, I don't think it's vital to have lossless copies on a hard drive. Things like soundstage are not quite as important to me as to some other listeners, because I listen casually and rarely even sit directly between my speakers (I did for this test though). The only DAC I have is a Topping TP30 (16/48 max), which only supports USB for the digital input. My CDP has an optical out, but I don't have a DAC that supports optical, so I just use the internal one. A DAC may be my next big audio purchase if I can be certain it will improve the sound of my system.
 
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nick12345 said:
Because I keep the original CDs, I don't think it's vital to have lossless copies on a hard drive. Things like soundstage are not quite as important to me as to some other listeners, because I listen casually and rarely even sit directly between my speakers (I did for this test though). The only DAC I have is a Topping TP30 (16/48 max), which only supports USB for the digital input. My CDP has an optical out, but I don't have a DAC that supports optical, so I just use the internal one. A DAC may be my next big audio purchase if I can be certain it will improve the sound of my system.
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You will probably find, as I recently did, that your original CD's will decay with age. When I recently ripped my entire collection to FLAC files I found that a considerable number wouldn't rip with EAC because of the numerous pinholes that weren't there when the CD's were new. A few were so bad that they would no longer play on a CD player. These discs were kept cool and dry and out of direct light their entire lives.
 
That's because you didn't paint the edges green and let all the bits leak out ... shame!

Still hoping to find a medium that will last longer than me anyway. Of course, every year that passes, that gets easier ... <G>

I treated most of my vinyls over the years with LAST archival treatment ... those seem to be holding up well.
 
If it's all going to be on the music server - pick your poison.

If you are making compilation CDs to take on the road (digital versions of "mix tapes") use 192 as it is native to things like CD Walkmen and such - more choice of playback equipment.

If you want to hand off a good copy, I like 256 as the files are noticeably smaller, but still very playable :)

320 is really pretty close to WAV in quality as far as I can tell ...
 
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