What makes you pick a particular Music format?

[E-Stat]

Just curious. Care to share what year and the format/bitrate?

Since they were used to create CDs, they were in their native 16/44 WAV format. I later changed to FLAC because of tagging.

I say, "why bother?"

Noticeably better (at least to me) sound quality.

But when I'm in the car, my garage, on my deck, the lawnmower, or at the firepit...HQ lossy on-demand streaming amplified is a no-nonsense no-brainer.

Ok, but I find the same to be true with lossless content. In cars via CDs or connected to iPhone. In garage, Touch player is networked to music server and and can play up to 24/192. Out by firepit and pool, in ceiling speakers are driven by house system driven directly by music server always using original resolution. While mowing or running, I use iPhone with lossless content and Shure SE535 IEMs.

To each his own. I seek the best quality - especially if I already have the content!

 

[JoeESP9]

But when I'm in the car, my garage, on my deck, the lawnmower, or at the firepit...HQ lossy on-demand streaming amplified is a no-nonsense no-brainer. So yeah, for me, lossy fills a practical place and is a big win/win. Utility aside, the catalog alone makes it worth keeping the bathwater along with the baby.

Isn't "HQ lossy" an oxymoron?

 

[Condorsat]

Isn't "HQ lossy" an oxymoron?

IMHO ... just a matter of perspective. Wendys Dave's Double Burger is higher quality than the Mac D Big Mac ... kind of sort of ... in it's own weight class. To some people ... neither are good ... it's just fast food.

In the YouTube video below ... various bit rates of MP3 are compared ... the higher bit rates sound better than the lower bit rates. Higher Quality in their own right.

 

[JoeESP9]

How can any lossy file be considered "HQ"? IMO/E there are three basic files types, HQ, CD quality and any lossy compressed file. The key word being lossy.

 

[E-Stat]

How can any lossy file be considered "HQ"? IMO/E there are three basic files types, HQ, CD quality and any lossy compressed file. The key word being lossy.

There might be one possible exception: the MQA standard which claims to be able to "pack" a 96/24 signal into a 48/16 wrapper.

 

[Alobar]

There might be one possible exception: the MQA standard which claims to be able to "pack" a 96/24 signal into a 48/16 wrapper.

Ah yes, MQA. Another chance to have to buy a new DAC and all new music again! Sign me up for that...

 

[E-Stat]

Ah yes, MQA. Another chance to have to buy a new DAC and all new music again! Sign me up for that...

Agreed. It makes zero sense from the standpoint of downloading the media. I think it might have life for a while for "serious streamers" who subscribe to services like TIDAL.

 

[Rockyhill]

"What makes you pick a particular Music format?"
Sound quality & convenience of playback. For me at this point in time that equals streaming via AirPlay for 90% of my listening - AppleMusic & jazzradio.com (with the occasional nod to Pandora. Their forthcoming new format may be of interest) . The balance is FM via college radio or CD/SACD. I used to have well over 1k CD's but have pared that down over the years. Basically unloaded the one-hit-wonders. When I retire and we downsize the home vinyl might make make a resurgence in my life. To each his own!

 

[Condorsat]

IMHO ... Vinyl ... Cassettes .... CDs .... and yes MP3 was a format (just not in the traditional hard media sense)... Streaming is also a format unto itself.

 

[Alobar]

Streaming is also a format unto itself.

I suppose it could be considered that. If the big corporations such as Apple get their way it could become the last format too. It sort of reminds me of how the internet took over from "hard copy" as our main news source. It is arguable that most good journalism left for good after that. I wonder what the flip side of streaming as our sole source of music could be?

 

[Condorsat]

I suppose it could be considered that. If the big corporations such as Apple get their way it could become the last format too. It sort of reminds me of how the internet took over from "hard copy" as our main news source. It is arguable that most good journalism left for good after that. I wonder what the flip side of streaming as our sole source of music could be?

IMHO MP3 was the music industry's Cortez the Killer ... as the Neil Young song would say.

Streaming did not start that ... it's just what's next.

 

[Alobar]

IMHO MP3 was the music industry's Cortez the Killer ... as the Neil Young song would say.

Streaming did not start that ... it's just what's next.

Got no argument there.. I think that with mp3s at least we could buy the music we wanted, vote with our wallets sort of. I keep wondering when, once the streaming thing has had time to stabilize and most of the competition has fallen by the wayside if everyone is still going to be marveling as much.

 

[+48V]

To each his own. I seek the best quality - especially if I already have the content!

True that. I enjoy both worlds. A personal library/archive of lossless files along with a colossal music collection from on-demand streaming services both lossy & lossless. It's simply not worth sacrificing such an enormous volume of music at my disposal...for me to be a purist for purity's sake. I'm not willing to cheat myself like that.
#musicjunkie

 

[+48V]

Isn't "HQ lossy" an oxymoron?

Not at all. There many levels of lossy encoding and the difference in sound quality is enormous.

 

[E-Stat]

It's simply not worth sacrificing such an enormous volume of music at my disposal...for me to be a purist for purity's sake.

Perhaps I wasn't clear and certainly don't mean you should "sacrifice" anything. To the contrary, I suggest you recover something that has already been lost! I refer this earlier statement of yours regarding CD rips:

"I re-ripped what I had done+ @320k…"

If you still have the CDs, why not rip them lossless and fully enjoy that which you already have?

 

[E-Stat]

Streaming did not start that ... it's just what's next.

Computer data storage / bandwidth considerations have always determined the quality of commercially delivered digital recordings. Dr. Stockham's Soundstream system used by Telarc in the late 70's ran at 16/50 using Honeywell data tape drives. That wasn't a problem, because the final product was pressed to quality vinyl. The CD, however, lowered resolution to 16/44 entirely because the media only supported 640 MB. It was fenced in from the outset using 1980 era technology.

MP3 based music was intended for portable devices with limited memory. As removable media capacity has risen and memory costs have dropped, those old limitations shouldn't continue to limit the quality of the signal - but unfortunately do.

 

[JoeESP9]

Not at all. There many levels of lossy encoding and the difference in sound quality is enormous.

I don't consider any lossy recording to be HQ. If you've thrown away part of the music in the beginning whatever you end up with is lower quality than what you started with. That in no way constitutes HQ. Sure some lossy schemes sound better than others. They all have one thing in common. They are all of a lower audio quality than the original.

Nowadays data storage media is so inexpensive I can't see the point of using any lossy compression scheme.

FWIW: I don't download MP3 files although I stream them from the web strictly for casual listening. My entire CD collection (1600+) is stored in FLAC format.

 

[Condorsat]

I don't consider any lossy recording to be HQ. If you've thrown away part of the music in the beginning whatever you end up with is lower quality than what you started with. That in no way constitutes HQ. Sure some lossy schemes sound better than others. They all have one thing in common. They are all of a lower audio quality than the original.

What you say is true ... but

This reminds me of the scene from Pirates of Silicon Valley where Jobs tells Gates that his their (Apple) stuff is better ... Gates replies "You don't get it Steve, I doesn't matter".

MP3 works so well (it's job is to capture what human beings can actually hear or pay attention to ... not total data) ... that most people can't tell the difference.

Hi-fi music streaming: People can't tell it when they hear it <<< click link CNBC test.

"Pay as cheap as possible for music ... because it doesn't matter"
Brian Sullivan (news anchor)

Ouch

 

[JoeESP9]

What you say is true ... but

This reminds me of the scene from Pirates of Silicon Valley where Jobs tells Gates that his their (Apple) stuff is better ... Gates replies "You don't get it Steve, I doesn't matter".

MP3 works so well (it's job is to capture what human beings can actually hear or pay attention to ... not total data) ... that most people can't tell the difference.

Hi-fi music streaming: People can't tell it when they hear it <<< click link CNBC test.

"Pay as cheap as possible for music ... because it doesn't matter"
Brian Sullivan (news anchor)

Ouch

I have no problem with MP3's. My portable player (SanDisk ClipZip) is loaded with them (320VBR). However, calling any lossy compressed file HQ is IMO completely inaccurate.

 

[N8Nagel]

I was pretty much an idiot when I was younger. Understand that when I started getting into music CDs hadn't quite been introduced yet and in my young eyes LPs were those things that my parents had which were finicky, fragile, and hard to deal with. I wasn't discriminating enough nor did my parents have a system really good enough for me to discern the difference in sound quality between LP and cassette, so my very early music purchases were made on cassette.

Then CDs came around and I was a somewhat early adopter; once they started hitting the music stores I purchased my first CD player probably in 1988 or thereabouts. I don't remember what it was other than it had an orange display which I thought was cool. Pretty much all my music purchased from then on was on CD which was a good call as once I got around to setting up EAC and archiving everything 90+ percent of it ripped perfectly. This is great as then I can take Foobar2000 and convert all those files to MP3 and load them on a thumb drive for road trips etc. when I know we'll be in an area where there's no good radio stations and wireless data may be spotty.

Now of course both LPs and CDs can be picked up at bargain prices so pretty much all of my purchases are used examples of both. Occasionally if there's something I really want I will buy a new CD or hi res download. Spotify Premium supplies my new music listening needs, thanks to what's her face who is just as voracious a listener as I am.