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[lazygecko]

There is no humanly measurable difference. This was established as far back as the early 90's when the technology was in preliminary testing. People saying that you can buy high end gear to tell a difference are probably just rationalizing their investments with placebo.

I can tell the difference between Mp3 and FLAC with classical music and or anything involving rich and multi-layered instrumentation.
Listen to the album Thriller in mp3. Do it again in FLAC. You should notice a difference.

Using classical music as a benchmark for compression is a bit funny and misguided, because typically that sort of music plays along very nicely with compression algorithms. It's music with very fast and sharp high end transients that are more difficult to process. "Rich and multi-layered instrumentation" can be used to describe most types of productions that aren't barebones garage rock. There is nothing special or magical that somehow elevates it on a technical level (besides the fact that it is more likely to avoid being dynamically compressed to hell).

 

[Stumpokapow]

I think people discussing this subject should be required to submit ABX results for their claims.

 

[dork]

probably, but i'm sure 99% of the population can't tell the difference and the 1% just pretend they can

Agreed

 

[ZackieChan]

Yes there is.

But you need the gear to be able to tell, and beyond that you need to be so in to audio that you fool yourself into thinking that you can tell.

FTFY

This is one of those things, like wine tasting, that is super important to those who think they are experts. Doesn't empirical testing of this kind of thing show that it is, at best, completely subjective?

 

[DOWN]

FTFY

This is one of those things, like wine tasting, that is super important to those who think they are experts. Doesn't empirical testing of this kind of thing show that it is, at best, completely subjective?

Yes, for both wine and audio. In wine tests, the experts rated the wines at varying levels when they didn't know price. Once told prices, they rated the expensive wines higher. Same thing here.

 

[Coreda]

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Mathematically there is a difference. Audibly is up to you to decide.

 

[Raistlin]

There is no humanly measurable difference. This was established as far back as the early 90's when the technology was in preliminary testing.

That doesn't make sense given MP3 encoders have improved dramatically since release.

 

[Risible]

Every time this topic comes up the audiophiles choose to ignore the numerous studies that have been done that show in double blind tests no one can hear the difference between 320 and FLAC. Every audiophile believes they have the golden ear.

So much quackery and snake oil in the audiophile community. Cable and headphone burn-in, the use of nebulous qualities to describe the sounds they are hearing, purified-silver connects, just so much bullshit.

 

[CassidyIzABeast]

Yes, but not really.

 

[Jarmel]

No. It's bullshit.

 

[Geneijin]

No. It's bullshit.

Someone forgot about Shingeki no Kyojin :3

 

[Enron]

I'm listening to Ace of Base album Flowers (Brilliant Album BTW) both in 320kbps & FLAC and cannot tell the difference.

Rock and pop its really hard to discern any difference because in general, the engineering done on most rock and pop recordings isn't very good.

I agree that there's virtually no difference to your ears. On certain recordings my FLACs are slightly noticeably better than my 320 cbr mp3s but maybe it was just a bad rip or something.

Like someone said earlier, lossless is handy for transcoding but that's about it really.

 

[Ptaaty]

I am not sure - but because I can so reliably tell the lower bitrates from higher, I tend to have FLACs where I can.

192kpbs mp3 is something that bugs me on maybe 75%+ of what I listen to. 256kpbs mp3 it starts to get a bit iffy, sometimes I might pick up on it, sometimes not.

I don't recall every hearing artifacts on 320k mp3, but I haven't done A/B trying to find out either. It falls into the certainly good enough for all but the most critical listening and maybe fine even there.

 

[Cute Dragon Here]

Going beyond about 192 kbps is likely to result in diminishing returns in audio quality when it comes to standard audio codecs. It's extremely unlikely that anyone would notice a difference between a 192 kbps or higher bit rate audio file compared to the unaltered original.

At some point, you'd be hard-pressed to hear the difference, even with great audio equipment. Software engineers did a great job with most codecs and their basis when it comes to transparent audio compression within reasonable bit rates, and I respect their work.

 

[Rich!]

On my dads ridiculously priced sound system there is a definite improvement in bass and high end treble between FLAC and 320kb/s, but on every other device of mine I struggle to notice.

192-320kb/s is very noticeable on my setup though

 

[jellies_two]

audiophiles claim to hear the difference between cables, capacitors, run-in vs new amps, and the difference between a 40k speaker and a 10k speaker is often described as orgasmic. They can write a page of adjectives on the improvements when changing a turntable power from ac to pure dc.

I wish there were more well run double blind tests on this stuff. So much is placebo.

 

[Burgess_101]

Sometimes I can tell the difference sometimes not but I'm a firm believer in the having the best possible to start with, I have a pretty decent HiFi set up though.

It takes up way more space but it's worth it for me, though straight from a CD it is usually better than flac anyway.

 

[Korey]

No. Nobody can tell the difference. Someone did a survey test here with files encoded in different qualities and everyone got it wrong.

Any perceivable difference is purely in the imagination.

 

[Ampersands]

I personally can't tell a difference. And at that point, I don't think it really matters. But I'm no audiophile. The large file size seems like a waste too.

 

[DOWN]

Since people are seriously curious about Tidal because it offers lossless and Spotify "only" has 320kbps, I just wanna bump this to again say that paying to listen or stream lossless is paying for placebo. The whole audible range of music is captured in 320kbps.

 

[Phat Michael]

No. Nobody can tell the difference. Someone did a survey test here with files encoded in different qualities and everyone got it wrong.

Any perceivable difference is purely in the imagination.

LOL.

Sounds well sourced. People claiming no one can ever tell the difference should post their setups.

If it's a $5 set of Apple ear buds running off an iPhone 5 then I'd agree with you.

 

[DOWN]

LOL.

Sounds well sourced. People claiming no one can ever tell the difference should post their setups.

If it's a $5 set of Apple ear buds running off an iPhone 5 then I'd agree with you.

It's science. LOL.

 

[Phat Michael]

It's science. LOL.

That doesn't mean anything.

 

[Dicer]

There is but most people don't have the ears or the equipment to really hear it, and at the end of the day, and after all that money the difference isn't worth it for most...

BUT there will always be the small % that have "super hearing" that will tell you it IS worth it.


so YMMV...

 

[Delta Assault]

I rock it to 128kbps, old school KaZaA style.

 

[Dead]

If you have the right equipment, the difference is there.

No shit you're struggling to hear it on your $50 Logitech PC speakers.

 

[Sparkedglory]

FLAC is supposed to be a bit higher quality, but I'll never download them since the file sizes are so big compared to MP3's

 

[Phat Michael]

FLAC is supposed to be a bit higher quality, but I'll never download them since the file sizes are so big compared to MP3's

Flacs aren't so big. Most between 30mb and 50mb per song. Wav, DSD and some 192khz etc files I have are around 250mb per song. I have norah jones' album recorded from SACD in this format and it sounds amazing with a set of HD800s.

 

[Dio]

Yeah, but I don't hear it all that often, even with a good setup.

I keep FLAC around for archival purposes; some of the CDs I possess are either quite rare or expensive, and keeping a FLAC around is the best method of preserving those CDs instead of a lossy 'rip' being the only version available. Plus, you can use FLACs as a sort of 'master' from which to make all lossy versions, instead of doing the music equivalent of compressing a compressed JPG, artifacts and all.

 

[Jpop]

Yeah, but the majority of people do not have the set-up to tell the difference. Diminishing returns and all.

Flacs aren't so big. Most between 30mb and 50mb per song. Wav, DSD and some 192khz etc files I have are around 250mb per song. I have norah jones' album recorded from SACD in this format and it sounds amazing with a set of HD800s.

That's fucking huge. Considering how many songs are in an album and how many albums a person has.

 

[battousai11]

I can't even tell the difference between 320kbps and 128kbps.

http://mp3ornot.com/

I can definitely tell, but the differences are subtle, and are more present in some tracks as compared to others.

 

[DECK'ARD]

Flacs aren't so big. Most between 30mb and 50mb per song. Wav, DSD and some 192khz etc files I have are around 250mb per song. I have norah jones' album recorded from SACD in this format and it sounds amazing with a set of HD800s.

Hilarious.

You've got the placebo effect bad.

 

[Phat Michael]

Yeah, but the majority of people do not have the set-up to tell the difference. Diminishing returns and all.


That's fucking huge. Considering how many songs are in an album and how many albums a person has.

Yeah I have 4TB of stuff in that resolution. Some of the stuff sounds really amazing.
Pet sounds, blue Nile, thriller, white album, the Eagles,Donald Fagan. So many well recorded albums on there.

For my portable dac/amp I use majority flac, for the home setup I use the higher res stuff. Shame most albums are terribly mixed and recorded.

 

[Sparkedglory]

Flacs aren't so big. Most between 30mb and 50mb per song. Wav, DSD and some 192khz etc files I have are around 250mb per song. I have norah jones' album recorded from SACD in this format and it sounds amazing with a set of HD800s.

30 to 50mb a song is freaking huge. The largest MP3 I have is like 15mb, and I'm constantly downloading music, so I would prefer not to have to buy multiple hdd's just to play all of my songs.

 

[Phat Michael]

Hilarious.

You've got the placebo effect bad.

And I'm guessing you have the same earphones that came with your mobile?

The norah jones album in SACD sounds incredible. If you don't believe that, then enjoy what it is you are listening to.

 

[Phat Michael]

Hilarious.

You've got the placebo effect bad.

Yeah. Pretty bad placebo effect.

 

[Danchi]

I can't tell the difference, but I do buy/download everything in lossless when I can. That means paying a pound or two more on Boomkat, but other sites like Bandcamp give you the option of various formats for the same price.

I do it for archival purposes because it just gives you more options. Mostly thinking that in the future there might be a new standard that sounds better/is more space effective than MP3 that I can convert to.

 

[stump sock]

I think people discussing this subject should be required to submit ABX results for their claims.

I actually think this thread is being remarkably reasonable about the whole thing, considering the subject matter.

audiophiles claim to hear the difference between cables, capacitors, run-in vs new amps, and the difference between a 40k speaker and a 10k speaker is often described as orgasmic. They can write a page of adjectives on the improvements when changing a turntable power from ac to pure dc.

I wish there were more well run double blind tests on this stuff. So much is placebo.

haha funny you should mention that. Audiophilic writers are so absurd.

also:

http://wathifi.com/

 

[Easy_D]

I did that test and it's hard to explain but the 320kbps clips feel a bit more rich, it's hard to "hear" the difference as much as I can feel it, it just feels better in my ear.

4/4. I'm assuming that the difference would be more pronounced if I wasn't wearing 50 euro headphones.

 

[this_guy]

If you're listening to music on your smartphone then 320kbps is good enough. Headphones will make a bigger difference than bit rate, and the best headphones will require a separate amp or DAC. 320kbps + Sennheiser Amperiors with Rdio on my smartphone is good enough.

 

[Courage]

Pretty sure it depends on how the audio was recorded and mastered, i.e. the source itself. Most of the time, I'd say it's pretty indiscernible.

 

[stump sock]

amusingly enough, with the Tidal announcement, they've put up a test where you can check to see if your equipment is "up to snuff" for their lossless offerings

two different pairs of $300 headphones through a DAC later, I can say there wasn't a perceptible difference. if you're richer than me, it might be worth checking.

http://test.tidalhifi.com/

 

[Im_So_Pringles]

I don't listen to FLAC. I have no reason to. However, I do prefer them when they are available because it is lossless, and then I can take that file and encode it however I want.

320kbps is fine. I literally can't tell the difference on my Sennheisers OR my KRK studio monitors. However, anything below that, it starts getting very obvious.

Edit: Also, a song with great production and a good pair of headphones will take you much further than how a file is encoded anyway (unless it's just plain bad quality) IMO

 

[DECK'ARD]

Yeah. Pretty bad placebo effect.

And I'm guessing you have the same earphones that came with your mobile?

The norah jones album in SACD sounds incredible. If you don't believe that, then enjoy what it is you are listening to.

The snobbery is amazing, you just demonstrate where the placebo effect comes from.

If that same Norah Jones master was delivered at CD quality you wouldn't be able to identify it any better than tossing a coin.

And that's equally true if it was delivered as a 320k mp3.

 

[Hari Seldon]

You cannot tell the difference assuming it came from the same source. HOWEVER, often sources and recording techniques are better in Flac versions. The 320kB version sometimes is just someone re-encoding the original shit recording. The Flac version might be a special high end audio version with a much better mastering tailored to people with high end gear.

 

[stan423321]

Well nobody said you have to just listen to thing as intended. Slow down the thing 5 times, pitch shift it an octave up and the differences become fairly more audible.

 

[DopeToast]

I have all my stuff backed up on an external hard drive in lossless but simply for archival purposes and that I got rid of my CDs. But I'd be lying if I could ever tell the difference between the lossless and 320 kbps, or even 256 kbps. Some old iTunes purchases were in 128 kbps, and those sounded a bit tinny in spots, but other than that I can't tell any difference with the equipment I have. MP3s are awesome. The space they save is great.

 

[Dead]

audiophiles claim to hear the difference between cables, capacitors, run-in vs new amps, and the difference between a 40k speaker and a 10k speaker is often described as orgasmic. They can write a page of adjectives on the improvements when changing a turntable power from ac to pure dc.

I wish there were more well run double blind tests on this stuff. So much is placebo.

Have you listened to 40k speakers before, powered through 1000+ watt monoblock amps?

Don't get me wrong there's a lot of stuff that audiophiles waste money on but you can't clown on an expensive HiFi system if you haven't heard one.

 

[Brandson]

The difference is only noticeable sometimes, in certain tracks, on quite good equipment. The way I view it is mp3 won't be the default audio standard forever and storage is cheap (6TB is only about $300 these days). I'd rather maintain a personal archive of lossless audio for perfect transcoding in the future. Audio tracks in blu-ray movies are mostly lossless by the way too.