iTunes Audiophile Downloads

[f1eng]

A more accurate digitisation of a poor master is still pointless.

One of the insoluble problems of old digital files is the implementation of the anti-aliasing filter on the input. A good brick-wall filter does not exist and without one there will be aliasing products in the recorded signal.

Thankfully few of the golden age microphones produce much output above 15 kHz so there was rarely, if any, any higher frequency information than this on the input if older recordings.

Plenty of modern microphones have sensitivity up to 40kHz making 44/16 recordings without ugly anti-aliasing or filter artefacts unlikely nowadays.

 

[jhwalker]

In my mind, the only benefit of making, say, 96/24 recordings available is for those albums which were originally recorded in a high enough (how high is "enough"?) quality and can be re-encoded at the higher bitrate / word depth to take advantage of the new technology. Upsampling garbage just gives you more garbage - I hope if iTunes starts making higher-quality music available, they'll tell us in some way if the album has been re-encoded from an original, high-quality master or simply upsampled from Redbook content - or, preferably, not doing *any* upsampling at all!

 

I'd be happy if we could get the older content in full, lossless 44/16 and the new stuff at either MP3, lossless Redbook, or up to 96/24 (or higher, in the course of time).

 

[daniloreyes]

OMG... All master recordings have better quality than cd,

how ever the important point is about mp3s, when listening to them on a good system, sound terrible. Current society is used to it, so they do not care. Mp3 was created when there was space issues and memory price instability on electronics. Its true some 24bit offerings are 16bit upsampled, and lets hope itunes does not do that. But the difference between a low resolution mp3 and a real 24bit music is un-describable, you need to experience it.

 

[djjimmylyons]

Bit depth is a systems ability to represent the dynamic range of the signal. A cymbal crash will decay naturally but a digital recorder has to have a high bit depth to represent that.

It doesn't matter what the overall dynamic range is for a recording, there are still sounds within that recording, that have decays in them that we need accurately recorded/represented.

Picture legos. With a lot of really small legos, you can almost make a wheel...

 

[firedog]

That Apple is offering a streaming subscription service like Rhapsody.

 

[f1eng]

Many, or most, CDs are still way off exploiting the potential of 16/44 so I don't expect the producers of this type of garbage to make a better recording in 24/94, personally.

90% of people find mp3 indistinguishable from the original ( this was the sign off condition of the original algorithm) mp4 at 256 is -much- better than mp3.

How many Apple customers have a system good enough to hear the difference, even if their ears are good enough...

0.01% or less would be my guess.

Yes, I would love to have my favourite recordings available at a higher sound quality than now. I suspect most will never be re-issued this way though since for many of the old ones the masters are damaged or poor.

I hope they do it. I hope it is a success. I am not holding my breath.

 

[Paul R]

With systems good enough to distinguish between MP3, Mp4, and a CD?

 

All of us.

 

 

 

[f1eng]

I know loads of people who think my system is a stupid waste of money. Most are music lovers and some professional musicians.

I also know several who think it is fantastic, most, again, are music lovers but some are "audiophiles" who spend their time listening to small differences and mainly do tests rather than enjoy music. I have one friend who will only accept vinyl and has at least as many test records as music, it seems. For him all digital is hideous and unlistenable, which leads to him missing out on some great music.

I have tried several music lovers on mp4, alc and aiff rips of the same tracks and only a few hear a difference they consider significant enough to get excited about, even when it seems a big difference to me. The performance is the important thing.

Otoh I also would rather listen to Bach on a telephone than Bruce Springsteen in 24/192.

 

[4est]

"Otoh I also would rather listen to Bach on a telephone than Bruce Springsteen in 24/192."

 

Gotta love this site!

 

 

 

[Paul R]

I do think that any modern Apple computer will reveal the differences in those formats - certainly a Mac Mini will.

 

But in regards to the whole subject, if your system gives you pleasure, and the cost of it is not breaking up your family or driving you into bankruptcy, then - in my opinion - it is anything but a stupid waste of money.

 

It is indeed, a very wise expenditure of money, and something well worth the doing.

 

Until recently, I had an enormous amount of computer, network, and software at my house. I could, with a few flicks of my keys, be on a current z/OS mainframe, a current HP Open-VMS, HPUX, or out of date HP-3000 system, as well as Windows, MacOS, and a range of Linux systems from mainframe to IA64 to x86 and more. I have more than a 100mbs of internet connectivity running into my home office.

 

I used all that to great advantage, and have built a nice life for myself and my family. Of course, I rarely saw my family, as I was always either at work, at a client's office, or in my office. Often till the wee hours of the morning, all weekend, and during vacations too.

 

It was a very good investment of my money and time in some ways- I made a lot of money, met a lot of people, had a lot of fun.

 

Now I go home, sit down on a loveseat with my wife, watch meaningless but fun videos, and listen to great music until around midnight. We can listen to that music in either the living room, the bedroom, the loft, or occasionally, in my office.

 

Total investment in the stereo/television bit so far is quite modest, less than $10K, including the television. And that puts sound in four rooms and counts the costs of the music server (and a backup to it) as well as the DASD storage.

 

Does it all meet "audiophile" standards? Probably not, but my wife, daughter, and I get 100x the cost in enjoyment out of it.

 

In all the rooms with sound, the speakers seem to disappear, and it seems that the performers are playing on an invisible stage right before us, with vertical and horizontal distinction between the players. At least, it does that with decent recordings.

 

And we all seem to talk to each other more, and hang together in the same rooms.

 

I personally find it immensely difficult to spend a lot of money on the audio/video gear, but that is a mental thing with me. I know I will not make money off it, or at least the chances I will do so are very slim indeed.

 

Once I have spent the money however - ah - then it is a completely different story.

 

It becomes, without a doubt, some of the best money I have ever spent, and I am quite sure I will be spending more in the future.

 

So a "stupid waste of money?"

 

No way - not in my opinion.

 

YMMV, etc.

 

-Paul

 

[f1eng]

As with you my system seems good value to me, I use it hours per day. It was more expensive than my car but I use it at least 5x as long, lots of people I know think it was a waste of money though...

 

[jerico]

Well stated, Paul!

 

 

[firedog]

Apple: announcing iPad2

HDTracks: Stones in high res

 

Did I miss something, or is that all there is?

 

Note: I do like the Stones reissue, as it tells us labels are finding releasing classic material in hi-res is worth it, and more will be coming. We may be able to build a respectable library of hi-res popular music in a few years.

 

[jhwalker]

We don't yet know what Apple will be announcing today. *Probably* an updated iPad (version 1.5?), possibly updates to the MobileMe service to allow more flexible iTunes library management, doubtfully any updates to allow higher-quality music - *at this time*.

 

The story on CNN re: Apple planning for higher-quality downloads did not mention *any* timeframe, but it will definitely come - whether in the next few months or the next few years is the question.

 

[MarkS]

No news today that I am aware of on the iTunes high res front

 

[agentsmith]

Disappointed. Apparently nothing happened.

 

 

I bought a couple of $100 gift cards to get ready for that.

 

[realhifi]

Patience grasshopper. I think it's brewing. Probably not "hires" but at least something along the lines of 24/48 full cd quality or better. I'm betting they are getting their ducks in a row on the hardware side before springing something on people and not letting their players support it.

 

iPad 2 more than what it seems perhaps?

 

[Paul R]

Yeah - I was a little bummed out about that as well. iTunes 10.2 released last night, and it has a few nice things in it. Just on a 5 minute listen, the sound from it seemed a little tighter.

 

The big thing is iOS4.3 will enable home sharing on iPhones, iPads, and iPods, meaning we can stream out libraries to the devices now. Something that was sadly and foolishly lacking previously.

 

They also fixed the bugs where by a maliciously crafted image could cause iTunes to crater. Most annoying especially if running under Windows.

 

-Paul

 

 

[agentsmith]

Still no words?

 

[Enicar]

"Yeah - I was a little bummed out about that as well. iTunes 10.2 released last night, and it has a few nice things in it. Just on a 5 minute listen, the sound from it seemed a little tighter."

 

Would they really do somthing to enhance audio quality and not say anything about it?

 

 

 

[Paul R]

Mind you, I am not saying they knew they did it, it might have been a side effect or just the result of general bug cleanup. Who knows? It seems to have tighted up the bass a little bit on ALAC and AIFF recordings where the bass is really charged up.

 

-Paul

 

 

[william may]

were do u get 24 bit 48khz apple lossless files. i only get

16 bit 48khz aiff files.Apple only gives us 16 bit.

 

[Erwin S]

Cheapest way to get a fine start collection is to subscribe to B&W SoS for $60. For that, you get to download every new album: one Classical and one other. And! You can download the entire back catalogue from the start. Must be about 50 albums or more.

EDIT: just noticed that B&W did away with the earliest albums. Still a fine deal, though.

 

Format is ALAC or 24/48 FLAC. Choose flac and convert that to AIFF using XLD if you have Apple.

 

http://www.bowers-wilkins.co.uk/Society_of_Sound

 

[bikemig]

I second what Erwin says about B & W SoS. I finally got around to joining a few days ago and I frankly don't know what took me so long. I like classical and the LSO offerings are great. The world music selections by Peter Gabriel are really interesting. There are considerably less than 50 CDs on there but they do add new music on a regular basis. They also have a few binaural recordings for headphone lovers that I need to check out.

 

[bottlerocket]

Here are some sources I have used.

 

1) HDTracks - www.HDTracks.com - most comprehensive collection

2) http://www.itrax.com/

3) http://bluecoastrecords.com/

4) Rip DVD Audio discs with DVD Audio Extractor - requires Windows. - There are many DVD Audio discs available at http://store.acousticsounds.com/

5) the B & W link mentioned in this thread.

6) Blu-Ray. Lately there have been some blu-ray releases that include hi-res downloads or you can play them via the disc through your blu-ray player (older models are often limited to 16/48 output though)

 

You mentioned Ipod. Your Ipod will not play more than 16/44 although its host computer will if it is a Mac.

 

HDTracks is the most straight forward method. Find some music, pay some money, download the tracks usually in either FLAC or AIFF and then determine if you need to convert that format to another format for playback. If FLAC and if you are using Itunes, you will need to convert to AIFF or ALAC using Max (free at sbooth.org) or some other converter.

 

A word to the wise, although it is nice to have the option of hi-res, it adds complexity that is not always worth it. I have many CD quality (16/44.1) albums that sound better than my hi-res tracks.