New Music
My headphones finally died, so I decided it was time to invest in a quality pair of headphones. I don't know anything about audio equipment, so DavidM hooked me up with some recommendations (and some soldering for the ends) and I settled on the Sennheiser 280 HMD-Pro. In addition to being a great pair of headphones, they also come with a microphone (which is useful for Skype & our office softphones).
It's like I'm listening to my music for the very first time. Even tracks encoded at 128 kbps (now painfully noticeable) have a now exposed depth & richness. I only have a few lossless tracks, but they sound phenomenal. Entire parts of songs I didn't know were there appear, like the weird very low frequency heartbeat in John Murphy's "The Surface of the Sun" from the Sunshine soundtrack.
Questions I have now are:
a. what program is best for audio playback on my Mac?
b. what file format is gives the highest fidelity in digital playback?
c. where do I get music in that format?
No idea if any audiophiles read this blog, but any advice you can provide is much appreciated.
Music | By Josiah Roe | 06:50 PM
Comments
a. The playback program is irrelevant in terms of sound quality. Sound quality is the result of the source material, digital-analog converter, amplifiers and speakers. Essentially, it's a hardware issue. I use iTunes because its fast, accessible and organizes my library in a method to my liking. I turn off all the Playback features like Sound Enhancer and Sound Check because they alter the depth and dynamics of the artist's original intent.
b. AAC at 192 kbps or 320 kbps. But the differences between AAC and mp3 are negligible at higher bit-depths. I use 320 kbps*.
c. iTMS, ripping from CD and more often than not - wherever I can get them.
*Before you go changing the bit-depth or file format of your entire library, note that making these changes after the fact will actually lower the sound quality of your music. Once a CD or file is encoded to a specific codec or bit-depth, it will always be that particular quality. If you try to re-encode a file, you will actually take even more information away from what's already there. Think of it like trying to rescan a 72 dpi printout at 300 dpi to improve image quality. It won't work.
Posted by: davidm. at May 16, 2008 08:14 PM
I should point out that I have no experience with the Apple Lossless Encoder.
Posted by: davidm. at May 16, 2008 08:18 PM
FLAC is a lossless compression format. Music at it's best.
Posted by: stelmodad at May 16, 2008 08:53 PM
Yes, go for da FLAC.
Lots of download sites -- and especially bands offering downloadable shows -- offer it.
Posted by: Bill at May 16, 2008 09:53 PM
I like VLC for playback on OS X (mostly because I tunes is such a hog)
XMMS is my standby in Linux.
You really can't beat FLAC for compression. It completely lossless but you still get some decent compression (not to mention the format is open).
I bought some Sennheiser headphones a few months ago myself and have been loving them ever since, my only complaint is that Sennheiser does not make any Bluetooth compatible headphones, they may simply be waiting for the quality of Bluetooth audio transmission to improve though.
Posted by: James at May 17, 2008 04:51 AM
Vinyl sounds really good too, but I don't know where you can download it.
Posted by: Totten at May 17, 2008 02:22 PM
FLAC for sure. Also those are nice headphones, I used to own a pair until my dog ate them. Now I just have a cheap pair of wireless RCA's.
Posted by: Jam at May 27, 2008 07:59 PM
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