2nd Gen Mp3 Playback Quality

[bratt]

A few members have mentioned that the MP3 playback quality on their new 2nd gen units isn't as good as they expected.

Can anyone post their findings?

Please include:

Bitrate and encoder name/version.

Ta

Mike

[bug80]

Anyone? I'm curious too.

[monkenstick]

I can't notice any difference between playback on my rh910 and my computer

most of my mp3s are at 192 or higher

[bug80]

I can't notice any difference between playback on my rh910 and my computer

most of my mp3s are at 192 or higher

←

Thanks for your info! Would you like to do another test? One user pointed out that the playback on the unit sounded better if the files were converted from MP3 to ATRAC before transferring. In other words, the ATRAC decoder maybe sounds better than the MP3 decoder.

Can you test if you hear the same effect?

[bratt]

I can't notice any difference between playback on my rh910 and my computer

most of my mp3s are at 192 or higher

←

Also... what encoder did you use?

[Lemmy]

I can't notice any difference between playback on my rh910 and my computer

most of my mp3s are at 192 or higher

←

Hi,

Just wondered how many mp3s encoded at that rate you can fit on a 1gb minidisc?

Or roughly how many albums?

Thanks,

L

[The Low Volta]

Hi,

Just wondered how many mp3s encoded at that rate you can fit on a 1gb minidisc?

Or roughly how many albums?

Thanks,

L

←

welcome to MDCF Lemmy,

but please try not to post new questions about other topics (even if they're related) in existing threads... this will make more ppl see your question and at the same time lets the existing thread stay on topic...

but to get an answer to your question... try this thread

(see what a little searching can come up with )

Edited May 16, 2005 by The Low Volta

[though]

in my opinion, the mp3 tracks sound great.

- troy

[Guest NRen2k5]

Is the playback anything approaching gapless? Or does the player pause for a few seconds between MP3 tracks?

[icie]

With my unit, I can't tell any difference between ATRAC and MP3 playback. Maybe because I use stock earphones or because I listen on the go (with a lot of noises outside). If I connected up with some good headphones I might be able to tell the difference, but right now, no.

Then again, all my mp3's are 256 or up. What I HAVE noticed, however is that mp3 playback cuts into battery time quite badly. My Nickel metal hydride seems to last for around 3-4 days (around 5hr playback per day), with a mixture of ATRAC and Mp3...not sure what the official ("ideal") specs are.

I have a thing about re-encoding...firstly, I seriously doubt that re-encoding something from one format to another will make the quality better. Secondly, (and this is a purely personal reason) I wouldn't re-encode mp3's in ATRAC unless I really wanted to squeeze maximum time out of my battery.

[bug80]

My Nickel metal hydride seems to last for around 3-4 days (around 5hr playback per day), with a mixture of ATRAC and Mp3...not sure what the official ("ideal") specs are.

15-20 hours sounds good to me. The manual of the RH10 states the following playing times for the NH-14WM battery:

PCM: 9

Hi-SP: 12.5

Hi-LP: 14.5

MP3 (128 kbs): 13

I have a thing about re-encoding...firstly, I seriously doubt that re-encoding something from one format to another will make the quality better. Secondly, (and this is a purely personal reason) I wouldn't re-encode mp3's in ATRAC unless I really wanted to squeeze maximum time out of my battery.

←

True, re-encoding reduces the quality in general. It will only lead to higher quality if the ATRAC decoder is really better than the MP3 decoder.

[lical]

True, re-encoding reduces the quality in general.

That's the only reason why I would consider buying a 2nd gen Hi-MD unit, because an important part of the music I have is already encoded in mp3. Re-coding mp3->atract3plus must be done (IMHO) at maximun possible bitrate otherwise loss is important.

[DJ_THE_CROW]

Well, MP3 is generally worse than ATRAC...

dont even try to compare MP3 with ATRAC....

and if youre gonna tell me that MP3 is quite good as ATRAC and you hear no difference.... then i am so damn sure you are deaf...

the native ATRAC used 292 kbits/s (STEREO), it goes back that using a lower bitrate would cause an bad effect in the quality and it can be heard... and thats why sony did not go down anyfurther with the bitrate, and their decision was right and they won many many trophies in HI-FI magazines, especially for the MDS-JE 500...

4 or 5 few years later MP3 was published in the internet and people started to use MP3 with napster... people just wanted all songs and music... there was no intension to check the quality at all... this is why MP3 is so popular even right now.... but it never means that MP3 is the same or even better than ATRAC...

there are restrictions in MP3, one can only use up to 320 kbits/s (STEREO), i did try that all, but the quality was still lost... using the new space gained if increased bitrate up to 320, MP3 doesnt sound better really cos the efficiency of using the space is damn bad in MP3... i tried the same with OGG, and there we go.... OGG is damn cool, and OGG even allows up to 500 kbits/s (STEREO), so therefore of course OGG is better than ATRAC (or MP3).... and OGG is completely free... but MP3 still stays the worst in quality even if its the most popular...

if you want to do a test with audio formats... i recommend you first to get a ORIGINAL AUDIO CD... now save your track in MONO (!!) as a WAV-file...

MONO ist the best for doing a benchmark ! With MONO you can also find failures in your HARDWARE, for example the balance if the left speaker is louder than the right one etc... ill NEVER RECOMMEND STEREO FOR AUDIO BENCHMARK ! by the way, i only use MONO with all the music i hear, so i can hear the difference very crlearly if its is MP3...

anyway...

the WAV file is now that master file for all the others...

open the WAV-file with nero-WAV-editor and normalize AND optimize it (optimizing == increase the average peaks to the tops, normalizing is only one step, but optimizing has better efficiency)...

WAV ==> 705.600 kbits/s MONO (you have this one as MASTER FORMAT now)

now after that, convert this track into different audio formats... for example,

MP3 ==> 160 kbits/s MONO

OGG ==> 160 kbits/s MONO

WMA ==> 160 kbits/s MONO

now use Winamp 2.91 and add all your track into one new playlist, so that you can JUMP VERY QUICKLY from one file to another during playback... to get the QUALITY DIFFERENCE also VISUALLY (if you are more deaf than blind...), use

"Nullsoft Tiny Fullscreen 2001 (v2.04) [vis_nsfs.dll]" and chande below to "Spectrum Analyzer + Oszilloscope"

Click on "Configure" and change the Oszilloscpe color to black (its not needed for the Audio-Benchmark), also look up the "Spectrum_Analyzer_Oszilloscope.GIF" hich i have attached here. You will see a lot of colors etc.... and you will see the difference between WAV and MP3 very clearly... look at the RED PEAKS !

==> In MP3 the red peaks dont appear anymore as compared to the WAV-file, whereas OGG is still the best... this means that the amplitude is killed in MP3... why did this happen ? read the next...

==> the amplitude is killed a little in MP3 because you see a second difference in MP3 and WAV... between all frequencies, there is SPACE in MP3 !! In WAV THERE IS NO SPACE ! what does that mean ? let me tell you why this is... WAV use all frequencies with full amplitude, but MP3 kills every neighboured frequency... [its comparable with INTERLACED or PROGRESSIVE SCAN used in VIDEO technlogy... (PROGRESSIVE SCAN IS PERFECT, whereas in interlace mode every 2nd line is killed...)] ...and thats why also the amplitude is not reached perfectly (as in WAV) anymore...

well, now ive shown you a method of how it goes... but if you still dont know which song is good for a benchmark... then let me give you a hint:

CENTORY - EYE IN THE SKY

M C SAR REAL MC COY - RUN AWAY

and to all who try to tell me that its impossible to tell which one is ATRAC or WAV, let me tell you: its true ! and thats why i love the OLD MINIDISC SYSTEM ! but i wont love the new HI-MD system, the bitrate is decreased down to 128 kbits/s for each channel...

in a time like ours, we gain more and more SPACE for saving data (for example today you have 1 GB SD-CARD, soon there will be 2 GB SD-CARD... or today you have 4480 MB on a DVD+-R(W), tomorrow it will be replaced by BLU RAY RECORABLE) therefore its senseless using lossy audio compression technologies, especially that old lossy thing called MP3...

my recommendation to you is to use only WAV ! you cant do anything wrong if you use WAV! WAV was perfect yesterday, WAV is perfect now, and WAV will be perfect tomorrow and in the later future too!

once i bought an MP3 cd-player prtable... i converted my fav songs into MP3... the next day, when i listen the songs in the train during travel to school, oh damn, i thought "what did i do wrong? this soungs like a different song! i have wrong equalizer setting ???" i tried everything, but couldnt help... later i took the same song and recorded as AUDIO CD... and when i listened to it in the same CD-Portable.... ITS PERFECT !

LOVE THE PERFECTION ! WE LIVE IN A DIGITAL AGE ! NEVER USE MP3 ! MP3 IS BULLSHIT !

Edited May 18, 2005 by DJ_THE_CROW

[The Low Volta]

disclaimer: I actually do believe that I'm going slightly off topic here, so feel free to chuck this post and the post referred to in a relevant thread, mods

if you want to do a test with audio formats... i recommend you first to get a ORIGINAL AUDIO CD... now save your track in MONO (!!) as a WAV-file... the WAV file is now that master file for all the others... open the WAV-file with nero-WAV-editor and normalize AND optimize it (optimizing == increase the average peaks to the tops, normalizing is only one step, but optimizing has better efficiency), now after that, convert this track into different audio formats... for example,

MP3 ==> 160 kbits/s MONO

OGG ==> 160 kbits/s MONO

WMA ==> 160 kbits/s MONO

WAV ==> 705.600 kbits/s (you have this one as MASTER FORMAT)

now use Winamp 2.91 and add all your track into one new playlist, so that you can JUMP VERY QUICKLY from one file to another during playback... to get the QUALITY DIFFERENCE also VISUALLY (if you more deaf than blind...), use

←

even though I have nothing against Atrac(3+) and definitely nothing pro MP3, I have a few questions with your audio test technique...but DJ The Crow, I'm not trying to flame you, just tired of all these differing audio-test methods that ppl use and then present as 'objective' views/results:

first of all...isn't this all about the listening experience of our preferred music? I mean...I actually couldn't care less about the scientific view, as long as it sounds right, I can live with it... so the actual test should be held with a demanding but real (and unmodified!) piece of music you would like to listen to (or the wellknown 'castagnets'-thingy that is so hated by anyone who has tried audio tests ) ... perhaps ripping in Mono and optimizing a CD-track might bring out the differences more (which you are trying to do here I guess) but unless you actually do this with all the music you listen to, I personally couldn't really care less how the resulting track sounds...

the second question I pose...if you are really serious about testing audio files (which you are, if you go through the trouble of mono'ing and optimizing tracks, I guess) why not use the very objective and universally agreed ABX-method (a link to a little but very usefull ABX-test program is presented in the first post in this thread ) If you can reproduce significant results without any biass and without any visual aid (which only adds to the biass in a normal/non-blind listening test) then you could convince someone...

hope you try the ABX-method with a normal (but taxing, couple of crisp highs, some deep lows and so on,...) and unmodified(!) piece of music...

greetings Volta

PS: and just to repeat...all this ranting doesn't mean I do or don't agree with your results (that is besides the point, as I almost exclusively use Hi-SP ), I only question the method

Edited May 18, 2005 by The Low Volta

[Night Rider]

Is the playback anything approaching gapless? Or does the player pause for a few seconds between MP3 tracks?

←

Yes, on my rh10 the playback is gapless with mp3. Even in shuffle mode.

I can't tell any difference between mp3 and ATRAC either.

[eggowong]

Thanks for your info! Would you like to do another test? One user pointed out that the playback on the unit sounded better if the files were converted from MP3 to ATRAC before transferring. In other words, the ATRAC decoder maybe sounds better than the MP3 decoder.

Can you test if you hear the same effect?

←

I don't notice any difference either during MP3 playback.

Funny you should mention this test, because I do have a normal 80 minute MD that I had a bunch of dance/trance songs transcoded from the original MP3 format (192Kbps/LAME encoder version 1.11 from an app called MP3 Workshop) to ATRAC (132Kbps if i remember correctly/OpenMG Jukebox version 2.2 that came with my MZ-N1 NetMD recorder) and the playback indeed does sound better on my new RH10 than on the older N1. I remember trying various treble/bass settings on that N1 to try and and negate the "digitizing" I constantly heard (especially during the highs), though I never really got rid of it. I haven't tried the custom settings for the EQ on the RH10 (I like the "Unique" setting) but I'll try and test it out sometime soon.

Hope this helps...?

[bug80]

DJ_the_crow, the general quality difference is not on question here, but differences between the hardware decoders in the 2nd generation units.

By the way, I don't agree with you. MP3's encoded with LAME sound definitely better to my ears than the ATRAC encoded files at the same bitrate. And I'm sure I'm not deaf. I've done a lot of blind testing to prove my statements. Just like this test, where Atrac3 was the loser of 6 formats, even WMA.

Finally, looking at the spectrum is not a measure for perceived audio quality. In fact, an audio file can be of very low quality in terms of mathematical quantities, but still be transparent, i.e. people won't hear the difference with the original.

[bug80]

I don't notice any difference either during MP3 playback. 

Funny you should mention this test, because I do have a normal 80 minute MD that I had a bunch of dance/trance songs transcoded from the original MP3 format (192Kbps/LAME encoder version 1.11 from an app called MP3 Workshop) to ATRAC (132Kbps if i remember correctly/OpenMG Jukebox version 2.2 that came with my MZ-N1 NetMD recorder) and the playback indeed does sound better on my new RH10 than on the older N1.  I remember trying various treble/bass settings on that N1 to try and and negate the "digitizing" I constantly heard (especially during the highs), though I never really got rid of it.  I haven't tried the custom settings for the EQ on the RH10 (I like the "Unique" setting) but I'll try and test it out sometime soon.

Hope this helps...?

←

Yes, thanks. The amplifier in your RH10 is most probably of higher quality than the one in your N1 (although I'm not sure).

[The Low Volta]

first of all, sorry 'cause this is really getting off topic... ppl still interested in the MP3 behaiviour of the 2nd gen Hi-MD would better read this thread, as it really focusses on the MP3 playback (and the problems/limitations thereof) and hasn't been turned into some MP3 is always rubbish rant

for all ppl still reading on: sorry for my late reply, but I hadn't seen that DJ_THE_CROW edited his post...(hey, he removed the 'white noise' test-object from his test setup, now my previous reply looks kinda funny, not?) The rest of my post will be my reply, directed at DJ_THE_CROW... I do not intend to flame, but I have serious problems with his methods AND the way he presents them...

MONO ist the best for doing a benchmark ! With MONO you can also find failures in your HARDWARE, for example the balance if the left speaker is louder than the right one etc... ill NEVER RECOMMEND STEREO FOR AUDIO BENCHMARK ! by the way, i only use MONO with all the music i hear

so you're actually saying stereo is crap? dude that's harsh... as I said before, I don't care about music being technically perfect reproduced, but I would like to get the best listening experience. If you would take away some stereo effects/images from a lot of CD's (Tool, The Mars Volta, Explosions in the Sky, Mogwai, Godspeed You Black Emperor!,...) I really think that you'd be missing out on a lot stuff! Music isn't all about frequencies and waves, it's about moods, soundpictures, soundscapes, impressions, feelings, etc.... too

but if you still dont know which song is good for a benchmark... then let me give you a hint:

CENTORY - EYE IN THE SKY

M C SAR REAL MC COY - RUN AWAY

I just hope you don't just choose your music 'cause it shows all frequencies sorry, this remark really is redundant

and to all who try to tell me that its impossible to tell which one is ATRAC or WAV, let me tell you: its true !

I didn't say it was possible or impossible, I didn't even question it...I just don't believe in your method. There still is no pure blind/unbiassed listening part (like in ABX-tests) at all. So maybe one shows better/worse than the other on an oscilator...but I happen to listen with my ears, not with my eyes...so I'm actually only interested in listening tests. To make sure such a test is honest, it needs to be blind...and I don't believe in

JUMP(ing) VERY QUICKLY from one file to another during playback

as a reliable blind-test method. Try a real, honest ABX test with some good honest encoded test-tracks, and honestly present your results, that would already be more convincing...

and thats why i love the OLD MINIDISC SYSTEM ! but i wont love the new HI-MD system, the bitrate is decreased down to 128 kbits/s for each channel...

so you've devided Hi-SP (256bps) by two to get the bitrate for each channel...so that would mean real-SP is 146bps/channel, as mono uses half the space (the amount of info doesn't double, it's still 146bps/channel, only twice the same info, while in stereo you'd get 146bps/channel but the two channels differ)...

- first of all: 128><146 isn't that big a difference I would say

- secondly: 1st gen Hi-MD can record in real SP too

- thirdly: Hi-MD can record in the so loved PCM format

so I would say, read some specifications before you throw away a complete technology

in a time like ours, we gain more and more SPACE for saving data ...therefore its senseless using lossy audio compression technologies, especially that old (note from Volta: just as old as atrac I believe) lossy thing called MP3...

my recommendation to you is to use only WAV ! you cant do anything wrong if you use WAV! WAV was perfect yesterday, WAV is perfect now, and WAV will be perfect tomorrow and in the later future too!

well, until there really are some Hi-MD-discs with enough storage room, or any big-HD-recorders that really record well (playing music back is only half of the picture when dealing with MD users!) I guess we will have to use the next best thing (in my opinion Hi-SP)...BTW: FLAC is even better than wav, all (yes really ALL) the info/data/bit&bytes) but at 50% of the space needed...too bad it's not supported by Hi-MD

... i have wrong equalizer setting ???...LOVE THE PERFECTION ! WE LIVE IN A DIGITAL AGE ! NEVER USE MP3 ! MP3 IS BULLSHIT !

←

well, this got me thinking: as you would like perfect reproduction of all frequencies, how can you use an equalizer? that really is just mutilating the 'music as it was intended', isn't it? PERFECTION??? while in mono? if music is recorded in stereo, to get even close to perfection wouldn't that imply keeping stereo? I really don't get you I guess

We do live in a digital age, we also live in a free age! So who are you to go around shouting "NEVER USE MP3!" and "MP3 IS BULSH!T" (yes, you are free to do so, but then again, the mods are free to remove such things)... please keep the conversations at a less adolescent and simplistic level and formulate your opinions as opinions as that is just what they are... the opinions of one person who can hope to find likeminded ppl and even convince some others through the use of real, sturdy arguments...and definitely not with shouting...

greetings, Volta

[Flexis]

Volta zelfverklaarde Mod ofwat ...pro nag hehe

Edited June 9, 2005 by Flexis

[bug80]

Volta zelfverklaarde Administrator ofwat

←

'T lijkt erop hè.

I totally agree with Volta's comments, btw.

[The Low Volta]

'T lijkt erop hè.

please keep these forums english guys just kidding

I totally agree with Volta's comments, btw.

←

thanks, BTW I'm already trying to keep my rants/nags more and more to myself...

greetings, Volta

[Guest NRen2k5]

Well, MP3 is generally worse than ATRAC...

dont even try to compare MP3 with ATRAC....

and if youre gonna tell me that MP3 is quite good as ATRAC and you hear no difference.... then i am so damn sure you are deaf...

the native ATRAC used 292 kbits/s (STEREO), it goes back that using a lower bitrate would cause an bad effect in the quality and it can be heard... and thats why sony did not go down anyfurther with the bitrate, and their decision was right and they won many many trophies in HI-FI magazines, especially for the MDS-JE 500...

4 or 5 few years later MP3 was published in the internet and people started to use MP3 with napster... people just wanted all songs and music... there was no intension to check the quality at all... this is why MP3 is so popular even right now.... but it never means that MP3 is the same or even better than ATRAC...

there are restrictions in MP3, one can only use up to 320 kbits/s (STEREO), i did try that all, but the quality was still lost... using the new space gained if increased bitrate up to 320, MP3 doesnt sound better really cos the efficiency of using the space is damn bad in MP3... i tried the same with OGG, and there we go.... OGG is damn cool, and OGG even allows up to 500 kbits/s (STEREO), so therefore of course OGG is better than ATRAC (or MP3).... and OGG is completely free... but MP3 still stays the worst in quality even if its the most popular...

if you want to do a test with audio formats... i recommend you first to get a ORIGINAL AUDIO CD... now save your track in MONO (!!) as a WAV-file...

MONO ist the best for doing a benchmark ! With MONO you can also find failures in your HARDWARE, for example the balance if the left speaker is louder than the right one etc... ill NEVER RECOMMEND STEREO FOR AUDIO BENCHMARK ! by the way, i only use MONO with all the music i hear, so i can hear the difference very crlearly if its is MP3...

anyway...

the WAV file is now that master file for all the others...

open the WAV-file with nero-WAV-editor and normalize AND optimize it (optimizing == increase the average peaks to the tops, normalizing is only one step, but optimizing has better efficiency)...

WAV ==> 705.600 kbits/s MONO (you have this one as MASTER FORMAT now)

now after that, convert this track into different audio formats... for example,

MP3 ==> 160 kbits/s MONO

OGG ==> 160 kbits/s MONO

WMA ==> 160 kbits/s MONO

now use Winamp 2.91 and add all your track into one new playlist, so that you can JUMP VERY QUICKLY from one file to another during playback... to get the QUALITY DIFFERENCE also VISUALLY (if you are more deaf than blind...), use

"Nullsoft Tiny Fullscreen 2001 (v2.04) [vis_nsfs.dll]" and chande below to "Spectrum Analyzer + Oszilloscope"

Click on "Configure" and change the Oszilloscpe color to black (its not needed for the Audio-Benchmark), also look up the "Spectrum_Analyzer_Oszilloscope.GIF" hich i have attached here. You will see a lot of colors etc.... and you will see the difference between WAV and MP3 very clearly... look at the RED PEAKS !

==> In MP3 the red peaks dont appear anymore as compared to the WAV-file, whereas OGG is still the best... this means that the amplitude is killed in MP3... why did this happen ? read the next...

==> the amplitude is killed a little in MP3 because you see a second difference in MP3 and WAV... between all frequencies, there is SPACE in MP3 !! In WAV THERE IS NO SPACE ! what does that mean ? let me tell you why this is... WAV use all frequencies with full amplitude, but MP3 kills every neighboured frequency... [its comparable with INTERLACED or PROGRESSIVE SCAN used in VIDEO technlogy... (PROGRESSIVE SCAN IS PERFECT, whereas in interlace mode every 2nd line is killed...)] ...and thats why also the amplitude is not reached perfectly (as in WAV) anymore...

well, now ive shown you a method of how it goes... but if you still dont know which song is good for a benchmark... then let me give you a hint:

CENTORY - EYE IN THE SKY

M C SAR REAL MC COY - RUN AWAY

and to all who try to tell me that its impossible to tell which one is ATRAC or WAV, let me tell you: its true ! and thats why i love the OLD MINIDISC SYSTEM ! but i wont love the new HI-MD system, the bitrate is decreased down to 128 kbits/s for each channel...

in a time like ours, we gain more and more SPACE for saving data (for example today you have 1 GB SD-CARD, soon there will be 2 GB SD-CARD... or today you have 4480 MB on a DVD+-R(W), tomorrow it will be replaced by BLU RAY RECORABLE) therefore its senseless using lossy audio compression technologies, especially that old lossy thing called MP3...

my recommendation to you is to use only WAV ! you cant do anything wrong if you use WAV! WAV was perfect yesterday, WAV is perfect now, and WAV will be perfect tomorrow and in the later future too!

once i bought an MP3 cd-player prtable... i converted my fav songs into MP3... the next day, when i listen the songs in the train during travel to school, oh damn, i thought "what did i do wrong? this soungs like a different song! i have wrong equalizer setting ???" i tried everything, but couldnt help... later i took the same song and recorded as AUDIO CD... and when i listened to it in the same CD-Portable.... ITS PERFECT !

LOVE THE PERFECTION ! WE LIVE IN A DIGITAL AGE ! NEVER USE MP3 ! MP3 IS BULLSHIT !

←

Your test is invalid:

Your criteria are mostly invalid and you neglected to specify what software you used to create the MP3's. What did you use, anyway? I'm very interested in this.

Furthermore, what gives you the impression that Hi-SP is only 128kbps per channel?

Why is this worse than old SP, considering there are new tricks involved in the compression, so it's more efficient?

Finally, why use WAV only? It's not quite perfect. Better to use a lossless format like FLAC so that you can save a bit of hard drive space AND tag your files.

Edited June 10, 2005 by NRen2k5

[greenmachine]

Didn't have such a good laugh for a long time, thanks DJ.

[Damage]

One quick reply about testing in MONO mode: it does have its advantage that the output to both left and right channel is equal. In that case, you can quickly tell if there is an imbalance in your headphone for example. So you really shouldn't dismiss it as useless outright.

Of course, with all the channel specific sound output files (for testing surround systems), one can easily argue that this is useless.

[Doerthe]

15-20 hours sounds good to me. The manual of the RH10 states the following playing times for the NH-14WM battery:

←

What????? 15-20 hours with ONE NH-14WM???

I can't believe it................

[dex Otaku]

I'm glad I didn't read this thread before. I'm too tired right now to rip DJ_THE_CROW's methods and opinions into shreds.

My god, where do people get this crap from?

[DJ_THE_CROW]

One quick reply about testing in MONO mode:  it does have its advantage that the output to both left and right channel is equal.  In that case, you can quickly tell if there is an imbalance in your headphone for example (DJ_THE_CROW: the imbalance can also caused by the HARDWARE UNIT, not only from the headphones) .  So you really shouldn't dismiss it as useless outright.

←

thanx, you are the first smart one in here

you did not only read what i wrote... you also experience what i talk about...

thank you.

#=#=>> for all other people:

the more people will get INTO the music... the more they will experience...

well, if someones gonna tell me that FLAC is better than WAV.... sorry, i gotta laugh... lol...

as a computer scientist, let me tell you something...

==> nobody can listen OGG

==> nobody can listen MP3

==> nobody can listen ATRAC

==> nobody can listen FLAC

==> nobody can listen WMA

==> nobody can listen any other compressed audio formats, doesnt matter lossless or lossy...

==> everyone CAN AND DO ONLY listen WAV !

you dont believe me ? HAHAAAAAAAAAAAAA.... i am 100 % right !

there is no HARDWARE playing MP3 or ATRAC etc.... every HARDWARE does ONLY PLAY WAV, nothing else.... even if there is a HARDWARE DECODER in your prtable audio unit, it only converts to WAV on the fly...

ok...... thats for the first (huh..... sheeeew.... lol)...

so whats the difference between WAV and FLAC ??

==> WAV is better BECAUSE ==> there is NO CPU POWER NEEDED for encoding or decoding... heheeeee....

==> WAV is perfect for QUICK EDITING (NO CPU POWER USED for loading and playback)

==> using WAV can save a lot of production cost (if the industry did do that...), cos NO HARDWARE ENCODER or DECODER needed for any compressed audio format... that means ==> just READ or WRITE commands will be sent to the MEDIA... heheeee....

==> using WAV does not mean to lose space, its 100 % pure... the perfection...

==> using FLAC will cause your CPU to working... every time... and if you want to edit (normalizing or optimizing), it will cause your CPU more work...

ummmmmmmm.... i tell you..... i can let my WAV play on a CPU with 75 MHZ or even lower... can you do the same with MP3, ATRAC, FLAC ??? ==> NO !

i will never have any problem playing WAV.... will work with every CPU...

lol.... dont try to tell me MP3 is better than WAV... i will lol...

[DJ_THE_CROW]

Your test is invalid:

Your criteria are mostly invalid and you neglected to specify what software you used to create the MP3's. What did you use, anyway? I'm very interested in this.

==> doesnt matter which encoder to use... MP3 is crap... i can understand why you dont want to accept this, cos all your music collecion is maybe in MP3 and thats why you dont want to accept what i said... but one day you will know... i am sure of that... i just hope its not too late when you recognize what i said just now...

Furthermore, what gives you the impression that Hi-SP is only 128kbps per channel?

==> STEREO has 256 kbits/s, that means ==> each channel has only 128 kbits/s left...

the OLD MiniDisc (MDS-JE 500) has STEREO 292 kbits/s ==> that means 146 kbits/s for each channel...

Why is this worse than old SP, considering there are new tricks involved in the compression, so it's more efficient?

==> decreasing the bitrate will not decrease quality by linear... it will decrease quality like x = x² (if you know what i am talking about, its mathmatical... )

Finally, why use WAV only? It's not quite perfect. Better to use a lossless format like FLAC so that you can save a bit of hard drive space AND tag your files.

==> tagging files ?? you can add a UNIQUE NUMBER at the beginning of your filename, thats all...

you ask about disk space ?? LOL... we already have more than enough diskspace nowadays... and soon there will be more, wait for the BLU RAY if you want even more....

←

[DJ_THE_CROW]

===> first of all, you think you are the COOL MAN here, isnt it ?? lol... i will ask you a question at the end of this reply...cos you think you are so COOL... heheeeee...

I do not intend to flame, but I have serious problems with his methods AND the way he presents them...

===> well if you have some trouble... find a doctor... he ll make it double... lol...

so you're actually saying stereo is crap? dude that's harsh...

===> its CRAP ?!?!?... its just wasting of space, and contains a lot of REDUNDANCY... this is the only reason why MP3 can work with 128 kbits/s... using the MONO-MP3-MODE will lead to 64 kbits/s... do the test, its crap...

Something else about STEREO... tell you.. you have 2 ears... thats why you always listen STEREO, right ?? but what about the SOUND (everything you hear in your environment, in school, outside etc... ) COMING INTO YOUR EARS, is it STEREO or is it MONO ?? its MONO... you think its STEREO ?? its your dream then...

as I said before, I don't care about music being technically perfect reproduced, but I would like to get the best listening experience. If you would take away some stereo effects/images from a lot of CD's (Tool, The Mars Volta, Explosions in the Sky, Mogwai, Godspeed You Black Emperor!,...) I really think that you'd be missing out on a lot stuff! Music isn't all about frequencies and waves, it's about moods, soundpictures, soundscapes, impressions, feelings, etc.... too

==> i have been using STEREO for a long time... so many differences i heard... even difference on MASTER AUDIO CDs (original CDs), the soundstudios even make failures when producing audio (for example, one channel is generaly louder than the other [try normalizing, using stereo will improve to the pic of only one channel] , the peak is too low... the hardware style is different... etc...)... my aim was to have UNIQUE audio... and after converting into MONO, it was done perfectly...

I just hope you don't just choose your music 'cause it shows all frequencies sorry, this remark really is redundant

==> i have all kinds of music, from techno to heavy, dance, trance, electric, jungle, rave, drumn bass, elvis, really everything etc... l listen music i like, and when i get it, i want it to be AS IT WAS....

I didn't say it was possible or impossible, I didn't even question it...I just don't believe in your method. There still is no pure blind/unbiassed listening part (like in ABX-tests) at all. So maybe one shows better/worse than the other on an oscilator...but I happen to listen with my ears, not with my eyes...so I'm actually only interested in listening tests. To make sure such a test is honest, it needs to be blind...and I don't believe in

as a reliable blind-test method. Try a real, honest ABX test with some good honest encoded test-tracks, and honestly present your results, that would already be more convincing...

==> i want perfection at any time, no need of tests anymore.... the only perfection is WAV... please stop telling me to do any kind of white/black/blind or any other tests... its useless to me, cos i will always have PERFECTION using the WAV format... so i dont need any tests anymore... NO NEED, really... using WAV i am at the SECURE SIDE ( 100 % natural audio power ) !

so you've devided Hi-SP (256bps) by two to get the bitrate for each channel...so that would mean real-SP is 146bps/channel, as mono uses half the space (the amount of info doesn't double, it's still 146bps/channel, only twice the same info, while in stereo you'd get 146bps/channel but the two channels differ)...

- first of all: 128><146 isn't that big a difference I would say

==> decreasing the bitrate will not decrease quality by linear... it will decrease quality like x = -1(x²) (if you know what i am talking about, its mathmatical... )

- secondly: 1st gen Hi-MD can record in real SP too

==> does only support MONO playback which is recorded by OLD decks, but does not allow to record in MONO, ask SONY... those id*o*s.......

- thirdly: Hi-MD can record in the so loved PCM format

so I would say, read some specifications before you throw away a complete technology

well, until there really are some Hi-MD-discs with enough storage room, or any big-HD-recorders that really record well (playing music back is only half of the picture when dealing with MD users!) I guess we will have to use the next best thing (in my opinion Hi-SP)...BTW: FLAC is even better than wav, all (yes really ALL) the info/data/bit&bytes) but at 50% of the space needed...too bad it's not supported by Hi-MD

==>

WAV ==> 100 % disk space needed

any lossless compression ==> 66 % disk space used

lossy compression (OGG with Q-level 10) ==> 33 % disk space used

so dont tell me you can save 50 % using FLAC, its because you use STEREO, and STEREO has a high REDUNDANCY, no wonder you can save up to 50 %... try MONO, you will see it will compress around 66 %... MONO HAS NO REDUNDANCY, therefore every compression method will face a real match... lol.....

if you use lossy compression, please only use OGG at Q-Level 10, its the one and only lossy perfection ive heard and can recommend... never use MP3...

well, this got me thinking: as you would like perfect reproduction of all frequencies, how can you use an equalizer? that really is just mutilating the 'music as it was intended', isn't it? PERFECTION???

==> only if you use headphone (little earphones), you can be into the music... not with speakers at home, and also not with cheap pc speakers... so using little earphones... and combining them with equalizer, i can hear DETAIL of any music... i did the same with MP3.... i got to tell you that even my PANASONIC RQ-P266 (cassette player) sounds better than this MP3 crap... in MP3 all details were killes, it seemed that i was listening a different song, maxi version maybe... but surely in the worst of quality i had ever heard.....

while in mono? if music is recorded in stereo, to get even close to perfection wouldn't that imply keeping stereo?

==> NO ! MONO IS PERFECTION because you hear the SAME on both of your ears, if you use STEREO, you can never detect any technical failures, cos its virtaully playing... try MONO... you will see.... not only try MONO once, try it many many times... you will even recognize that MONO HAS MORE POWER inside of it... ... play a techno song for example, and increase the volume, you ll feel the difference... every bit of the sound is full of POWER... and not the forget: the high esprit amplifiers use DOUBLE-MONO-TECHNIQUE.... and those are made for real HI-FI people... did you know that ? i am sure you did not know and never heard that before....

I really don't get you I guess We do live in a digital age, we also live in a free age! So who are you to go around shouting "NEVER USE MP3!" and "MP3 IS BULSH!T" (yes, you are free to do so, but then again, the mods are free to remove such things)... please keep the conversations at a less adolescent and simplistic level and formulate your opinions as opinions as that is just what they are... the opinions of one person who can hope to find likeminded ppl and even convince some others through the use of real, sturdy arguments...and definitely not with shouting...

==> MP3 is CRAP... i will always try to tell the people whats the BEST... and MP3 IS NOT THE BEST, MP3 is the rest....

greetings, Volta

←

[bug80]

there is no HARDWARE playing MP3 or ATRAC etc.... every HARDWARE does ONLY PLAY WAV, nothing else.... even if there is a HARDWARE DECODER in your prtable audio unit, it only converts to WAV on the fly...

I'm sorry, I have to correct you here. Most sound devices play linear PCM (WAV is only a container for PCM).

==> WAV is better BECAUSE ==> there is NO CPU POWER NEEDED for encoding or decoding... heheeeee....

That is only if the PCM data is in exactly the same format as your sound device expects. If your soundcard drivers are running at 44.1 kHz / 16 bit and your PCM data is in 48 kHz / 24 bit, decoding is still necessary.

==> WAV is perfect for QUICK EDITING (NO CPU POWER USED for loading and playback)

Have to correct you again. Most PCM data is stored as signed integers, when you want to do editing with it, your software has to decode it to floating point (32 bits most of the times). That takes extra CPU power.

Something else about STEREO... tell you.. you have 2 ears... thats why you always listen STEREO, right ?? but what about the SOUND (everything you hear in your environment, in school, outside etc... ) COMING INTO YOUR EARS, is it STEREO or is it MONO ?? its MONO... you think its STEREO ?? its your dream then...

That is so wrong... Let's say a bird is whisteling at 30 degrees from you. Do you know why you can make a good estimation of where the sound is coming from? Right, because your ears both get different information. Mono aural means, that both ears get exactly the same information (that's the technique you're advertising here). To really confuse things, a bird can be considered as a monopole, i.e. sound coming from one point. Now the mathematics part: a monopole source emits plane waves in all directions! Talking about multichannel sound!! When you sum all the waves up, you get a so-called spherical wave.

When you want to reproduce that sound as good as possible, you need to synthesize such a wave as good as possible. In mono aural situations it is impossible, with a stereo setup it is slightly better. If you want to do it really good, you need a lot of speakers (than you can use a technique called Wave Field Synthesis).

DJ, I really hope you understand what I'm saying. You say you're a computer scientist, so you probably know something about mathematics and maybe even physics.

[dex Otaku]

I hate to perpetuate the totally off-topic thing here, but this absolute dolt is beginning to irk me.

so you're actually saying stereo is crap? dude that's harsh...

===> its CRAP ?!?!?... its just wasting of space, and contains a lot of REDUNDANCY... this is the only reason why MP3 can work with 128 kbits/s... using the MONO-MP3-MODE will lead to 64 kbits/s... do the test, its crap...

You really don't have a clue, do you?

MP3 works in stereo, at any bitrate, much as any other lossy, or in fact, lossless coding method does: it encodes the information in two channels. The efficiency of various encoding methods varies, yes.

Most stereo encoding loans bandwidth that isn't as effectively used by one channel to the other when it needs it, on a priority basis, based on which channel is more complex. ATRAC SP works this way. Stereo encoding [as opposed to joint stereo or dual mono] with virtually every lossy format works this way. This has its pros and cons, the main con being phase distortion. This is where joint stereo [m/s] coding comes in.

Joint stereo takes the sum and difference of the left and right channels and encodes them instead, using basically the same method. The fact that there's a sum channel [basically, all the monaural content] means you don't get the same kind of phase distortion, differences in levels between channels, &c. HiSP uses joint [m/s] stereo encoding, as do most current MP3 encoders with bitrates above 96kbps. [Note: technically, joint stereo as used with MP3 can dynamically switch between "stereo" and m/s encoding, and when using VBR modes, can even fall back to intensity-stereo coding for passages of extremely low complexity, like the fadeout at the end of a song].

Part of lossy encoding is getting rid of redundancy. Another part of most formats is dynamic bandwidth allocation, as I mentioned above.

And yes, 64kbps mono MP3 is crap; it's a lossy encodnig format whose basis is in algorithms developed around 1990!

Something else about STEREO... tell you.. you have 2 ears... thats why you always listen STEREO, right ?? but what about the SOUND (everything you hear in your environment, in school, outside etc... ) COMING INTO YOUR EARS, is it STEREO or is it MONO ?? its MONO... you think its STEREO ?? its your dream then...

What you hear is neither mono nor stereo. Your hearing itself is binaural [two-eared]; this gives your brain the needed information to process location and distance to a sound source.

Mono and stereo in audio terms are recording, storage, and playback formats, which have nothing inherent to do with hearing whatsoever. They are [regardless of recording medium] an analogue of the original, that is, a representation of it.

Sound itself comes from a variety of source types, including point sources [similar in essence to mono, though by no means the same], diffuse sources, reflections, reverberations, echoes, and all. A single point source could for all intents and purposes by considered mono, but what we -hear- of it is by no means mono, because we have two ears, and each one gets a different signal. That is, unless you happen to be standing in a perfect anechoic chamber, in which case we're back to the point source. [bug80s explanation here is better than mine. Read up on wave propagation if you really want to learn about it.]

As far as your recordings are concerned, most would have been mastered in stereo [which is actually a one-dimensional medium]. The fact that you're downmixing to mono means that you're keeping only the sum of the signals [the redundant parts, as you say], and throwing away a great deal of the difference [the stereo and phased parts]. Chances are, what you're listening to is actually lacking a great deal of what was in the original recording, from phase-cancellation alone.

==> i have been using STEREO for a long time... so many differences i heard... even difference on MASTER AUDIO CDs (original CDs), the soundstudios even make failures when producing audio (for example, one channel is generaly louder than the other [try normalizing, using stereo will improve to the pic of only one channel] , the peak is too low... the hardware style is different... etc...)... my aim was to have UNIQUE audio... and after converting into MONO, it was done perfectly...

Sorry, but you're totally wrong on this. If it was mastered in stereo, and you've downmixed it, you've thrown away anywhere from 10-50% of the information, irretrievably.

As for level differences between channels, there are many reasons for it - usually it would come from using pan controls on a mixing board. Other reasons include using channel-following compression [the common method of compressing stereo signals], where the loudness of one channel determines the compression applied to both. [The only truly accurate way to compress or for that matter process most stereo signals is to use m/s processing, by the way].

Otherwise it could just be as you suggest - shoddy equipment or shoddy handling of equipment.

==> i have all kinds of music, from techno to heavy, dance, trance, electric, jungle, rave, drumn bass, elvis, really everything etc... l listen music i like, and when i get it, i want it to be AS IT WAS....

If you're altering the mix from how it was sent out from the engineering and/or mastering studios you aren't listening to it as it was. Converting to mono falls into this category.

==> i want perfection at any time, no need of tests anymore.... the only perfection is WAV... please stop telling me to do any kind of white/black/blind or any other tests... its useless to me, cos i will always have PERFECTION using the WAV format... so i dont need any tests anymore... NO NEED, really... using WAV i am at the SECURE SIDE ( 100 % natural audio power ) !

Need I point out that WAV is a container format, not an encoding format? That WAV files can contain virtually any audio encoding you like, whether it be linear or nonlinear PCM, PWM, MP3, OGG, ADPCM, or a hundred other encoding formats?

WAV is by no means perfect nor secure. It's just a way of storing information, and telling the system using the information -how- it's stored, i.e. what the encoding is.

And for the person who put the bit in about FLAC vs. WAV and tagging: you can tag WAV files. There are standards for it that have been around since the container format came about. You can even, if you like, use ID3 type tags on WAV files; they end up as fact chunks that get thrown away by most software.

==> decreasing the bitrate will not decrease quality by linear... it will decrease quality like x = -1(x²) (if you know what i am talking about, its mathmatical... )

Not that I think that HiSP is better than SP, but you're completely full of it here.

Any given encoding algorithm has its own rate of efficency. It's already well-known in the audio world that newer codecs can encode far more accurately and efficiently, with less audible artifacting, than older codecs that use higher bitrates.

Bitrate when encoded does not scale equally from codec to codec. They are, after all, perceptual encoding systems, and as our understanding of perception increases, accuracy and efficiency also increase.

==> does only support MONO playback which is recorded by OLD decks, but does not allow to record in MONO, ask SONY... those id*o*s.......

While mono recording is used extensively by the broadcast industry, it's rarely been used by consumers. The advantages of having twice the disc length are pretty nonexistent, if you ask me, when you take into account the fact that you're missing 10-50% of the audible content because you downmixed it.

Of course, if your recording was originally in mono, it's another story:

HiSP among others that use [m/s] joint-stereo encoding, when given a monaural signal, basically give the single signal the entire available encoding bandwidth. If you insist on downmixing your music, or if you're recording live from a monaural source like a single microphone - what you're losing in playback time, you're gaining in encoding quality.

==> NO ! MONO IS PERFECTION because you hear the SAME on both of your ears, if you use STEREO, you can never detect any technical failures, cos its virtaully playing... try MONO... you will see.... not only try MONO once, try it many many times... you will even recognize that MONO HAS MORE POWER inside of it... ... play a techno song for example, and increase the volume, you ll feel the difference... every bit of the sound is full of POWER... and not the forget: the high esprit amplifiers use DOUBLE-MONO-TECHNIQUE.... and those are made for real HI-FI people... did you know that ? i am sure you did not know and never heard that before....

Mono is perfection! Mono is perfection! Blah blah blah.

Hearing the same in both your ears is not perfection. We have two ears for a reason: to perceive the difference between them.

Mono also does not mean more power. Downmixing from 2-channel stereo usually involves adding the left and right channels and then dividing the resulting signal by half, or, alternately, dividing each by half and then adding them.

The reason you feel "more power" from your downmixed recordings is likely only because you've convinced yourself of it. Look up: placebo effect.

Whatever medium a recording is mastered in will be the reference [as close to perfection as possible] for that recording. Altering that in any way [such as mixing 5.1 to stereo, or stereo to mono] means you're destroying part of the signal, and you're destroying the original intent of the authors and engineers.

Further: dual mono amplifiers means that each amplifier has its own dedicated circuitry for everything, including power supplies. It doesn't have anything at all to do with what signals go into the amps, or what signals come out of the amps.

Again - that has nothing whatsoever to do with whether the signal that is amplified is monaural, stereo, quadraphonic, 5.1, ambisonic, supersonic, subsonic, hydrophonic, or anything. It just means that EACH AMP IS ITS OWN BLOODY AMP.

[stereo amplifiers usually contain discrete amplification circuitry for each channel, but share a single power supply.]

so now you still think you are the COOL MAN here, isnt it ?? so here is my question to you... i wonder if you are able to answer me the question... cos you are so COOL...

Volta is pretty cool, actually. E knows eir stuff. You obviously don't know your ass from your goddamned elbow.

What is the difference between MONO and STEREO ?

Monaural:

In the simplest terms, is a one-channel recording and/or playback system.

In recording terms, is a recording and storage format that uses a single channel.

In playback terms, is the exact opposite of the recording or mixing/mastering chain, where the same one signal [monaural recording] is played through any configuration of loudspeakers; any system other than a single point source for playback will be inherently inaccurate. [Especially headphones.]

Wikipedia's version?

"Monaural sound reproduction is single channel. Typically there is only one microphone, one loudspeaker, or in the case of headphones or multiple loudspeakers they are fed from a common signal path, and in the case of multiple microphones, mixed into a single signal path at some stage."

In lossy audio-encoding terms - mono refers to an encoding system where a single channel of audio is encoded into a given bandwidth, either variable or fixed.

Stereo:

In the simplest terms, is a recording and/or playback system that uses more than one channel. Stereo is commonly used to refer to two-channel systems, though it in fact refers to any number of channels greater than one.

In recording terms, is a recording and storage format that uses two or more channels, usually two representing left and right and giving a one-dimensional [one axis of change is represented] recording.

In playback terms, is the exact opposite of the recording chain [for acoustic stereo recordings], or the same as the mixing/mastering chain [for mixed recordings]. For two-channel systems, it is where two signals representing a one-dimensional recording are played through any configuration of loudspeakers that represent a configuration similar to that used when mastering the recording [usually left and right, set in front of and at between 30-45 degrees from straight ahead of the listener]. Any other configuration will be inherently inaccurate compared to the original.

Note that the vast majority of two-channel stereo recordings are not actually intended for headphone listening.

Excerpt from Wikipedia:

"Stereo or stereophony generally refers to dual-channel sound recording and sound reproduction – sound that contains data for more than one speaker simultaneously. Compact disc audio and some radio broadcasts are stereo. The purpose of stereo recording is to recreate a more natural listening experience where the spatial location of the source of a sound is, at least in part, reproduced.

Stereo comes from the Greek word for solid, and the term can be applied to any system using more than one channel, such as the multichannel audio 5.1- and 6.1-channel systems used on high-end film and television productions. However it is more commonly used to refer exclusively to two-channel systems."

In lossy audio-encoding terms - stereo usually refers to a system where multiple channels share the same given bandwidth, either variable or fixed. The bandwidth can be divided equally between channels [as with "dual mono" encoding], or shared by priority [determined by complexity] between channels [as with most stereo encoding and m/s joint-stereo encoding methods].

Binaural:

In recording terms, is a two-channel recording [technically also stereo] system using of microphones placed at the same distance apart and angles as an average human's middle ears, with similar occlusion and reflection characteristics caused by the average human's head, pinnae, and sometimes torso, imbedded in the recording by the presence of an actual or artificial head as part of the microphone itself. This differs from stereo in that phase angle, occlusion, and reflection are inherent parts of the recording that are necessary for actual binaural playback.

In playback terms, is the exact opposite of the recording chain, requiring the use of headphones. Playing true binaural recordings over stereo loudspeakers is inherently inaccurate, as the speakers are commonly at the wrong angle to the listener, and are equalised in a completely different manner from headphones.

From the Wikipedia entry:

"Binaural recording is a method of recording audio which uses a special microphone arrangement. The term "binaural" has often been confused as a synonym for the word "stereo", and this is partially due to a large amount of misuse in the mid-1950s by the recording industry, as a marketing buzzword. In truth, binaural recordings are the best way to reproduce stereo with headphones. Typical stereo recordings are mixed for loudspeaker arrangements, and do not factor in natural crossfeed or sonic shaping of the head and ear, since these things happen naturally as a person listens."

Lastly, as bug80 already alluded to one point of, decoding of PCM does take power in specific cases. Most consumer sound cards in Windows boxes use CPU power for everything from system EQ to the volume control to multiple-stream mixing, not to mention bit-depth requantization and resampling.

To take it a step further than that, most consumer A/D and D/A converters are not in fact PCM converters at all, but variations on PWM converters, meaning the PCM bitstream has to be converted by the hardware - just like ATRAC or MP3 or AC3 or DTS or FLAC - before being converted to analogue.

[The Low Volta]

I have been wondering really long if I should answer to this. Not because it would be so difficult for me as I'm so 'cool' but oh so dim but 'cause this really is to adolescent for words. Man, you even destroy your own arguments, so why should I bother. (you say you don't use stereo cause it's often unbalanced and not 'as-it-is' but you still use equalizers... they enhance only a couple of frequencies so that would really destroy the soundpicture as is, not?) I will try to keep my answer simple and at a decent level...

its CRAP ?!?!?... its just wasting of space, and contains a lot of REDUNDANCY...

but that redundancy was put in there by the ppl who made the music...if my favorite bands would make a mono record, I would respect their idea and listen to it in mono, not go about and try to make stereo from that mono track... sounds logical, not? then why would you want to do it in the opposite direction? ever listened to things like Arvo Pärt or Satie? They not only use stereo as an "instrument" (it really ads something to the music) but they also use silence as an instrument...according to your theory this should yield very small files, as when you "edit out all redundancies" by making it mono, why stop at that, silence is just silence, so why keep all of that in? If you leave just a little gap, so you know there was some silence there, no INFO actually is lost?

Something else about STEREO... tell you.. you have 2 ears... thats why you always listen STEREO, right ?? but what about the SOUND (everything you hear in your environment, in school, outside etc... ) COMING INTO YOUR EARS, is it STEREO or is it MONO ?? its MONO... you think its STEREO ?? its your dream then...

that would be true, if both your ears would be placed right on top of each other let's say in the middle of your forehead or something (perhaps they are, in which case, sorry )... But with normal ppl they are situated at both sides of a real physical separator: your head. becouse of that, even a pure 'mono' sound coming from somewhere will yield two different sounds IN your ears. This has to do with a lot of factors like the angle of the soundsource to the line of your ears; interaction between soundwaves and physical objects (like that head) and many more... and that would imly a free open space, once you start looking at room accoustics, the picture really gets complicated.

Even though it is this complicated, ppl can reproduce sounds in such a way that you (by listening trough headphones with only two speaker-elements, not stereo surround stuff) can get a clear directional picture of the sounds. This recording technique is called 'binaural recording'. You should listen to it sometimes, but don't 'mono' it first and then complain you couldn't hear it

i have been using STEREO for a long time... so many differences i heard... even difference on MASTER AUDIO CDs (original CDs), the soundstudios even make failures when producing audio (for example, one channel is generaly louder than the other [try normalizing, using stereo will improve to the pic of only one channel] , the peak is too low... the hardware style is different... etc...)... my aim was to have UNIQUE audio... and after converting into MONO, it was done perfectly...l listen music i like, and when i get it, i want it to be AS IT WAS....

so you change everything to make it sound as it was? boy that must be the most haughty remark I've heard in a long time

i want perfection at any time, no need of tests anymore.... the only perfection is WAV... please stop telling me to do any kind of white/black/blind or any other tests... its useless to me, cos i will always have PERFECTION using the WAV format... so i dont need any tests anymore... NO NEED, really... using WAV i am at the SECURE SIDE ( 100 % natural audio power ) !

sorry, but now I've got to laugh... I never said you should do tests in the first place. You just popped up in this thread with the 'one and only, the ultimate test that would prove once and for all that MP3 sucked'... well, for all I care you should never do a test again, but don't post about them either. If you post about them, I have the right to question your method and to suggest other (in my view better) methods...that is what a free forum is all about.

For the "wav 100% natural audio power"-part I want to point out again that as bug80 also explained... we hear nature in stereo, even if it sings in mono...so any natural sound would be in stereo... besides, wav (or PCM) can sound like crap too if the recording, the source material is crap, not even going mono will change much ...PCM is only bits and bytes: say digital photography... of course a low res pic can't be as sharp as some very high res one, but with the high res one you could also take rubbish pics if you don't get the lighting right.

decreasing the bitrate will not decrease quality by linear... it will decrease quality like x = -1(x²) (if you know what i am talking about, its mathmatical... )

I know my maths, but I just don't get it... wouldn't you say that there is a much bigger difference between 294 and 146 than between 146 and 128? By halving the stereo to mono, you compressed all the info in the music to half the bits&bytes, 'cause as I said, stereo is 2 channels with (slightly) different info, while mono, played through a stereo speker set or headphones is 2 identical channels. So according to your calculationsreverting to mono cost you a lot more in quality than using Hi-SP in stead of SP.

does only support MONO playback which is recorded by OLD decks, but does not allow to record in MONO, ask SONY... those id*o*s.......

My guess, the Sony-dumb@sses actually realized that (almost) noone uses mono to listen to music...I personally think mono is very useful...for speech, memo's and stuff, but then I use a dictation machine (they can still do mono)

so dont tell me you can save 50 % using FLAC, its because you use STEREO, and STEREO has a high REDUNDANCY, no wonder you can save up to 50 %... try MONO, you will see it will compress around 66 %... MONO HAS NO REDUNDANCY, therefore every compression method will face a real match... lol...

he day I think saving space is worth it to really cripple my listening experience, I think I hope they have found better lossy codecs, 'cause I really won't try mono just to save space, kills to much musical-info IMHO...until then, Hi-SP suits me just fine for listening on the move and such

only if you use headphone (little earphones), you can be into the music... not with speakers at home, and also not with cheap pc speakers... so using little earphones... and combining them with equalizer, i can hear DETAIL of any music...

if I would ever use mono, it definitely wouldn't be through headphones. If you listen to it through speakers, (like on a lot of rockshows), the room accoustics and the position of your ears and all at least work to give the impression the sound is natural and alive. If you listen to mono through headphones, why bother using both ears? You get all the info exactly identical at both sides, so you could just as well plug one ear shut and only use the other to listen.

NO ! MONO IS PERFECTION because you hear the SAME on both of your ears

?? so stop listening in real life, 'cause you never hear exactly the same through both ears. And believe me, a bird-concert early in the morning, when you rise from your tent on a hike in the woods comes very close to audio-perfection ...even if I still hear it in stereo...darn, I wish I was deaf at one side, those lucky bast@rds hear audio perfection all the time (this last remark was sarcasm and definitely not intended to hurt any partially deaf person!)

if you use STEREO, you can never detect any technical failures, cos its virtaully playing... try MONO... you will see....

ah, with perfection you mean the dull, very dead 'not one interferin factor present' I hear e v e r y t h i n g that is in there exactly as it is there... well, let me tell you one thing, that is not audio perfection, also 'cause I'm afraid you can never control your ears to signal everything perfectly to your brain...the best thing is to print out all the digital 1's & 0's or some graphs and read your music, much closer to perfection. But the whl audio experience involves human listening to stuff... this can and should never be 'perfect' as that would mean dead...

MP3 is CRAP... i will always try to tell the people whats the BEST... and MP3 IS NOT THE BEST, MP3 is the rest....

I find it very hard to respect ppl that won't understand the idea that what they are shouting is just an opinion. Arguments can work consructive to gain a better knowledge of certain issues... shouting only proves one's incompetence to formulate real arguments

so now you still think you are the COOL MAN here, isnt it ?? so here is my question to you... i wonder if you are able to answer me the question... cos you are so COOL...

auch, sorry if I insulted you by rationally reasoning against you method and ideas, but this is no ego show... I simply didn't believe in your method period. So maybe I write it down a little different than someone else, sorry I'm not so tech savvy...that doesn't make me cool, that makes me jealous of all those other ppl here that are trashing your methods/ideas by using the correct terms. I never called myself cool and never would...but if you mean with it that I don't get carried away and start SHOUTING in capitals all the time, than I thank you very much for the compliment

What is the difference between MONO and STEREO ?

(i give you hint: its impossible to answer this question by only one sentence)

to be honest, I would have tried to explain it to you as clear as I ever could (and there probably would have been some mistakes in it) but Dex has beaten me to it, and believe me, I can never out-tech him! (and strangely enough I respect his arguments, as he never shouts them)

What I think is very important here concerning stereo is the listening aspect through headphnes, as that's what this thread was about:

-with mono, both ears recieve exactly the same info

-with stereo they recieve a (slightly) differing signal, so that in our brain that difference is translated into spatial info... so stereo produces some extra info, not from the bits & bytes present, bu exactly from the difference in b&b's between both ears.

in nature and everywhere in real life, your ears pic up differing signals, that's part of our survival technique, as we cn guess from what direction danger is coming... so our ears are quite used to that stereo thingy...and I for one wouldn't want to miss it, certainly not when a band I respect has put effort into producing that stereo picture...who am I to say that it's redundant?

greetings, Volta

[dex Otaku]

This thread is now closed.