Do people still care about audio quality?

[KaraK]

My housemate and I often lament the tendancy of people these days to not appear to give a st about audio quality - particularly with the way that MP3s are for many people replacing CDs altogether. So thought it was fascinating to watch this test on the bbc site:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/working_lunc...

It got me thinking - do people just put up with the low quality of listening to crappy lossy MP3s on cheap earphones on their iPod because they don't know any better? With mass storage getting cheaper all the time do you think we'll see a move back to lossless formats for portable players or will it be all about "its 120Gb you can have billions of songs on it"?

[SGirl]

Ha. I see they didn't dare compare their "second-hand CD player" with a decently set up turntable.

[KaraK]

SGirl said:

Ha. I see they didn't dare compare their "second-hand CD player" with a decently set up turntable.

yeah I spotted that

I think it makes it even more interesting when you consider that the CD player etc they used was far from being a high-end setup and it still beat the "best of the bunch" ipod + dock

[GlenMH]

Most people haven't cared about sound quality, ever. It is all about convenience and accessiblity.

[SGirl]

GlenMH said:

Most people haven't cared about sound quality, ever. It is all about convenience and accessiblity.

As evidenced by the woman in the video who said she preferred B but "didn't know why, she just did".

Horses for courses I suppose. As Glen said - convenience and accessibility. The iPod playing MP3s doesn't sound too bad if you use a decent headset anyway - sure, it's not high end audiophile quality, but it's not the tinny nonsense you get out of a mobile phone either.

But then again, maybe I'm not the best person to comment on MP3 vs. CD quality. I still prefer vinyl.

[OldSkoolRS]

I've been revisiting my setup specifically to improve my CD listening (I do have a turntable in the loft BTW, but very few LPs that I'd want to listen to these days ). I'd gone over to using my BluRay player and AV amp for CDs, but some recent listening tests proved to me that my old fairly modest NAD C540 and matching C350 amp outperformed my Sony BDP-S350 and Denon 2808 (even with an external Arcam power amp).

I might be in the minority, but I do care about audio quality...I only listen to MP3s in my car for convienience and to keep my CDs from thieves should the worst happen (my car plays direct from cheap SD cards). They sound way inferior put through my living room setup compared to the original CDs, so I don't bother.

[k-ink]

There are still plenty of people around who value high fidelity.

Not only in their homes, but on the move too. For example, with high end headphones, portable amps and lossless recordings.

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k-ink said:

There are still plenty of people around who value high fidelity.

Not only in their homes, but on the move too. For example, with high end headphones, portable amps and lossless recordings.

With you on that one.

Can tolerate a cheap pc speaker system in my room but save the majority of music listening for my HD25 (London commute) or my main system in the living room.

Have managed to convince one guy at work to get some HD25 to replace his ibuds, but it didn't involve a word from me. Just plugged him in and they did everything for me!

[CRACKIE]

Its all about the speakers..........The speakers used in most I-pod docks are grim even if we're being kind. IMHO ~ If the output of the Yamaha dock was fed into the old M/S speakers I doubt there would have been such a marked preference for system B. I-pod lossless fed into any competent amp sounds just fine if the speakers are not compromised.

[Toffer]

My listening habits...
1. Switch on the hi-fi.
2. Put iPod in dock.
3. Whilst things warm up, move from room to room and tidy up house whilst iPod plays.
4. Load CD into player, press play, relax on sofa and read a book or newspaper.
5. Place cherished vinyl on turntable and listen to wonderful music...and do nothing else...wonderful!
BTW. If you are in any doubt, play a vinyl LP by Christopher Hogwood and the Academy of Ancient Music. e.g. http://www.binbin.net/compare/Vivaldi-The-Four-Sea...

[koenig999]

I care, I care deeply about quality, so it is vinyl and a fine record player.

I have lots of *.oggs on a portable device for listening on the train etc. but not at home thank you.

Koenig

[tybalt]

I picked up a really decent Ipod dock for £70 - Monitor Audio Ipod deck (RRP around £200 IIRC). Two proper speakers and a decent little amp. Sounds really nice in the kitchen. It's not as nice as the Cyrus/Monitor Audio setup in the lounge, but it fits on a small shelf, and I also plug a cheap DAB pure radio into the line in, which gives me a really decent quality radio too.

[6655321]

It wasn't really a 'best of the bunch' ipod dock though, was it.

[Deluded]

The problem with the ipod docks and the like is that the majority of them have 3" or smaller drivers, Most with far smaller. They can't produce the low frequencies and so the sound is just appalling, and when they try, the crappy plastic casing vibrates horribly.

Can't beat some well designed, wooden speakers.

I don't actually have a "hifi" system as such, or a dock thing. I listen to music through my PC or 360. The PC I use for music production so have a pair of monitors running off an 80s Yamaha amp. The sound is spot on imo. The xbox is linked to a pair of Acoustic Solutions floor standing speakers running off a Marantz amp. The sound isn't perfect EQ wise as the EQ on the amp is a little knackered BUT, COD : MW2 sounds amazing on it, as do dramatic films.

As far as MP3s go, I can't stand anything lower than 192kb. Especially playing it on a good quality system, it really brings out the quality loss. They don't sound terrible on crappy head phones so I suppose alot of people don't worry about it, although they probably wouldn't notice anyway.

Edited by Deluded on Friday 13th November 22:41

[Techn0]

I'm not sure what to believe these days.

I have always encoded my mp3's in 320kb or higher. As a DJ I have enough vinyl and enjoy the sound. Sound quality is of great importance to me and I hate my Ipod shuffle because I can't change the headphones.

As an aside, my uni lecturer(a proper geek) told me that CD's you buy in the shops are recorded at quite a low biterate(obviously different to the studio recording) compared to some other digital formats.

IE, the compression on a good mp3 is less than a cd.

I'm still not sure what to believe.

[nelly1]

But wasn't the whole point of MP3 to compress the size of the track by cutting out the frequencies you supposedly can't hear?

The fact that the resultant file contains less information than the original analogue means that MP3 can never be classed as 'Hi-Fidelity'.

[OldSkoolRS]

Techn0 said:

I'm not sure what to believe these days.

I have always encoded my mp3's in 320kb or higher. As a DJ I have enough vinyl and enjoy the sound. Sound quality is of great importance to me and I hate my Ipod shuffle because I can't change the headphones.

As an aside, my uni lecturer(a proper geek) told me that CD's you buy in the shops are recorded at quite a low biterate(obviously different to the studio recording) compared to some other digital formats.

IE, the compression on a good mp3 is less than a cd.

I'm still not sure what to believe.

I'd change your lecturer.....if he spouts such rubbish about CDs being more compressed than MP3s then what other rubbish is he teaching you? CDs are 'recorded' in linear PCM....note the 'linear' bit, ie NO compression (apart from any added during the mixing stage by the producer of course).

[PJ S]

Indeed, noise gate compression for instruments or mics in a studio/event is a very different thing from bitrate compression of a digital audio signal.

[Scraggles]

bought mp3 player recently, amazon reviews rated ipod as having great looks and crap sound, while the sony walkman for having crap looks and great sound, considering it is usually inside a closed case for the majority of the time, went for sony walkman

played 99% of the time in the car

at home mostly play mp3's on the 5.1 sound system aka the pc

[reggie82]

OldSkoolRS said:

Techn0 said:

I'm not sure what to believe these days.

I have always encoded my mp3's in 320kb or higher. As a DJ I have enough vinyl and enjoy the sound. Sound quality is of great importance to me and I hate my Ipod shuffle because I can't change the headphones.

As an aside, my uni lecturer(a proper geek) told me that CD's you buy in the shops are recorded at quite a low biterate(obviously different to the studio recording) compared to some other digital formats.

IE, the compression on a good mp3 is less than a cd.

I'm still not sure what to believe.

I'd change your lecturer.....if he spouts such rubbish about CDs being more compressed than MP3s then what other rubbish is he teaching you? CDs are 'recorded' in linear PCM....note the 'linear' bit, ie NO compression (apart from any added during the mixing stage by the producer of course).

He didn't say CD's are more compressed then MP3's, he said CD's are quite a low bitrate compared to some other digital formats - which is entirely true.