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I have some free time so I'm looking at what's available these days
in new cars. This is mostly for my own education. Not asking for
comments unless someone wants to comment, which would be just fine.
Buick Verano, just released in 2011. 4 cylinder. Apparently under
$30,000 with every possible option taken. Only $ 26,700 well equiped.
Other Buicks are more expensive.
===============================================
a 7-inch touchscreen display, Bluetooth (phone and audio streaming), OnStar telematics and a six-speaker sound system with a CD player, satellite radio, a USB/iPod interface, an auxiliary audio jack and Buick's IntelliLink smartphone-connectivity system.
The Convenience Group 2 adds heated sideview mirrors, rear parking sensors, an auto-dimming rearview mirror and a power-adjustable driver seat. The Leather Group adds keyless ignition/entry, a heated steering wheel, heated front seats, leather upholstery and a nine-speaker Bose audio upgrade.
Before going the lossless way, check it for yourself. MP3 are much more standard and easier to carry around thant FLAC files.
Install foobar ABX system, tacke a CD, extract a wav file with EAC, convert it to both FLAC and 320 kbps MP3, and try to find out the difference between the 2 files, on your best equipment. Choose a track with high frequencies.
I'm pretty sure you won't be able to find any difference. Of course, this will be bad for your ego, because you would like to be able to distinguish the subtle differences of lossless, but I think 99% of the people won't hear the difference.
Of course, you may be part of the 1% lucky (and probably young) that are able to recognize the 2 formats. In that case, it will be useful to go the FLAC way.
Thanks gomi. I really should. If I could hear the difference it would be with my headphones, not on the computer
with its two speakers and subwoofer.
If one thinks about a CD track, what would that be if it was a MP3? At the link below (don't bother to click on it,
it's just there if anyone wants to waste time)
someone said that a CD track would be >900 kbps.
You mention 320 kbps MP3. So...one just increases the bitrate until it becomes lossless (or extremely close)??
How high can one go, 640 kbps or 1280 kbps? (just wondering)
Ok, I took a wav file and converted it to Mp3 in Audacity. I remembered that all my
wav's are recorded at 192 kbps as far as I know. (Dang!). So that was a bust.
I don't think I actually own a CD made at a factory.
Got to buy a Superbus CD (hee hee).
On-line comments generally, but not always, say that at 320 kbps Mp3 is perfectly adequate.
Someone (at youtube) took a wav and a mp3 and inverted one and played them back simultaneously.
He said it showed how bad the mp3 is. I've included the link, but this seems more like an academic
exercise than anything useful. (If they were identical, obviously there would be total silence.)
It was set to Constant so I didn't change it. Don't know if that's good or not.
The channel mode was Joint Stereo or Stereo
It was set to Joint Stereo so I didn't change it. Don't know if that's good or not.
========================================================================
Anyway, I'm probably wrong about not going to Mp3 320 kbps going forward. Someday someday someday
I'll have time time time to listen to music. (Back on-line in several days.)
Truth is beautiful, without doubt; but so are lies.
we did extensive tests on mp3 quality in a studio environment with Logic and a Yamaha digital mixer, and believe me, most audiophiles got buffled and sometimes angry when confronted with the test results. It is more a technical issue knowing the encoded data misses frequency information that are lost by the way ear and brain computes music anyway. Many audiophiles even don´t know where to spot mp3 artifacts that exist in lower bitrates.
So for your compatibility issues mp3 is a great way to go. I can only subscribe to what Gomi said.
I could rant on during hours on audiophilia. Maybe because I'm an ancient (deceived ?) believer ;-)
"Audiophilia" is really like a religion, with people trying to convince you of crazy things ("I hear the difference when I change the direction of my signal cable") they can't prove, and that resists any scientific (or historical) evidence...
And when scientists prove that even with the best high-level measuring equipment, they are unable to find any evidence in the signal, only response they get is "you can't measure everything". So we're really in faith issues. But come on, if we can built neutrino ( that travel through atoms) detectors , I'm pretty sure we're able to analyze 20 kHz signals to their fullest extent.
I you have 1 hour to spare, watch the AES convention on audio myths :
If you're out of time, here are some good cue points where you have sound demos you can test by yourself :
5:28
Demonstrates that if you expect to hear something, you will (excellent satanic Stairway to Heaven demo)
This explains why, if you don't do careful blind testing, you will definitely here a difference between cables, even if there is none. And you will be 100% convinced about it.
32:30
Can you really hear jitter noise which is -100 db below signal level ?
Check what you noise sensitivity is , -30, -40, -50 db ?
So do you really need that $10k external DAC that eliminates jitter ?
46:18
Do you really need 24 bit audio ? How much bits are enough ?
Can you even recognize 12 bit audio ? 10 bit audio ? 9 bit audio ? 8 bit audio ?
Less fun but very important :
17:57 :In room response of standard room with reflective walls
18:58 : frequency response differences from 4 inch apart positions
19:37 : basic subwoofer frequency response in a room
See those huge -20 dB gaps ? Impact of the listening room on music fidelity is way, way, wayyyyy over the distorsion a basic amp...
To sum up : get a decent amp, try to acoustically treat your room (no flat walls, avoid 1st reflections), and you'll be good to go.
Of course note everyone can afford this
Or it might raise a WAF issue....
Personally, I use a cheapo Behringer DSP to cancel most important room modes in my room and improve bass response.
I recorded a streaming audio clip of a song that was for sale at a certain
website. It was 30 seconds at 1411kbps according to the Properties.
I'm assuming that is what would
be on the CD if I purchased it, therefore a WAV file.
I took that file and changed it to Mp3 at 320kbps and 192kbps and played
them through my computer's speakers. I couldn't tell the difference. I then
reduced it to 40kbps and I heard a great difference indeed. I only did that
to confirm what I thought I was doing. No one uses 40kbps of course.
I'd like to try this with my headphones but there is a problem.
It seems I've never used my headphones with this new-ish computer.
I've played the original clip in Audacity and Windows Media player with my
headphones plugged in, but there is only music without the singing. With
my speakers there is music and singing. Which makes no sense to me.
Just went to Pandora internet radio. Problem is basically the same. Music
through speakers is fine. Music through headphones is messed up.
I would think this is a simple problem...
Any suggestions?
I tried everything I could think of at Control Panel. No soap.
What I've done is take the original CD quality wav file and made
it track #1 of a new CD. Took the MP3 of 320 and converted it to
a wav of track #2. The 192 to track #3 and the 40 to track #4.
Tomorrow I'll be over to a relative's house where I left my CD player
for that person to use. (The person hasn't been using it.) I should be
able to connect my headphones to that CD player, assuming the jack
fits on this Apollo 13 mission.
There is no real way to judge anything with 2 small Dell speakers and
the subwoofer here. Everything changes when I use my quality headphones.
====================================================
I did look at about 15 minutes of that video you posted. One comment I have
is that some people have extremely well developed hearing. I knew someone
years ago that commented that a certain piano tuner he knew did a better
job than another one. He was/is a piano player from way way back.
I'm not claiming he has super human powers of course, just that some people seem to, when compared to the rest of us.
You wrote: But come on, if we can built neutrino ( that travel through atoms) detectors , I'm pretty sure we're able to analyze 20 kHz signals to their fullest extent.
Apparently they ( not us ) can cloak time.
The scientists created a lens of not just light, but time. Their method splits light, speeding up one part of light and slowing down another. It creates a gap and that gap is where an event is masked.
"You kind of create a hole in time where an event takes place," said study co-author Alexander Gaeta, director of Cornell's School of Applied and Engineering Physics. "You just don't know that anything ever happened."
Their time cloak lasts an incredibly tiny fraction of a fraction of a second. They hid an event for 40 trillionths of a second, according to a study appearing in Thursday's edition of the journal Nature.
