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Topic: "they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio (Read 9889 times) previous topic - next topic
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"they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

Reply #1 –
From the article...
Quote
A 128Kbps MP3 file (which, according to Apple's iTunes software, is regarded as "good" quality) is less than 1/11th of the size of the uncompressed original so, in theory, has 10/11ths of the audio information missing.
That seems overly simplistic and highly misleading to me personally. 

Cheers, Slipstreem. 

"they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

Reply #2 –
it is pure lie,

simplified would be: say flac does 60% which is lossless, then one could probably say that about 5/6 data is 'missing' (not audio information).
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"they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

Reply #3 –
Why are they writing about stuff they don't know like audio compression. Just another one jumping on the mp3 hate wagon thinking they are cool. "10/11 missing" is so amateurish you'd think a kid wrote it.

"they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

Reply #4 –
Quote from: shadowking on
Why are they writing about stuff they don't know like audio compression. Just another one jumping on the mp3 hate wagon thinking they are cool. "10/11 missing" is so amateurish you'd think a kid wrote it.

Because news outlets aren't about truth. They are about selling what is bought. I am amazed that people here still believe in the fairy tale of news being about "reporting truths".
I am arrogant and I can afford it because I deliver.

"they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

Reply #5 –
I didn't think it was so bad.  The Oxford prof pointed out that audiophile sound could be a waste for many people.  What does everyone think B & O management is going to say about MP3?  They want to see high-end audio and they're going to say what they need to in order to get people to consider their product.  The part about the missing fractions of music won't make much of an impact on anyone who currently listens to and likes MP3 files.

"they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

Reply #7 –
do i need to write some apologies to the firm if i listen mp3s on my B&W's?
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"they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

Reply #8 –
Quote
"MP3 does degrade the sound," he says, "but probably not enough for most people to notice."

Oh funny, how right he is! But he didn't mean it that way. This "not enough to notice" is what lossy codecs are all about, but he thinks that's the bad thing, while in reality it's the audio codec development's greatest achievement. Seriously, he should show more respect towards scientific research.

"they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

Reply #9 –
I thought it was pretty sensible article about home audio which is rare.

> they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

I think this applies to non-audiophiles as well of an age to have become used to listening to music on a normal home hi-fi. When I was young I was quite happy listening to the terrible quality from a MW portable transistor radio. Today I cannot listen to music on typical computer speakers although speech is no problem.

"they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

Reply #10 –
But the article's insensible to the - let me say - fact that the methods of the loudness war are much more damaging to the audience's receptiveness than lossy codecs ever were.

Maybe except for the short period in the history of the internet when MP3 was the new thing. The earliest encodings that floated around the net sounded horrible but it was analogous with getting music from open HTTP directories, WinMX, Napster and Morpheus or whatever it was called. Things that are long gone, or mainly exist in a zombie-like state today.

"they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

Reply #11 –
Quote from: 2Bdecided on
Quote from: Livy on
...B & O...
B & W!

I don't think B&O is really about the sound these days, if it ever was.

Still, B&W have jumped on the iPod accessory wagon.
http://www.bowers-wilkins.co.uk/display.as...tent=PROMOLINK2

Cheers,
David.



Just a typo, brother...

Quote from: Fandango on
Quote
"MP3 does degrade the sound," he says, "but probably not enough for most people to notice."

Oh funny, how right he is! But he didn't mean it that way. This "not enough to notice" is what lossy codecs are all about, but he thinks that's the bad thing....


I didn't read his comment as derogatory toward MP3 at all.  I think his comment is a pretty rational and realistic description.

"they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

Reply #12 –
It really depends here what he means by "degrade the sound". In any humanistic view, MP3 does not degrade the sound when transparent. Indeed, the whole point of MP3 is to provide smaller files without human-audible sound degradation.

"they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

Reply #13 –
Quote from: Canar on
It really depends here what he means by "degrade the sound". In any humanistic view, MP3 does not degrade the sound when transparent. Indeed, the whole point of MP3 is to provide smaller files without human-audible sound degradation.


I took the "not enough for most people to notice" part as meaning just that. 

But let's face it, any sound is degraded (even if not preceptibly) when transferred to a lossy format.  Otherwise, what's the point of having something like FLAC around?

"they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

Reply #14 –
Yes. And whilst it's safe to say that some quality is always lost with MP3, the lossiness is aimed most heavily at what you won't hear anyway due to masking effects, so the 90% of data you lose may only equate to a notional 10% loss in audible quality to the individual.

As it's not possible to directly quantify "quality" in percentage terms against bitrate in solid numbers, it's simply not possible for the guy not to realise that you are not throwing away 10/11ths of the sound. He's either very badly misinformed or has an axe to grind, IMHO.

Cheers, Slipstreem. 

"they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

Reply #15 –
A larger issue with the whole "9/10 of the music is missing!) argument is the use of lossless compression techniques inside MP3 (and all lossy schemes). By the same logic, wouldn't FLAC be removing 40% of the music?

"they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

Reply #16 –
Quote from: Slipstreem on
As it's not possible to directly quantify "quality" in percentage terms against bitrate in solid numbers, it's simply not possible for the guy not to realise that you are not throwing away 10/11ths of the sound. He's either very badly misinformed or has an axe to grind, IMHO.

This thread does make me wonder about who has an axe to grind and why.

The original quote was: "A 128Kbps MP3 file (which, according to Apple's iTunes software, is regarded as "good" quality) is less than 1/11th of the size of the uncompressed original so, in theory, has 10/11ths of the audio information missing."

I would suggest that you consider how much additional information is needed in order to exactly recreate the original signal from the information in an MP3 file. An MP3 compression does indeed discard most of the information in an audio file (a FLAC compression only reduces to roughly 60% and it organizes its data in order to be able to recreate the original unlike an MP3 compression). Of course what it seeks to do is discard the least important "10/11"ths of the information.

"they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

Reply #17 –
you could then also say:

"jpeg compression does indeed discard most of the information in an audio file"

(which would be a bit closer i guess...)

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Quote
I would suggest that you consider how much additional information is needed in order to exactly recreate the original signal from the information in an MP3 file

mp3 doesn't even try that.
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"they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

Reply #18 –
Actually, the reporter is the only one suggesting MP3 at 128 might be a problem. The others are focusing on speakers and/or headphones -- it's only the hi-fi salesman who mentions an expensive amp, and even he's sceptical about really expensive CD players (oops, sorry, transports).

The reporter, OTOH, gets a psychoacoustic expert to confirm his experience that he still gets the emotional experience out of the music, whatever the reproduction quality.

Even the B+W man admits most people won't hear the difference between MP3 and WAV -- which is, after all, the truth, though they are very few, which is why the people who can hear the difference are highly valued here.

Surprisingly well balanced, actually, for the Independent, which used to be a fine newspaper, but these days is credulous about alternative medicine and electro-smog and stuff. Reminds me of the first time I bought decent stereo gear, from people I knew. At the end they said, "You'll be happy with that, as long as you don't listen to any one else's set-up."

"they've taught themselves to become irritated by poor audio

Reply #19 –
Quote from: shadowking on
Why are they writing about stuff they don't know like audio compression. Just another one jumping on the mp3 hate wagon thinking they are cool. "10/11 missing" is so amateurish you'd think a kid wrote it.


Right.


So, now, for how many years do you think the popular press has been slaughtering Information Theory and DSP?

I stopped counting the mistaken quotes years ago.
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J. D. (jj) Johnston