Is Sound Quality of iTunes Plus "Amazing" Enough?

Isn't it spelled "Audiophile"?

"Audofiles"? That's what your mp3s are -- data files that reside on your computer. People who love music enough to convince themselves to spend more money on needless extra "quality" are audiophiles. In the 70s and 80s they were debating Bose vs JBL vs Infinity speakers and wondering whether digitally recorded music could ever match the resonance of that pressed into vinyl. Actually, some of them are still debating that today, but they're also the folks who will pony up the extra money for the more expensive audio files that no one else can distinguish from the cheaper ones. But I bet they know how to spell "audiophile". Or at least look it up in a dictionary. And most of them don't present themselves as professional writers. :)

"256 kbps sound quality" is as meaningless a phrase as "500 foot architecture quality"

In the early years of this century trained "golden ear" listeners judged the quality of lossy audio compression schemes such as AAC and High Effiency AAC ("aacPlus") to be equivalent to the original source material at bitrates much less than 256 kbps. In fact AAC at 128 kbps was judged by the EBU (European Broadcast Union) to the "Broadcast Quality."

Audio recording and playback is a science and an art. Excellent results are determined by numerous factors, and "256 kbps audio quality" can be superb or dismal due to reasons apart from the compression format.

The notion that it's "too expensive" to host lossless or higher quality encoded music is patently ridiculous. The only difference is in storage space - the cost to the seller is slightly higher. Given that music e-taillers are already charging rates comparable (slightly cheaper) than buying a CD, it's fairly obvious to anyone with a grasp of the facts that basically consumers are being ripped off. There is no earthly reason why music shouldn't be sold in high-quality digital formats. Basically it's just squeezing that little bit extra profit out of customers who've been fed the lie that "only audiophiles can hear the difference". Most average listeners, in an unbiased demonstration, can hear the difference. They've merely been lead to believe that those wanting higher quality are somehow elitists.

Anyone that's listened to MP3s (or any other kind of compressed audio) through an average sound system would now that it sounds 'flat', just pay a little attention to the sound and you can quickly tell that it's wrong - you don't need to be an audiophile for that. So I agree, in time people are going to want to hear it sound like the way that they remembered before from off their CD or Vinyl. The trick will be how to deliver bigger and better files, when we've spent so much effort squeezing the life out of them in the first place.

Audiophiles, bub.

There definately is a noticable difference between 128Kbps and 256Kbps especially in the high end of the spectrum. But the difference between 256Kbps and lossless formats like FLAC is not as noticable IMHO.

Learn to use a spellchecker.

No offense Mr. Burrows, but I feel like the CEO of a company specializing in high bit-rate audio may not be the most reliable source concerning the quality of lossy audio. And this day when "we'll all start hankering" for the quality levels needed by top end stereos? I don't think most people, even those affluent enough to own iPods, can afford those $500 Shure earbuds, or the more expensive and high-ended stereo systems that require bitrates above 256. I feel that bitrates above 256, which is above what most humans can distinguish on most songs according to some tests ( http://www.slate.com/id/2163508?nav=aias ) is always going to be important only to the affluent audiophile, because honestly who heard of a poor man with a nice stereo?

Right on. Digital destroys fidelity. It started with the CD which is based on 1974 digital technology. Are people going to forget what real music sounds like? I am afraid so.

I can certainly tell the difference between CD and iTunes (even with my old ears) and I'm excited at the chance to get better audio. I have over 11,000 tunes from my collection (including several hundred iTunes) on my iPod and I listen on those wonderful expensive Shure earbuds (I got a good deal on eBay). If we ever get lossless compression, I'll be first in line for that too.
Dave.

This is a joke. A 256 kbps encoded lossy file can not and will never sound amazing. Apple is merely taking advantage of the general public's lack of knowledge and understanding of what these files actually are to make them think that this is a big deal. It's nothing.To say that this is a big step up is like falling down a 100 foot hole in the ground and then saying it is amazing to have managed to climb 6 inches towards the top.

Long ago, everything was recorded to analog tape. Done right with good gear this was and still is the best sound you can get. When those recordings were mastered for and transferred to vinyl or cassette there was always a significant loss of quality. If this was done right though one still had a very listenable (as in enjoyable) product. Many people once listened to pre-recorded open reel tapes as well which was even better. CDs were the first major backwards step in audio quality that the industry ever undertook-until then the idea had been to keep improving fidelity see? Many fine engineers had the pain of hearing their good analog work utterly destroyed by the time it went to CD. They were and still are a far cry from a good analog master to say the least. And now...the industry has fully embraced lossy and so-called lossles encoded files made at pathetic bit rates as the new standard. What I am trying to say is that we have hit rock bottom sonically. Higher bit rate from Itunes? Fine. Amazing? Don't
insult me. At the very very least if I were to ever pay a dollar to download a song ( I do buy my music legally-just never at Itunes or for a dollar a song) then give me the 44.1khz 16 bit .wav file. Or the 96 khz 24 bit .wav file if that's how it came out of the studio. Consider this-a dollar a tune is about what a CD costs-why would you accept a mediocre facsimile of that for the same price? Apple should be taken to task for trying to dumb down it's consumers and heralding this as some kind of advancement-at best it's a baby step out of the dark ages of recorded audio, and a very tiny one at that.

The new version of Apple's iTunes Producer program for prepping files for upload to the iTunes store gives the option of encoding the file in Apple Lossless Format. Look for this to become the new standard in the near future.

Come on now, let's not exaggerate here. 256 kbps so close to lossless than no one can tell the difference no matter what kind of sound system it is played on. Anybody that says otherwise is probably trying to promote a product.

I keep my (large) CD collection around, despite the bulk, just to be sure that about every 3 or 4 years, I can re-rip it to the next higher quality data format. I'm now on my 3rd go-round (256 kbps stereo mp3), and anticipate doing this until a lossless format is available on my portable player.

The author's English is really BAD!

Well, I hope you're right about all this, since that would imply the survival of the professional music business.

My honest feeling is that an entire generation has grown up with the attitude that anything downloadable should be free -- that piracy is a mere technicality like driving 56 -- which strips the revenue out of the entire industry.

Should DRM disappear from all digital music, I predict piracy on a scale the likes of which we have not seen since the original Napster. Apple will not long have an iTunes market at all; $1.29 is simply not as attractive as $0.

The eventual blowback to consumers will be the destruction of the music business, and the abolition of professional content suitable for stealing. I'm not sure that will really be an improvement on today's world. At least today, people do like the music well enough to steal it in the first place.

Dude, clearly you are not savvy of the Apple marketing weenies. The music elitists will buy anything that's promoted as 'better' just so they can rub it in their friends faces, reinforcing their effete' status. Real quality aside, aren't we really just talking about perceptions?

You misspelled "independance" and "Schure" which should have been "independence" and "Shure", and I was hard-pressed to understand the the point your article was making. Your writing could be a little clearer. Thanks. Mark

Websites like Traxsource.com and Beatport.com offer dance tracks in your choice of 320kbps MP3 or .Wav formats. No DRM. They've been doing it for quite some time. Of course they are for the DJ industry and you won't find anything mainstream. While there isn't DRM to prevent remixing and cd burning they do include traceable imbedded coding to track miscreants trying to resell those tracks. But if they can do it why can't iTunes, Rhapsody or any of the other music services?

Now if only other services would do this.

Lossless does not equate to high quality. This is a very common mistake.
The two factors you care about when speaking about audio are resolution and sample rate. CDs are recorded at 16 bits and 44.1 KHz. Hardly the highest quality money can buy (this is also what MusicGiants uses).
If you are a true audiophile (I'm not that hardcore) then you should be looking at DVD Audio (up to 192 KHz and 24 bits). Also, they can do 5.1 channel sound, compared to two channels (stereo) on CD.

Seems you really nailed it, when mentioning earbuds. So much of today's ubiquitous one-dimensional pop was never conceived of as much more than "thump-thump-sizzle", so one shouldn't expect the lo-fi implications of compression and teeny little speakers to make much difference to most people.

But even so, there's a decent amount of modern music made with acoustic/analog sources, consisting of lush complex tones, from Wilco to Nina Nastasia. And there's continually a renewed interest among younger listeners in classics from Joni Mitchell to the Clash. It's a shame when people only get to hear the bright surface of good music, and completely miss out on the richness of particular instruments -- the lingering vibrations in a cello body, the warmth of a vacuum tube guitar amp, the way a cymbal is struck.

There is always something higher quality and better. The market will keep introducing something better until the price point for everyday users is met; then that will be the standard. This is basic stuff.

The difference between a 128 kbps perceptually encoded music track (as iTunes sells) and a 256 kbps file should be fairly apparent over even iPod earbuds -- and certainly over better quality buds and decent stereo speakers.

If you want to know what to listen for to tel the difference, listen to the decay of cymbals and reverb tails, which will "collapse" faster under the lesser quality formats.

If we REALLY wanted hihger quality music, we would insist on 24 bit depth recording instead of the 16 bit which is the CD standard (not the same as compression ratios measured as bitrates).

But, instead, we have the sorry spectacle of someone touting yet another DEGRADED format as "amazing quality" -- yeah... amazing ONLY when compared to the decidedly lo fi 128 kbps files you've been being ripped off for.

I'm not against perceptual encoding formats like Mp3, AAC, WMA -- or the FAR superior, open source Ogg Vorbis -- they make internet music possible.

But let's be REAL about the quality we've THROWN AWAY and let's stop buying into the con that we're now getting going to be given something "amazing."

What a pile of zeroes.

256kbps is certainly not high enough quality for MP3, but if it were a format with better compression such as AAC or WMA, 256kbps should be sufficient for a large majority of listeners.

Also, someone needs an editor. It's "consumers' priorities", "audiophile", and "Shure".

An "audio file" is what you download from iTunes. Perhaps you meant audiophile?

Lossy compression works because it models the psycho acoustic properties of human hearing -- what's being thrown away can't be perceived by mere mortals.

Heck, if you're a true audiophile, why would you even bother with a lossless codec achieving mere "CD Quality"? There are extended audio formats (such as DVD Audio) which offer 24 bit, 96 kHz audio in 5.1 surround sound (roughly 10 times as much information as "CD Quality").

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070530-apple-hides-account-info-in-drm-free-music-too.html

Beware.

The originating media is just one component of sound quality. Regardless of the media, if you're wearing a $10 pair of earbuds quality will suffer. With my iPod I use a $60 pair of over the ear Sennheiser earphones and for the first time am noticing nuances in recordings because of the superor technology. Maybe cheap sunglasses were okay for ZZ Top but I doubt whether they or anyone else can get by with cheap earphones. I also don't believe that sound from across the room speakers (regardless of price) can ever match the sound and quality obtained through a high end pair of headphones.

Gee, I have herd of 320kps music, and I have herd it. It is not a huge difference.

I don't consider myself an audiofile. I have a mismatched system of old audio stuff, a tuner, some big speakers, a cd/dvd player and TV set. I prefer listening to TV and DVD's through the big speakers. If I were an audiofile I'd be able to tell you the makes and models of what I'm playing things through, but I can't. I'd have to get up and look but I don't care to.

All I know is this: DVDs sound 1000% better than CDs and I think it's sad there's not more music available in DVD format.


I'm not rich by any means. To tell you the truth, I barely scrape by. But music is very important to me and I'm not against playing a couple extra bucks for a better sounding disc.

Have you heard The Beatles' "Love" album on DVD yet? Jesus Christ, man. I cried when I heard it.

So, yeah, if they can make downloads sound better for a few extra dimes, that's cool by me. But let's not assume everyone who wants better quality is some sort of too-much-time-on-their-hands, over-priviledged "audiofile".

I think you are missing a key point about whether people will care about the difference.

Much of the top 40 music is already highly compressed in dynamic range during the mixing stage so that it sounds better on the radio and much of this music actually sounds bad on an expensive stereo system even in its pristine form.

You have to start with a very high quality recording for any of this to matter and the recording is the sum of its weakest links.

So if you are listening to Purple Haze by Jimmy Hendrix, there is no difference.

If you are listening to a very well done recording of an orchestra and are listening over a stereo that allows you to hear the sound stage and pick out the instruments the difference is much more noticable.

Obviously there are many different types of music that have been recorded well, but to say everyone will start caring is an overstatement.

People will care about the flexibility of not having copy protection on the music that they purchased.

i think you've got the reasoning backwards -- it's not higher fidelity audio that happens to be drm-free. it's drm liberation with better sound to boot.

people may not be willing to upgrade for quality alone, but they sure will for the ability to shift content they rightfully own to whatever media they want, just as with any other distribution format.

digital music sales have been the oddball, and imo should have been restriction-free from the beginning. "digital rights management" comes off as a double-standard put in place to keep the labels from losing money. luckily everyone's starting to realize what net-philes knew to begin with: drm is ultimately pointless. this is the main message of apple's move.

additionally, audio converted between formats, which can now be done more easily, benefits hugely when the originals are of higher quality.

It is audiophile not audiofile. And I think the issue is more for archival quality. CD's provide source material that can be encoded in many different ways. A lossless DRM-free format from stores like iTunes would essentially do the same for digital music.

256 is definitely audibly superior to 128, but beyond 256kbps you need to be a trust fund baby to have ears good (young) enough combined with equipment good (expensive) enough to tell a difference.

I think the quality boost is an attempt to stretch the pricing model, $.99 per song seemed to be a no-pain point, now they're checking to see what the resistance is to $1.29, the quality (and lack of DRM) is a sufficient incentive to get those who will pay to go ahead and do it. If $1.29 is a big success, look for further increases in the near future.

The importance of music quality rests in the ears of the beholder. I enjoy listening to music that is clear, with an expansive and full sound, but is it so important to have a lossless compression method at the cost of file size? Not particularly. With the cost of storage dropping (I just bought 1 gigabyte of micro SD memory for my MP3 compatible phone for $10), the file size becomes less and less important, but I will always choose more songs of decent quality over fewer songs of absolute perfection. I understand the drive for complete and absolute crystal clarity for Audiophiles on a system capable of producing the analog sound waves exactly as the digital format allows, but most people need not be concerned with anything over 128kbs (BTW, if you intend to write about sound quality as an authoritative source, please spellcheck your articles so as not to confuse "audio files", such as mp3s, with audioPHiles (literally, sound lovers).
Quoting from wikipedia, "As well as the bit rate of the encoded file, the quality of MP3 files depends on the quality of the encoder and the difficulty of the signal being encoded. ...different encoders may feature quite different quality, even when targeting similar bit rates. As an example, in a public listening test featuring two different MP3 encoders at about 128kbps[2], one scored 3.66 on a 1–5 scale, while the other scored only 2.22. The transparency threshold of MP3 can be estimated to be at about 128k with good encoders on typical music as evidenced by its strong performance in the above test, however some particularly difficult material can require 192k or higher. As with all lossy formats, some samples can not be encoded to be transparent for all users." (By transparent, this quote refers to the inability to distiguish compressed sound from the original source.)
To summarize, the higher bitrate may be useful if you are in the situation of needing to hear EVERY nuance in a clip of audio, AND you have the equipment required to play it on. Otherwise (for most users), this is simply another way for companies to separate money from the uninformed.

The fact is the overwhelming majority of people cannot tell the difference between 128kbps MP3 and the original source. Bump that up to 256kbps, and we're talking about a tiny fraction of people -- and even then only with careful listening on excellent equipment in an ideal environment. There is no industry I can think of which is more built on lies and fake perception than high-end audio. The salesman in the store swears up and down that he hears how the Emperor's new format is better. Then the aspiring audiophile agrees, lest he be exposed as one with "normal" ears. It is a scam.

Another factor making this post pointless is the deterioration of audio quality in popular music since about 1994. Around that time, music industry executives entered into a loudness war on CDs. Dynamic range compression, used for decades to even out the loudness of music, had gone digital and extreme. (Not to be confused with data compression, which makes audio files smaller.) Almost any pop CD you buy today is so loud that the music is distorted. Rip your CDs to WAV format and look at them in an audio editor to confirm this -- the old CD's waveforms will be fine, the new ones will clip at the top and bottom of the wave.

Record companies are quick to blame piracy for lack of sales -- maybe they should address their distorted, ruined products first.

Not to be nit-picky, but it would be nice if the words "audiophile" and "Shure" were spelled correctly. Thanks.

Everyone I know has ALREADY transferred their collection of CDs to their iPod and play them over their stereo at home (and in the car, and in the gym, etc.). This is not a "someday in the future" kind of thing. Everyone is pretty happy so far.

It's sad that we've stepped backwards with online music

We're comparing MP3s to CDs, but CDs are an ancient, low-quality format at this point. Major studios record at high-definition, then "dumb it down" to CDs.

It will be a long time before we get anything near STUDIO-quality audio from the internet.

you don't have to be an 'audiophile' to notice the difference between a MusicGiants download sound quality and any MP or MP4 (iTunes); it's a huge difference; and the cost is the same as the 'amazing' 256kbps

Why has nobody yet commented upon the larger file size that will result from 256Kb (or higher) encoding? Switching to a higher bit rate will mean increased storage requirements for the same number of songs. Capacity will need to increase, or portable libraries will need to get smaller.

CD Quality is standard def, not high-def.

Apple is charging for what should have already been offered. 256 kbs is just OK (not even CD quality) and 128 is awful. You're paying more than $.99 (that's even a rip-off) for better sound quality that they should have offered in the first place. I have an Ipod and have never been to ITunes - check out www.mp3stor.com. It's legal, cheap and safe (they accept PayPal). Screw the RIAA.

Wow, what a lot of nasty people posting on here. It's free. You haven't paid the author so cut him some slack. When you make positive comments we all learn, but when you bitch it degrades the forum.

The reason apple is selling 256kbs downloads is that there is a trade off / balance to be found in terms of download time and player capacity. Apple clearly save alot of money overall each year in bandwidth by not selling large music files but overall, for the purpose they're being sold for, iTunes is not a rip off. Remember you're no longer being forced to buy "filler" songs which clog up most albums. So $1.29 is cheap.

Enjoy your music and try to be constructive, people!

Hello All,

To provide some real-life experience using CDs and iTunes 128K (VBR) files for our DJ/Karaoke gigs, i can tell you that it's been very accepted and people can't believe we're playing compressed audio from an iPod(actually via Numark's iDJ mixer). We plug two 30Gig iPods into the mixer.

Prior to using this method earlier this year, i needed to convince myself that the purchase of the iPods, mixer and subsequent downloads would be worth it vs continuing to purchase CDs. I tested an actual (don't laugh) Pussycat Dolls CD against a downloaded song from iTunes from the same album (burnt to a CD-R). We use Yorkville brand loudspeakers, sub and powered mixer as well as a BBE sonic maximizer and feel our equipment is semi-pro -- pro audio for our gigs. I put both CDs into a dual CD mixer that I could fade back and forth to create a very close A-B comparison (from a human ear's aspect). I stood there expecting to hear a drop off on the low end, less highs, less stereo separation, less of a soundstage.. Closed my eyes and quite honestly, i could not! For our purposes, if I could not hear a difference truly listening to the musical content (all be it pop music), it would certainly pass our main audiences' tests.

Did I compare Bach and Beethoven? No, but this test was good enough for me. I don't consider myself quite at an audiophile level but have a decent set up at home. B&K receiver, Mirage speakers. I will have to play a source CD through THAT system and compare to the same downloaded material via the iPod and let you know. I realize that material is being stripped from the audio, most likely in-audible material so I'm not convincing myself that I've lost nothing. For practicality purposes, AAC 128K has been a blessing. Less CDs to haul, and if clients want certain songs we don't have, I download them from iTunes.

I DO worry about the increased file sizes of the iTunes Plus files as this will reduce the advertized song capacity of their iPods... but i DO like the lack of DRM. This will allow some of our songs to be utilized on some newer digital hardware for DJs that we'd like to eventually purchase. Yes, I could use the burn/rip method to remove the protection but I worry about any rights violations.

Wow, a lot of useful information here. Let me ask you guys one question. If I upload my CD to itune then to ipod, what is the quality of the format?
128K? Less or More?

1. As far as sound quality goes-- Mp3

2. Listening to Mp3's for a prolonged period (more than 40 minutes or so)makes my ears hurt.

3. Earbuds? While walking around the city? Most people crank it so they can hear over the environment... Crank it so they can hear nuance through the digital artifacts... We're going to have an entire generation of people going deaf around 30. Can anyone say class-action lawsuit?

4. Don't get me started on the so called "loudness war".

5. And btw, the music industry's dying? OMG, boo-fxxxing--hoo. Don't expect any flowers on that grave.