Are your ears worthy of your headphones?


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Are your ears worthy of your headphones?…

Audio Quality
Audio Quality

The process of human hearing sound is very complicated.

Audio Quality
Audio Quality

But compared to the metaphysics of headphones and audio, the complexity of the human ear is basically not worth mentioning. But before we get into whether Beats is shallow, whether Sony is good, and whether headphone noise reduction is good for your ears, let’s take a look at what we’re talking about when it comes to sound quality. It may be that when you feel that the sound quality of a certain headset is not good, the problem is in your ears or in the sound file itself.

01 What is sound quality?

The essence of music and sound is the vibration of air, and sound quality is generally attributed to three aspects: volume, pitch, and timbre.

Everyone knows the volume and the tone is Do Re Mi Fa Sol La Ti. And what is the tone?

The American National Standards Institute defines timbre as “…a sensory attribute by which a listener can judge that two tones of the same volume and pitch are not the same.” We can tell the difference between a guitar playing a 440Hz tone and a piano playing a 440Hz tone.

The sound reproduced by different headphones is different, and the timbre is also different. However, in terms of volume, different headphones will also have a certain volume difference due to different internal circuitry; as for the tone, there is no obvious change without accident.

02Digital recording and analog recording

There is no doubt that pre-CD audio carriers: magnetic tapes, vinyl records, etc., are all analog recording products. The word “analog” is also translated as “analog”, in short, it restores and reproduces the vibration in the air at that moment in a physical way. Whether it’s vinyl or tape, physical features such as bumps, depressions, or magnetic dust splits on tape or disc are used to restore the vibrance detail of the audio.

But in the age of CDs and computers, all audio vibrations are converted to 0 or 1 on the surface of the disc and go into the so-called binary algorithm. After decoding, it is restored to physical vibration.

In popular music recordings, there are probably three most common formats:

44.1 kHz, 16-bit waveform

320kb mp3

128kb mp3


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Mp3, is it the best format for music and sound?

Mp3, is it the best format for music and sound?

best format for music and sound
best format for music and sound

People are looking for the best audio and video quality in 2022, what is it?

best format for music and sound
best format for music and sound

If you are seriously looking for high-quality audio and video, we advise you to stay away from the data-throwing fundamentalists and adopt a more practical attitude.

First of all you must ask yourself, on which devices will you listen to the audio or see the videos.

We have listened to dozens of fundamentalists who use numbers and certain statements as dogmas and have turned even this discussion of quality into a dogma.

And that is diametrically different from the simple my real aspiration to really enjoy the best audio and video quality that your equipment can deliver and that your eyes and ears are capable of detecting.

Mathematical statements are useless if you do not have an HD computer to listen to your audios and watch your videos.

Nor if the extreme is reached where the difference is already indistinguishable for 99.99% of the population.

It is fully demonstrated that for 99.99% of the population, even for those who have auditory training, an mp3 with 320 kbps and 48000 as sample rate is indistinguishable from a WAV or FLAC.

You can improve your audio with Mp4Gain regardless if you decide to continue using mp3s or prefer to switch to FLAC (Mp4Gain can convert and use these and other formats like ogg, m4a, etc)

In short, the discussion of sound quality should be based more on actually hearing the best possible audio and not a fundamentalist discussion about numbers.

The audio formats with the best sound quality

The audio formats with the best sound quality

audio formats

 

In addition, when editing, because some details have been compressed and sacrificed, the editing space is relatively small.

audio formats

It should be noted that the sound quality will be compromised every time these formats are output. After too many output programs, the quality can be terrible, so the number of times of recompression and conversion should be reduced.

Pros: small file size, maximum device compatibility

Disadvantages: destructive compression leads to loss of sound quality, less spatial flexibility for reissue

 

Resume
When it comes to sound files for editing, it’s ideal to work with uncompressed formats like .WAV or .AIFF. Such a format allows users to get the greatest degree of tolerance and freedom when editing, and most of these file formats are still supported, regardless of software or equipment. Also, when the video is output at the end of the project, the music file will still be compressed, so it’s ideal to use a file format with higher sound quality from the start, which is ideal for a project that needs to go through post-edit layers. But if it is based on the premise of convenient, fast and easy-to-use transmission, .MP3 can still meet your needs without sacrificing sound quality.

Mp4Gain is a program that allows you not only to normalize the audio of your sound or cvideo files, but also to improve the quality and offers you to perform a whole series of modifications so that you have better audio quality used.

The audio formats with the best sound quality

The audio formats with the best sound quality

audio formats
audio formats

First of all, divide all types of music files into three parts as follows:

audio formats
audio formats

 

Uncompressed file formats: .WAV, .AIFF

Lossless compression formats: .FLAC, .ALAC (Apple Lossless)

Destructive compression formats: .MP3, .AAC, .WMA, .OGG

Below are their respective advantages and disadvantages.

 

1. Uncompressed file format
Uncompressed music files are just like the concept of Raw files. Essentially no compression will of course have the best sound quality. (The sample rate and bit rate of the original recording are also very important. If the compressed music file is converted to an uncompressed file, the music won’t magically improve the sound quality.)

The most common disadvantage of uncompressed files is the file size. Generally, the file size of a song is around 25 ~ 40 MB. While that capacity is no longer an issue for cloud hard drives, it is still an issue for email. Also big (25MB max for Gmail attachments). Also, some portable music players or devices may not be able to play such music files.

Advantages: original sound reproduction, no compression, lossless, easier to use in post production

Disadvantages: large file format, fewer supported devices

 

2. Lossless compression format
The term “compressed and lossless” seems contradictory, but compression does not necessarily affect sound quality. More precisely, it’s more like “compressed to save space”. It’s like compressing a high quality file into a .ZIP and decompressing it when you want to use it, the quality of the file will not be affected.

Therefore, this type of file has a compressed capacity, but the file will be decompressed during playback to restore sound quality. Although the concept of reducing capacity without affecting sound quality is great, the downside is that support for this format is extremely low and in order to decompress the file during playback, an additional codec is required to use it, and it will. also take some performance.

Advantages: small file capacity (about 1/2 ~ 1/3 lossless files), good sound quality

Disadvantages: Decompression can eat performance when used, and support from hardware or software is extremely low

 

3. Destructive compression format
The destructive compression format is currently the most common music file format, the main reason is that it has the greatest compatibility with portable devices (mobile phones, MP3 players, etc.), and the files are small and have a space of limited storage. , users can store more music (compressed capacity is about one-tenth of lossless sound quality), and most of the music provided by today’s streaming media is files in this format. There is always a price to pay for smaller files. Compared to lossless formats, this destructive compression will affect the audio range that the original sound can present and will cause some distortion. So, to be safe, keep the compression rate above 320 kbps as much as possible.

What music file format is recommended? Part 2

What music file format is recommended? Part 2

AUDIO FORMATS

Opus is a new audio compression format developed by the IETF and standardized by RFC6716 in 2012. There is very little hardware and software supported, but at low bit rates of 128 kbps or less, it appears to be the strongest sound quality with compression with lost.

audio formats

Vorbis is a free audio file format developed by Xiph.org. It seems to be used on Youtube too. Since the standard bit rate is 112 kbps, the sound quality at a low bit rate appears to be good.

WMA is a standard Windows audio compression method developed by Microsoft. If the bit rate is 160 kbps or less, it exceeds the MP3 upper limit frequency. However, the size will be a little larger.

AAL (ATRAC Advanced Lossless) is a lossless compressed version of ATRAC mentioned above. According to Sony, it can be compressed to about half the size of the data without losing any music information on the CD, but it actually seems to vary considerably depending on the sound source.

As the name implies, Apple Lossless (ALAC) is Apple’s lossless compression audio codec. Used in iTunes, etc.

FLAC is an audio file format developed and distributed as free open source software. It seems to be the most popular in lossless compression.

Monkey’s Audio is an audio format that compresses PCM losslessly without degrading sound quality. It is so named because it is used in music playing software called Monkey’s Audio. The characteristic is that it does not fit the name and the compression rate is high.

TAK is a high-speed, high-compression, lossless compression audio encoder. It has the same level of compression as Monkey’s Audio, but it’s pretty crazy.

TTA is a free real-time lossless compression audio encoder / decoder. Like TAK, it’s too manic so I wouldn’t use it.

WMA Lossless is a lossless compressed version of WMA mentioned above.

Equalizer Image
AIFF is an uncompressed audio file format developed by Apple. It seems to be the Windows WAV. It seems to have been used on Macintosh (Mac) for a long time.

WAV (WAVE) is a format for describing audio data developed by Microsoft and IBM. This is what happens when you convert a CD (Linear PCM) into an uncompressed file in Windows.

Also, the sound quality of lossy compressed music file formats is almost the same at 192 kbps bit rates. If it is 160 kbps or less, I am wondering if other compression formats are slightly better than MP3. In this case, it is better to check the music player software. Sound quality is exactly the same for lossless and uncompressed music file formats. Lossless compression will have issues with compression ratio and playback load.

I want to read it together
What is free high-quality music player software for Windows?
After all, what music file format is recommended?
Image of listening to music with a portable music player
I’ve mentioned it so far, but I recommend MP3 or WAV (AIFF). The reason is as follows.

Due to the large capacity of hard drives and flash memory, lossy compressed music file formats do not need to have a bit rate lower than 192 kbps.
The compression ratio of the lossless music file format is currently 60 to 70% maximum, so taking into account the encoding time and effort and loading during playback, the file format of Uncompressed music is sufficient for lossless compression.
I don’t think I can distinguish between 192kbps MP3 and WAV, so I can’t help but worry about the compression format.
MP3 and WAV have many compatible hardware and software.

What music file format is recommended?

What music file format is recommended?

audio format

There are many types of music file formats, so it is difficult to know which one is recommended.

AUDIO FORMAT

I have only used MP3 and WAV due to their confusion, so I don’t really know about the new music file formats that are increasing year after year. So, I took a quick look at the existing music file formats based on the information from the internet. Let’s make a list of types and extensions so that you can easily understand them later.

* The target is a music file format that can be converted from a CD (linear PCM).


* The format can be replaced with the term codec and the extension can be replaced with the term file format. Simply put, a codec is a device or software that can encode (encode) and decode (decode) data in both directions using one encoding method. A file format is an information device like a computer. It is the storage format of the file used in.

* The bit rate for lossy compression is 192 kbps.

* The corresponding items indicate the amount of hardware and software that the music file format supports. ◎ Many, ○ Many, ▲ Normal, △ Less, × Very few.

Currently, lossless compression is emerging as a compression format in addition to lossy compression. Irreversible compression (lossy compression) is a data compression method in which the data before compression and the data after compression do not completely match, and reversible compression (lossless compression) is the data before and after compression. It is a data compression method that exactly matches the data.

In other words, lossy compression is a poor sound quality compression method because it adds a reduction in the amount of data, and lossless compression is a good sound quality compression method because it does not reduce the amount of data. . They are all the same in the sense that they aim for high sound quality with the smallest possible size.

Now, I’m sure there are music file formats that you already know, but let’s briefly explain each one.

Mixer Image
AAC is a music file format standardized in 1997 (approved in 1999). Standardized in order to obtain high sound quality and high compression that exceeds MP3. If the bit rate is 160 kbps or less, it exceeds the MP3 upper limit frequency.

ATRAC is a voice data compression technology developed by Sony since 1992. If the bit rate is less than 128 kbps, it is above the upper frequency limit of MP3.

HE-AAC is a music file format standardized in 2003. By incorporating SBR technology into the aforementioned AAC, the playback band has been expanded and the sound quality and compression efficiency at low bit rates (128 kbps or less) have been vastly improved.

* SBR (Spectral Band Replication) is a technology for audio compression and encoding, which aims to strengthen the conventional encoding method and increase the compression rate.

MP3 is the oldest music file format standardized in 1991 (approved in 1993). Since it is old, it has a high penetration rate and there is a large amount of supported hardware and software.

Audio formats.

Audio formats.

Audio Formats

There are many types of voice file formats, as well as image file formats.

Audio Files

Since the digital audio files are easy to copy, the illegal copy and distribution of music files has become a problem these days.

As explained in what analog data is, the mechanism of digital audio files is that analog signals become digital data and are saved.

Explaining in detail the conversion method, to convert an analogue to digital waveform, it is necessary to perform a job called “sampling” that measures (record) the sound waveform at regular intervals, and is the sampling cycle. The sampling frequency is called (sampling frequency).

The sampling frequency represents the number of samples per second and is in Hz. In other words, it is a unit that expresses how many times the sound is measured and recorded per second, and the greater the value, the more faithful the original and greater sound becomes the quality of the sound. However, the amount of data will increase proportionally.

The sampling frequency of a typical music CD is 44.1 k Hz. However, even if the sampling frequency is increased, there are sounds and frequency bands that can not really be recorded, so some classical music enthusiasts love expensive analogue equipment.

In addition, it is not only the sampling frequency, which affects the quality of the sound, but also the “sampling bit” that indicates the strength (volume) of the sound (16 bits are 65,535, 24 bits are 16,777,215). (Express) and “Number of channels” (number of sound lines recorded as stereo, monaural and 5.1 channels) also have an effect. The higher the value, the greater the sound quality.

Another factor that greatly affects sound quality is the bit rate. The bit rate represents the amount of data to be recorded per second and the unit is “BPS”.

In other words, the higher the bit rate, the more information can be stored, which results in a higher sound quality. As will be described in detail below, in the MP3 file format, 128 K BPS is the minimum bit rate that can be heard.

However, there is “constant bit rate” and “variable bit rate” in the bit rate. The constant bit rate is the same bit rate that is fixed from the beginning to the end of the voice, and the variable bit rate increases or decreases the bit rate according to the amount of voice information.

In other words, the bit rate is high for clauses with multiple voices and the bit rate is low for simple low voice clauses. You can reduce the total size of the file by choosing a variable bit rate.

This is the information contained in the digitized data of analog audio signals.

However, digitized data can not be used as. Just converting this data into an arbitrary file format and saving them, it will be possible to use them with multimedia devices and application software that admit that format.

The storage format of said data

file format

Is named. A file format is a file format with an extension.

Then, to save the data in a file format, it is necessary to transform (encode: encoding) the data according to that format. (For coding, see What is a character code?)

A dedicated program is used to codify the data, but said coding program is

Codec (codec)
Is named. In other words, the gross data obtained by converting analog signals into digital data are processed by a codec to market them as a file format.

Therefore, there are many types of codecs and coding methods for each type of codec.

Most current codecs are programs that compress and encode data when creating a file and decompress (decompress) data by playing a file. In general terms, codecs are used to compress and decompress data. It refers to a compression method program of this type.

What is the highest quality music format right now? PART 2

What is the highest quality music format right now? PART 2

Audio Files Formats

CD discs

audio file formats

The audio CD format, or rather the .cda extension, appeared around the same time.

Unlike “wave” files saved on the hard disk, they cannot be edited. Today it can be opened in an audio processing program, reformatted by audio transcoding, and saved anywhere other than on a CD.

After specifying the output format and the device we will play them on, the conversion will begin. For all these tasks, we only need to drag and drop the elements that we are working with in its user interface. For example, if we are playing a file at twice the speed, an easy way to interpolate would be to play one sample out of two.

If you place the object at 50% pitch, you should double the number of samples, and an easy way to do this is to find the average of the two actual samples. Well, this signal needs to be decompressed, and this requires a proportionally higher CPU load that can “saturate”. And a less saturated processor means less risk of “hang.” We will analyze the most popular compression formats that will allow us to compress any file without losing information. What is fast? The most powerful?

MP3 codec
With the advent of the LAME MP3 Encoder codec, the music industry experienced a real shock, because those files “weighed” dozens of times less than the same WAV file. Even a five minute compose at full compression rarely exceeds the size of 5-7MB. Agree, a significant advance, not to mention the fact, allowed not only to adjust the above characteristics, but also some additional parameters in the form of ID3 tags, which contained information, for example, about the artist, album name and tracks. , the release date.

What is file compression? What does squeeze mean?
And the most used? Have you ever come across a file that was too busy and you didn’t know how to make it work less, like mail it to a friend? Compressing the file allows us to reduce the size of the file. It will take up less space on your hard drive and it will be easier to send. Depending on the type of file used and the type of compression, its size will be reduced more or less.

What compression formats are there and which are the most popular?
As we just said, there are several types of compression methods. For example, it is a compression method used to compress video, audio, or image files. The main characteristic of this compression method is that by compressing approximations, the media file is reduced in size. This method looks for repeating patterns in addition to other more advanced methods. This is achieved by reducing the file size without loss of information or quality, although obviously the file size is not reduced. Unlike the previous case, this information is not lost. … When it comes to compression formats and methods, we have a wide range.

This type has become the most popular. Look, almost the entire Internet is full of this universal format. In general, we can say that the MP3 audio format has become a true revolution in sound. It remains one of the most popular and in-demand so far, even though it is being replaced by other types of audio. But more on that later.

A Guide to Choosing Audio File Formats: The Present Century and a Bit of the Past
.
FLAC, APE, ALAC and all, or just lossless
Formats from another planet: WavPack, Opus, MPC and other scary lyrics
FLAC vs MP3
So what should I do?
Introduction
As always, I’ll start with the senile complaints. Twenty years ago … In fact, twenty years ago there was no particular option. Because there were CDs that were turned into WAV files that took up the space of an average “hard drive”, well, there was quite a bit of space left in the operating system. And on the BBS. And the games. And in the archive of files. And that’s it. Because the average size of a hard drive back then was a whopping 850 megabytes today. Yes, exactly that 850, and exactly one megabyte. The impetus for everything was given by the appearance of the MP3 format in 1997, and it was a very significant year!

What is the highest quality music format right now?

What is the highest quality music format right now?

audio format

The first audio format in computer games

Audio Format

The first mention of computer sound came from the creation of primitive games at the time, in which sound was played through the system’s speaker. But no matter how hard the developers of such software (software) have been, the required quality, compatible with tape or reel recordings or recorders, could not be achieved.

High definition digital music has been around for a long time. Why does it seem that it is now catching on? In addition to traction, they can have devices like one, the answer on the market. The author of this disappearance does not have to look very far. Except in special cases, most of the users are more than enough for their smartphone to listen to music. Even players that have settled down, you see, they reduce the ground they hit year after year.

That is why many manufacturers are looking for a solution on how to change the audio format so that the sound is natural. Frankly, this has led to more competition than we have now. This applies not only to the material being played, but also to studio sound, live performances, quality or basic parameter settings in terms of knowledge of physics, acoustics, etc.

We come to the millionth question. This requires a sensitive ear and some education. If you’re a high-profile foodie, you’ll probably know the difference first, but for ordinary mortals who only listen to music with a background meter, it’s probably too hard to pay the difference just to have that kind of quality.

It is not just a music player. Those that combine with this equipment are not cheap. To top it all, there is music that is sold in high definition formats, which is also a bit more expensive. Finally, this is the technical section. There is not even consensus among audio professionals themselves on whether these devices make such an important distinction. At least on paper, it seems that HD music sounds better, but there is a strong marketing component behind it. Are we willing to pay to see the audience as music lovers?

The appearance of the WAV format
It is believed that the first full quality of audio formats was associated with the appearance of the standard and the .wav file extension (this abbreviation was formed from the English word “wave” or wave). Anyway, he became the first-born that could be processed into computer programs on a professional level.

As is usual in most multimedia files with which we work almost daily, we link to video with photos or audio files, depending on the type of use that we are going to make of them, we must use them in a specific format, so It is also important to know the main differences between them.

But this is what we are going to talk about, these are some alternatives that we are going to present to you and that will be very helpful when it comes to testing and converting the different types of audio files that we usually find. If you want to know the main differences between the two, we recommend that you take a look at this post that we offer you.

Advanced Audio Formats Part 2

Advanced Audio Formats Part 2

 

DTSaudio formats

DTS – Digital Theater System, in fact, is Dolby Digital, or rather its competitor. DTS uses a lower compression rate than Dolby, so it actually sounds better, as evidenced by DVDs that have DTS or DD tracks. DTS in home theater systems uses a maximum bit rate of 1536 kbps (full bit rate), this sound is better than Dolby Digital’s AC-3 format. DTS – Uses 6 free audio tracks and supports 7.1 sound distribution system, with this DTS 4.0 bit rate – it will sound as immersive as Dolby 5.1.

AIFF VS FLAC

FLAC

FLAC – (Free Lossless Audio Codec). Unlike lossy codecs (MP3, Ogg, and AAC), it does not remove any information from the audio stream and is designed for listening to music on high-quality Hi-Fi and Hi-End equipment and for archiving a professional audio collection. Currently, the FLAC format is supported by many audio players and music applications. The basic decoder uses ID3v1 and ID3v2 tags to store basic types of metadata, so they can be freely added and edited.

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MIDI

MIDI: (Musical Instrument Digital Interface), unlike other formats, MIDI does not store digital sound, but sets of commands: notes played, links to instruments, sound parameters. The convenience of the MIDI format is to use a device that is arranged according to the indicated chords. Midi files are typically several orders of magnitude smaller than digitized audio of the same quality. The MIDI format is versatile and designed so that any sequencer can read and write data without loss. At the same time, MIDI information that is incomprehensible to other software applications does not lead to misunderstandings, but is simply ignored. The mid-year backing track format allows you to save information about the instrument used, the tempo, the size designation, the information about the musical keys, the name of the track and the patterns and their number.

MP3

MP3: (MPEG Layer version 3) At the moment, MP3 is the most popular digital music encoding format. MP3 is a lossy compression format, that is, part of the audio information, according to the psychoacoustic model, the human ear can barely perceive is removed from the original file, irrevocably. The debate on MP3 quality still continues … First, the quality of the resulting MP3 depends not only on the bit rate of the compressed file, but also on the version of the encoding program used: the codec. Many music gourmets prefer to compress music with “maximum quality” – 320 kbps, or switch to other formats, for example FLAC, where the average bit rate is ~ 1000 kbps. At the moment, MP3 is the leader in universal recognition, but at the same time it is not a professional format in terms of technique. Professional musicians and DJs no longer use tracks with a bit rate lower than 320 kbps.

MODIFICATION

MOD is a format designed for the Amiga platform. Each MOD file contains digitized recordings of actual instrument sounds, called samples, somewhat similar to the structure of MIDI. Cj or a composer who writes in the MOD format uses a program called a tracker, in which he specifies what instrument, at what time, what note and octave should sound; This sequence of notes is written in a list; one track and several tracks. sounding in parallel forms a block called a pattern. The pattern collection forms a module: a file in MOD format, with the extension .mod. A track bar corresponds to an actual channel in which cj can play or edit numbered notes. Notes can be assigned various “patterns”, for example: tremolo, glissando, and so on.

OGG

OGG – Vorbis was developed in 2002 by the Xiphophorus team as an alternative to all paid licensed audio formats. Ogg Vorbis is compatible with all popular platforms. The format does not restrict the user to just two channels of audio (left and right), it supports up to 255 separate channels at a sample rate of up to 192 kHz and up to 32 bits, making Vorbis ideal for encoding DVD-Audio of 6 channels. home theater audio.