Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Stereo MP3 vs...

One of the discs that I have really been looking forward to listening to on my M80s is Yes, Close To The Edge. I only own it as an 320kbps mp3. Since some here say they hear no difference between this and full fidelity disc, I thought I would give it a whirl.

I must say, this is the first dissapointment. The bass seemed a little recessed and undefined compared to disks like Dire straits live or Clapton Unplugged.

I must say that I am noticing a lot more difference between discs in how they mix tracks, but this mp3 just didn't have the sound I was hoping for.

Now I need to go and buy the disc somewhere. Sigh...

Let us know what you think when you do find the disc please. I'm considering re-ripping all of my CDs now that I have the Axioms and 320kbps seemed like a good mid-point for file size, functionality with most MP3 players, etc.

I'll be curious about what you think when you do the A/B comparison.

Hi Fredk,

It's not the MP3 at 320 kbps that's at fault, it's the original source recording that's no good. I don't know that particular album, but if you get the CD version (assuming the mastering source was the original), then the CD will sound equally disappointing.

MP3 at 320 kbps is remarkably transparent for all but a few rare musical instruments, such as castinets and some other percussion. In the codec transparency tests I participated in some years ago with a big group of panelists at the NRC in Ottawa (the same tests were repeated in the UK and Australia with the same A/B/X protocol and test selections), you had to go to lower data rates with MP3 before any audible artifacts showed up. We did about ten different codecs (some were clearly inferior and were rejected). But MP3 at 320 kbps and a couple of others (a Franhauffer codec from Germany as well) were excellent.

Regards,

Alan

Alan, was *.flac part of that comparison? Could you tell the difference between a 320 kbps mp3, a flac file, and a wave file?

Thanks for the informative reply Alan.

Thanks Alan. As always, that was an extremely informative post.

Since I personally didn't do the compression, I was thinking that there could be several reasons why I was dissapointed including the hardware involved, and the original source.

Whenever I buy a new CD, the 1st thing I do is rip it in ITunes and use my media server to stream it to my XBox360 which is connected to my Theater System. When I rip, I rip at 320kbps and I would consider it 95-99% of the fidelity of the orignal.

Fred, I am pretty familiar with that album, and I'd be surprised if you found the CD version as satisfying as the other impeccably-produced disks you mentioned. Like Alan, I don't think it is the (lossy) compression. I've always been disappointed that the production quality of Yes recordings doesn't live up to the level of the virtuosity.

If I was going to spend time ripping my CD collection (and I DID...) I'd rip to FLAC. It takes more space but it is lossless, and there are utilities you can use to convert from FLAC to lower bitrate MP3's for portable devices. Storage is cheap. Just make sure you back-up

I agree with Tom. The early Yes recordings are pretty crappy to say the least which is truly unfortunate. One of the better recorded Yes albums is "Relayer"

Thanks Tom. I guess you have answered several questions for me. There is an audiohpile release of Roundabout that I will probably end up getting.

Unfortunately I don't think the later stuff Yes produced is anywhere near as innovative/interesting as the early albums.

I really liked a few songs on "The Ladder", and the Anderson / Bruford / Wakeman / Howe disk is solid, too.

Other than that, I'm with you. Although I do remember being excited that 90125 came out, because I thought they were Done prior to that. 20 years ago.

I always liked Topographic Oceans more than Relayer. I saw Patrick Moraz in a small venue once; that was fun. I'm going to the Yes show later this summer, and will try to report back. I am managing my expectations.

What is the best choice for an iPud? I could probably do mp3 at 320kbps but all my music might not fit on my little nanos. Right now I think my music takes up about 5gb out of the 8gb available and last I checked most of my music is ripped at 160kbps.

A guess a bigger ipod would be needed?

I didn't know wakeman rejoined the group again later on.

I felt the group lost something when he left. Songs like Owner of a Lonely Heart were commercial drivel.

What is this Yes Show you speak of?

Ooops. Apparently, Yes canceled their 40th Anniversary Tour last Wednesday.

Crud. Nevermind. Where's the Ticketbast@rd Refund line?

David, Alan may not be able to get back to this thread, so I'll comment that since the blind listening tests he described were likely intended to test whether the various lossy compression formats could nevertheless perform transparently, FLAC(free lossless audio compression)wouldn't have been included, since it's lossless and identical to the original data.

I rip everything to FLAC for the Squeezebox and then again as a 256 Kbs MP3 for my portable. I've never tested that rate against anything else. I just picked a number that I figured reasonable topped out the ability of a portable MP3 player and was a balance to allow for more songs in my measly 5GB player. Having a flac version also gives me more comfort when I want to re-encode back to wave to make an audio CD.

Digression....I'm really thinking I need an 80 GB Zune. Nothing bothers me more than when I buy a new CD and have to figure out what I will sacrifice to make room on my MP3 player. They are finally in Canada and at 249 for 80GB, they are probably the best priced, per GB, of the larger, full multimedia players.

I remember seeing Yes for the "union" tour, where all 8 major members were there:

voice: Anderson
guitar: Howe, Rabin
Bass: Squire
Keys: Wakeman, Kaye
Drums: Bruford, White

Great show. The T-shirt has survived 17 years so far.

I plan to eventually rip everything to flac or other lossless.

Funny, I never really looked into seing Yes inconcert after they went downhill. I probably missed out on a few good opportunities.

The thing about bands going downhill is that they tend to keep playing the tried and true good stuff in concert.

Worked for Metallica... Although I still have (insane, I know) hopes that their new album will be decent.

...yeaaah, I'm not getting my hopes up on that one.

I hear the new Metallica album will have a completely different sound. This will mostly be from the fact that Lars' head gets so big he starts using it as a bass drum. He won't even have to stuff a pillow in it to deaden the thump. . .

I've ripped most of my music to MP3 for my ipod at 320K. I played around with variable bit rate mp3 for a while but found it a pain that sometimes the time reported for songs were always way off.

I use my Ipod in a special dock made for my Yamaha reciever and the 320K mp3 sound excellent. If the origional CD sounds better I think it has to do with the fact that the Ipod is analog to the reciever while my Oppo DVD player is digital over coax.