Stereo vs. Joint Stereo

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Lite said:
If to paraphrase effect which we receive from Joint Stereo the virtual increase of bitrate turns out. Really so it is difficult to understand it? I repeat - virtual!
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that which i highlighted above makes no sense whatsoever

its really useless continuing this discussion, no offense but try using simpler english


i'm done with this subject
 
ok then, you didn't reply to my question, but here we go anyway :D

i took a random recent track in WAV quality and extracted a 1-minute part of it. i encoded this part in 4 (well, 5) different ways:

1) 320 kbps joint-stereo
2) 320 kbps stereo
3) 192 kbps joint-stereo
4) 192 kbps stereo
5) uncompressed - original WAV

i jumbled those around and gave the samples random numbers. the original WAV is also provided seperately a second time (labelled as such) for comparison.

all files -----> Index of /blind

everybody is invited to participate! :) but read the rules!

this is supposed to be a blind listening test, which means you may listen only, no looking at spectrograms or comparing files or anything else allowed. listening only!

also this is supposed to be a blind test, which means do not post your results here, instead send me a PM with your results! i will reply and collect the messages and then post the collected results after a while :)

ps: encoder used was LAME 3.98.2 and decoder used was libMAD 0.15.1b.
 
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dfx said:
why don't we all just go back and use uncompressed PCM everywhere?
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i second that motion :iagree: :)

anyway, settings for highest quality mp3s with lame is -b 320 -q0 (lame automatically uses -m j). if that makes an audible difference to -b 320 -h or -b 320 -h -m s is another story.
 
t4e said:
you missed the point i was making....regular listeners don't sit around with headphones, at least not all the time, let alone monitor headphones, they chillout some place in their home with music playing out of the speakers


i tell you what would happen if Dan announced he introduces Join Stereo, the same as it happened when some station switched from 192 to 256,
everyone claimed the sound was better....that's BS, human ear at normal listening can not detect the difference, however the human brain will try to "hear" a better sound because we've been told that higher bitrates have higher quality
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Hehe, I guess I wouldn't know..I don't know anyone that listens to ah, or even any internet radio station. But I listen through headphones to further appreciate the swings from the left channel to the right channel..


As for announcing the difference from 192 to 256..I guess it depends..I know I can clearly distinguish a difference between 192 and 320 with SOME tracks. But some tracks sound the exact same even when I go 192-lossless...

Meh..this is the kind of debate that will never end..sound and hearing is just way too subjective.
 
Tarek said:
Meh..this is the kind of debate that will never end..sound and hearing is just way too subjective.
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word!

also people who state "there is no (audible) difference between bitrate x and bitrate y" are wrong, just because they don't hear it, doesn't mean that no human being can hear it.
 
That's not fair! This slice does not approach for comparison! In it there are no accurately expressed sounds, and one medley. On such sound it is possible to look only on a spectrum. To accurately hear the difference a piece where does audible bits and high frequencies is necessary. For hearing the real sound, instead of medley is necessary.
For this peace low bitrate is enough.
The active site is necessary! Also is desirable a difficult and sharp sound.

Give another material please.
 
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a'ndY said:
i think he was being sarcastic :mask: :wink:

and a 6 hour dj set would nicely fit on a dvd :lol: even on one with only one layer :mask:
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No but I find (and I think almost everyone else does) that blu-ray is a joke..sure you SEE the difference..but I didn't think it was worth paying almost 300$ more than a regular dvd player (back when it came out..now prices are kinda reasonable)...apparently it sounds better too...so what I'm saying is itd be funny to put uncompressed PCM on a blu-ray and just give it out instead of a 192k version on a CD-R.

Not sure if you understood the joke..or if anyone did. I sometimes say things that should've stayed in my brain...for the sake of other people's comprehension motors :P
 
Lite said:
That's not fair! This slice does not approach for comparison! In it there are no accurately expressed sounds, and one medley. To accurately hear the difference a piece where does audible bits and high frequencies is necessary. On such sound it is possible to look only on a spectrum. For hearing the real sound, instead of medley is necessary.
For this peace low bitrate is enough.
The active site is necessary! Also is desirable a difficult and sharp sound.

Give another material please.
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No offense, but the problem with your argument is that what you're saying is 100% true, and I believe it all, but these differences in sound are much more easily perceived in music that uses recordings of real instruments, and not a combination of synths, since I THINK synth sounds are compressed to start with (hell if I know how)..

If you go to head-fi.org, its a community with an insane amount of knowledge about audio engineering and alot of money (to buy ridiculously expensive headphones, amplifiers, Digital to Analog converters, make wire replacements on their headphones..all for the sake of hearing a better sound.

But MOST of these guys all listen to forms of music that have recorded instruments. The limit to how good an EDM track can sound is closer than for recorded instruments (I think).

Another problem is that headphones and speakers also sometimes come hardwired with a custom EQ ..so even if we do take DFX's test, the brands of our sound systems, models, age, and condition are all factors that potentially change our results.

EDIT: btw, at this point shouldnt this thread be moved to Music Discussion?
 
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Tarek said:
No offense, but the problem with your argument is that what you're saying is 100% true, and I believe it all, but these differences in sound are much more easily perceived in music that uses recordings of real instruments, and not a combination of synths, since I THINK synth sounds are compressed to start with (hell if I know how)..
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synths are generated by software, that's what makes them synths, there's nothing there that could be compressed... only samples could be compressed, but every reputable sample packs delivers them as WAVs.

besides that, i think compression artifacts are much more apparent in EDM (esp. in trance) than in recorded audio as it's finely engineered and the noise level is exactly zero. it gives you a blast of sound on the full spectrum of audible audio (and then some), while "analog" music either focuses only on certain parts of the audio spectrum (pop, classic), or goes beyond audibility and lives from distortion (rock, metal), where you can't really distinguish between desired sound and compression artifacts...

which is also why i don't see why the audio sample i selected for the test would be bad, it has sound on the full audio spectrum and clear stereo seperation. shunning it because "it's unusable because you can't hear the difference" kinda proves my point, but i'm willing to cooperate...
 
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a'ndY said:
word!

also people who state "there is no (audible) difference between bitrate x and bitrate y" are wrong, just because they don't hear it, doesn't mean that no human being can hear it.
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sure anyone can hear the difference from 48 to a128 or to 192

however there is no audible difference between 128AAC and 192 or between 192 and 256, and i am talking about the majority of us at normal listening , not freaks that spend outrageous amounts of money on equipment, which are maybe 1 or 2% of the total listeners, and in such case its totally useless to provide something that only a select few will hear
 
a'ndY said:
also people who state "there is no (audible) difference between bitrate x and bitrate y" are wrong, just because they don't hear it, doesn't mean that no human being can hear it.
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i beg to differ. human hearing does have limits, nobody on this planet has "super hearing", which means there is aspects of audio that indeed no human being can hear. dogs maybe, but that's a whole new discussion :)
 
dfx said:
synths are generated by software, that's what makes them synths, there's nothing there that could be compressed... only samples could be compressed, but every reputable sample packs delivers them as WAVs.

besides that, i think compression artifacts are much more apparent in EDM (esp. in trance) than in recorded audio as it's finely engineered and the noise level is exactly zero. it gives you a blast of sound on the full spectrum of audible audio (and then some), while "analog" music either focuses only on certain parts of the audio spectrum (pop, classic), or goes beyond audibility and lives from distortion (rock, metal), where you can't really distinguish between desired sound and compression artifacts...

which is also why i don't see why the audio sample i selected for the test would be bad, it has sound on the full audio spectrum and clear stereo seperation. shunning it because "it's unusable because you can't hear the difference" kinda proves my point, but i'm willing to cooperate...
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Hmm..I would think that regardless of where in the sound spectrum a certain genre hits hard, a recorded instrument will show more signs of compression because the timbre is less accentuated or powerful..the sound gets flatter and flatter. Whereas EDM music is electronic to begin with, and compression ...(not sure how to describe it) "complements it" in a harder-to-notice fashion.

For instance, I think it's easier to discern the differing bitrate of a 10 second excerpt of a saxophone playing, than it is a dreamy trance pad, which would explain why the majority of people that spend loads of money on audio equipment are avid classical,rock,jazz,metal listeners..and not so many EDM listeners.

Heck, the only differing points I can tell of when comparing bitrates of trance tracks are the bass (lower bitrate= shallower bass) and the highs (lower bitrate= duller highs)

Whereas a recorded instrument will sound farther and farther away and the notes wont be as bright as a high bitrate. Think of putting a wall between you and the playing instrument..the lower the bitrate..the thicker the wall.
 
well i can only speak from my own experience. when listening to some non-edm music on youtube, it kinda sounds "normal". not really like the original of course and obviously compressed, but still listenable. trance videos on the other hand sound so bad that it's really obnoxious.

but that is only my personal experience, and i don't claim to be "audiophile", whatever that may be. (some of them are still convinced that vinyl sounds better than cds, heh. go figure.)
 
dfx said:
well i can only speak from my own experience. when listening to some non-edm music on youtube, it kinda sounds "normal". not really like the original of course and obviously compressed, but still listenable. trance videos on the other hand sound so bad that it's really obnoxious.

but that is only my personal experience, and i don't claim to be "audiophile", whatever that may be. (some of them are still convinced that vinyl sounds better than cds, heh. go figure.)
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Thats the problem..like I kept saying..this discussion cannot end ..sound is just too big a variable..
 
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