since Alan Davey has been brought up

[Jonathan Smith]

I am not well up on Apple formats.I recently bought my first iTunes album
(!). The format is 4Ma. is that lossless? It sounds pretty good.

You can only really hear the  difference with headphones or a stereo
I could not afford with the HD formats. There are more issues than just the
file  quality  as you said.


On 27 August 2013 22:01, Carl Edlund Anderson <cea at carlaz.com> wrote:

> On 27 Aug 2013, at 08:23 , Jonathan Smith <smithjm77x7 at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
> >
> > I agree with you. I will buy digital if I can. Mp3s are fine
> > on portable players but not as good as you really want.
>
> My phone carries a subset of my music in a compressed format of course.
> Limitations of current technology. Sounds "good enough" in many
> circumstances. It's not like I have an audiophile system, but I like to
> start with a HQ source, at least. :)
>
> Sure, I've bought 256kbps AACs from iTunes on occasion. They sound fine.
> But I'd be happier having CD quality files -- especially since a physical
> CD often costs the same! I recognize that Apple wants to deliver "one-size
> fits all" audio, and that 256kbps files are more practical on contemporary
> phones. But, still ....
>
> > I gave up LPs two decades ago. They probably sound better  than CDs if
> you
> > have a good  enough system and don't  scratch  them but I am not at all
> > convinced they are better than SACD/ 24-96/192 quality.
>
> Yeah, I haven't seriously listened to vinyl since I was in high school and
> using my parents' phonograph! I think there were some issues while people
> figured out how to master stuff for CDs/digital instead of for vinyl, and
> that contributed to the idea that "vinyl is better".  I mean, there's
> nothing inherently magical about vinyl (leaving aside the rose-tinted
> glasses of nostalgia or pseudo-nostalgia). It was just the most practical
> audio delivery system once upon a time. And, sure, well mastered vinyl on a
> good system will sound better than a cruddily mastered CD or badly ripped
> MP3 on a bad system; no surprises there. But well-produced digital audio on
> an equivalent stereo system will sound as good if not better than
> well-produced vinyl. I mean, it's just physics.
>
> That said, I haven't bothered to start doing my own home-recordings in
> "24/96" (though I think GarageBand supports it). It just wouldn't make a
> lot of difference with the equipment I have, I think (for recording or
> playback). Nor am I mixing for surround sound or 5.1 or something! :D  Much
> of the audio that I might capture at "24/96" is likely to be noises I would
> end up trying mix out anyway! :D
>
>
>
> Cheers,
> Carl
>
> --
> Carl Edlund Anderson
> http://www.carlaz.com/
>