Digital Audio

     iPods, Mp3 players, cellphones, these are all devices which play digital audio. It is the most popular method of storing and playing music but it is something that has to be done properly to fully enjoy the sound of music. Many people are satisfied with the perfectly decent sound of an average bitrate song being played on Apple ear buds. There is nothing wrong with that but for those who want the best (audiophiles, in this situation) I offer a few tips.

      You may have noticed I used a little known word; bitrate. In music this is used to measure how much information is being played every second, measured in kilobits. The higher the bitrate, the better the sound will be. Now I could go into great detail about the different types of audio compression and file types but it’s not that important. The most important thing to look for in music is what I mentioned above, the bitrate. Anything lower than 200 kbps (kilobits per second) will sound slightly distorted when played on good speakers. A bitrate of 128 kbps or lower is something to avoid at all costs. The sound is terrible and it makes for an unpleasant listening experience. This is the bitrate that the popular Youtube-mp3.org website converts all audio files to, regardless of the original quality. Many people have gotten used to that low quality “music” but for anyone who listens to higher quality audio, the difference is easier to spot than a turtle trying to pass as a sea lion.

I think I just threw up a bit

      The very best audio out there comes in a lossless file. This means that nothing has been compressed, unlike mp3’s. When I acquire music I always look for Flac, M4a or Wave files. These are all lossless encoding formats that boast bitrates ranging from 800 to well over 1000 kbps. The sound is flawless and well worth the added size of the file. If those formats are too hard to find, I’ll look for mp3’s with bitrates of 320 kbps or slightly lower. These aren’t as good as lossless formats but the difference is very subtle and often unnoticeable.

     

It's like music to my ears

You may be asking yourself where to find these types of audio. Since the highest quality stuff that iTunes sells is encoded in their own custom made format, called M4a,

Dat bitrate tho

the music you buy can only be played on Apple devices and some phones. The easiest way, then, to acquire high quality music is to wait for it to fall off the back of the truck. I won’t                                               explain this. Goodnight.



(In the event of a mistake, please inform me)




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