11-07-2007, 03:56 PM
If you digitize at a low bit rate, they just sound like crap...
Apart from that, there are so many things that contribute to how you perceive the sound. If you're in a car, aside from the quality of your car stereo, the speakers, the way you're hooking the MP3 player up to the car stereo, etc, if you're driving, you're not going to focus on the nuances of whatever you are listening to.
Also, if you're listening to stuff that's been in your collection for ages, your perception is going to be filtered based on previous experiences. ("Oh, I love this song..." it's playing more in your head...the stereo is more like a cue card).
If you really want to see if there's a difference, listen to a CD track and a ripped MP3 of the same track on some decent quality headphones.
Regarding digital formats and life-span, etc. If you are ripping LPs, or buying MP3s/AACs (ie: iTunes Music Store), you should save/convert them to AIFF (which is essentially an uncompressed format) and archive them somewhere safe. If they are DRM'd AACs (.m4p) then you have to burn them to an Audio CD format, then reimport them as AIFFs. Then if some future format comes along you've got the audio in a "raw" format that is pretty universal and should give you flexibility.
MP3/AAC gives you convenience/portability (thus the success of the iPod). AACs are a little better in this regard, but fewer devices support the format; MP3 is more universal. At higher bit rates, the quality loss from compression is acceptable for most use. I tend to rip MP3s are 192K and AACs at 160K. But I'll listen to 128K MP3s if that's all I can find. Heck, I listened to a crappy AM/FM clock radio for while and I still got into the music. Isn't that what really matters?
--tg
Apart from that, there are so many things that contribute to how you perceive the sound. If you're in a car, aside from the quality of your car stereo, the speakers, the way you're hooking the MP3 player up to the car stereo, etc, if you're driving, you're not going to focus on the nuances of whatever you are listening to.
Also, if you're listening to stuff that's been in your collection for ages, your perception is going to be filtered based on previous experiences. ("Oh, I love this song..." it's playing more in your head...the stereo is more like a cue card).
If you really want to see if there's a difference, listen to a CD track and a ripped MP3 of the same track on some decent quality headphones.
Regarding digital formats and life-span, etc. If you are ripping LPs, or buying MP3s/AACs (ie: iTunes Music Store), you should save/convert them to AIFF (which is essentially an uncompressed format) and archive them somewhere safe. If they are DRM'd AACs (.m4p) then you have to burn them to an Audio CD format, then reimport them as AIFFs. Then if some future format comes along you've got the audio in a "raw" format that is pretty universal and should give you flexibility.
MP3/AAC gives you convenience/portability (thus the success of the iPod). AACs are a little better in this regard, but fewer devices support the format; MP3 is more universal. At higher bit rates, the quality loss from compression is acceptable for most use. I tend to rip MP3s are 192K and AACs at 160K. But I'll listen to 128K MP3s if that's all I can find. Heck, I listened to a crappy AM/FM clock radio for while and I still got into the music. Isn't that what really matters?
--tg