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Apple Music Announces Spatial Audio and Lossless Audio

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Re: Apple Music Announces Spatial Audio and Lossless Audio

#151

Post by ErneX »

intrasight wrote: post #138
yRbfmm1rVg8K5TR wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You may have missed this footnote at the bottom: > Due to the large file sizes and bandwidth needed for Lossless and Hi-Res Lossless Audio, subscribers will need to opt in to the experience. Hi-Res Lossless also requires external equipment, such as a USB digital-to-analog converter (DAC).

I saw that too, but they didn't really give any context. Is Apple saying that the iPhone DAC is insufficient? Or Macs? Or something else?

They are saying exactly that, the DACs they ship are not ideal for hires audio.

Re: Apple Music Announces Spatial Audio and Lossless Audio

#152

Post by schmorptron »

Wow, I've been using Apple Music on trial to see how it's different from spotify and with this news + Spotify now selling pseudo-ads in the forms of playlist and recommendation algorithm placements for less artist royalties I'll stay with Apple for sure.

One thing that really differentiates it is that the curated playlists seem a lot more cared for than with Spotify. I've found so many of the pre-made playlists that I enjoy, and with Spotify you just can't really do that since you never know what's really there because the curator liked it and what's there because the label paid for it. Fun fact: The Apple Music Android app is suprisingly decent!

Re: Apple Music Announces Spatial Audio and Lossless Audio

#153

Post by tobyhinloopen »

objclxt wrote: post #96
tobyhinloopen wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have plastic shiny disks that are DRM free. They’re actually pretty great, lossless, and no monthly fees. They are called _Compact Discs_ and you can get them pretty cheap these days!

> They’re actually pretty great, lossless CDs aren't lossless unless the material was recorded at or below 16 bit/44.1kHz. You can argue whether the difference is perceptible - some blind studies suggest not - but this fact is what led to a variety of semi-obscure audiophile disc formats that offered higher sampling rates ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Audio_CD ).

Ok, when people talk about _lossless_ streaming, they usually want their stream to match CD quality.

Also, I’m aware SACDs exists. I actually have an amp that can decode DSD encoded audio but I failed to hear a difference.

Re: Apple Music Announces Spatial Audio and Lossless Audio

#154

Post by [deleted] »

cies wrote: post #132
StavrosK wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why does any of this matter? The point of a blind ABX test (and the whole question) is to see whether you can tell the difference between two formats. If you can, you can. Personally, I stop being able to tell somewhere around 200 kbit MP3s (with cheap equipment), anything above that is wasted space. You can run the tests as much as you want, if the hypothesis is that "people can't tell the difference between lossles…

> I stop being able to tell somewhere around 200 kbit MP3s (with cheap equipment) Yups. Me too. Even with cheap professional equipment I cannot hear the difference of lossless vs >= 192kbps MP3. > anything above that is wasted space. Unless you want to mix/remix/etc. Changing the pitch brings out the artifacts.

[deleted]

Re: Apple Music Announces Spatial Audio and Lossless Audio

#155

Post by fullstop »

marcodiego wrote: post #126
fullstop wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't carry a few thousand of those with me at all times, though. I hear what you're saying, but the convenience of a vast and portable library is compelling.

Except for convenience, since they're DRM free I don't believe there is any, even legal, reason not to rip it to an SD-card.

More and more phones are removing uSD card support. It's a losing battle.

I don't want the plastic, the physical storage requirements, etc, of a CD. With digital I don't "own" the music, sure, but I've definitely lost more music in my life from scratched discs, people not returning CDs than I ever will through Spotify.

Re: Apple Music Announces Spatial Audio and Lossless Audio

#156

Post by criddell »

josteink wrote: post #18

> By default, Apple Music will automatically play Dolby Atmos tracks on all AirPods and Beats headphones with an H1 or W1 chip, as well as the built-in speakers in the latest versions of iPhone, iPad, and Mac. Apple TV seems oddly missing in that list. Edit: If anything is to be expected to be connected to a surround Atmos setup, it would be a TV-room audio-setup. Edit 2: Confirmed supported.

It's interesting to me that they announce a high-end audio feature a month after they discontinue their high-end speakers. I realize the big HomePod wasn't selling well, but it seems like they should have a decent Apple speaker.

Re: Apple Music Announces Spatial Audio and Lossless Audio

#157

Post by marcan_42 »

andybak wrote: post #137
marcan_42 wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is largely because MP3 is a crappy, old format. Try high-bitrate Opus on most samples and you're a lot less likely to get above-chance results on an ABX test, pretty much ever, at high bitrates. Ultimately though, lossy compression is always program-dependent ("program" here means the song, not the app). The encoders use psychoacoustic algorithms, and there is no way to prove they will perform well on all sample…

MP3 with a good compressor and reasonable bitrate has repeatedly shown to be indistinguishable from uncompressed. The reason to avoid mp3 is to be able to squeeze the bitrate and save on storage bandwidth - but that has mattered less year on year. I'm personally baffled and irritated by this move from Apple. They'll be selling healing crystals next.

> MP3 with a good compressor and reasonable bitrate has repeatedly shown to be indistinguishable from uncompressed.

With most samples, yes. The issue, as I said, is that psychoacoustic codecs are basically heuristic by definition, and so you can pretty much always find counterexamples. It's possible to say 320kbps MP3 is indistinguishable from uncompressed for most samples; it is not possible to say it is indistinguishable for all samples, present and future.

It's also the case that lossy encoding is a bad idea if you're going to be further processing the audio in any way; repeated transcodes definitely start bringing out the artifacts more. So lossless music is always something worth having as an option.

Now, when you start talking about "high-resolution" 96/192k 24b stuff... yeah, that's just as good as healing crystals.

Re: Apple Music Announces Spatial Audio and Lossless Audio

#158

Post by chrisseaton »

tobyhinloopen wrote: post #44
cies wrote: post #23

From the article: > J Balvin said: [...] With Lossless, everything in the music is going to sound bigger and stronger but more importantly, it will be better quality. [...] There have been tests showing we cannot hear the difference between minimally lossy audio (e.g. mp3 320kbps) and lossless. But Balvin can. And it sounds "bigger and stronger". The extra quality of lossless is nice when mixing/remixing the sound, a…

I have plastic shiny disks that are DRM free. They’re actually pretty great, lossless, and no monthly fees. They are called _Compact Discs_ and you can get them pretty cheap these days!

Who still has a CD player? Most people don't want to carry around an extra, enormous, mechanical, device.

Re: Apple Music Announces Spatial Audio and Lossless Audio

#159

Post by mlacks »

Its too bad that Sony - among others - have been doing their own interpretation of this for a long time, but don:t have the marketing budget or presence of mind in the broader market for people to notice. The Apple machine (i use an iPhone and M1 mini - love them) is just so OP

Sony 360 Reality Audio https://www.tomsguide.com/how-to/what-is-sony-360-reality-au...

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