Quote:
Originally Posted by grilldanmo
Many thanks for both files, but I wanted to ask...
Are the FLAC files actually better audio quality or just larger files? How much better are they via Sirius?
Just a question of curiosity as I've DLed both.
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A FLAC file has no compression (therefore they are like a CD), so quality cannot be lower than MP3.
In terms of bitrate a FLAC at 44.1Khz/16bit) has 1411kbps, whereas high quality MP3 go up to 320kbps (which is the way I encode my files).
But this is theory, and I leave tech aspect to people that have more knowledge about the subject.
What I can say is that, in practice, there are few cases of live concerts where I could feel the difference between a ALAC or FLAC and a 320kbps AAC/MP3.
First of all, you need to have good headphones
to tell the difference, and also a good MP3 player or DAC.
Usually I listen music with pretty good devices: a Dragonfly Red DAC attached to my IPhone and Sennheiser HD660s open headset or Fiio F9 Pro in-ear.
Bottom line, I can feel the difference between a FLAC\ALAC and a MP3 only on studio recordings and best quality live releases (like the Central Park). On this ‘96 release I haven’t tried the comparison listening to check the difference, but I am almost sure it is quite insignificant.
In lower quality sources (like tapes) I have never fully understood the reason why the distribution of DMB torrents has always been done using FLAC files. To me is more a kind of “tapers philosophy” than a real advantage.