So...what exactly is the difference between 128kbps-360(i think?)kbps, lossless, flac, and all that?
Is it really worth all that quality for the size you're getting (I don't really understand this either)?

Basically, I'm asking for a crashcourse in sound quality (or a link to one)

Anyone help?

Honestly, I have no clue.


But, on my PSP & IPOD, I can't tell the difference.

Lol I once studied to get acces to what.cd, still I don't have acces, but okay heres the thing I learned.

audio such as mp3, wma (not lossless) and ogg are lossyless audio formats, like mp3 they have bitrates that vary but mostly up to 320Kbps.

320Kbps sounds better and fuller than 128Kbps, and sometimes you can hear that really annoying flying bites sound in the background. (you know the annoying sound when you have like a soundfile with only 64kbps.)

Now lossless are audioformats like APE, CUE and FLAC, they have bitrates that go over 320kbps and are excellent for publication on a cd.

You can't just convert lossless to lossyless, and offcourse you can't convert lossyless to lossless with the thought that it will be better quality.

If you want to convert lossless to lossyless, first convert it to uncompressed wave and then to mp3 or whatever format you want. (If you convert it directly to lossyless then you lose too much information at once.)

Good question! I'm kinda stingy about audio files I download and their quality, so I'll see if I can lend you some insight here. (Forgive the lengthiness!)

The most important determining characteristic is whether the audio format used is lossy or lossless. If you know some stuff about digital imaging, this is like the difference between a bitmap image and a JPEG image. Bitmap files consist of a list of colors for every pixel. JPEG (put simply) indexes colors of an image and then describes each pixel by the index position. Lossless formats contain as much data as the original release CD, and each format uses varying methods to reduce the file's size while still containing all this information, like compressing files with a ZIP or RAR archive. Wave files (*.wav) are lossless and use no means to decrease their filesize; consequently, a full 74-minute music CD in WAV format is ~650MB. Some lossless format examples are FLAC, WavPack, or Monkey's Audio, each of which can reduce a full CD's audio to around 400MB. (For more details and size comparisons between formats, see this page (http://www.bobulous.org.uk/misc/lossless_audio_2006.html).)

Lossy formats, on the other hand, do not attempt to preserve all information. Consequently, a wide range of compression strengths can be used. Compression strength is usually expressed in terms of an audio file's bitrate. The bitrate is roughly translatable as how much information is stored for every sample of audio. The lowest bitrate you usually see these days is about 128 kbps. As far as I know, this is what the iTunes store uses -- well, it used to (now apparently they have higher bitrates for new trendy stuff). 128kbps is generally regarded as undesirable by music/tech nerds, as the human ear is still able to distinguish interference and artifacts at this level; you know, audio files that sound like they're being played through a tin can. I think YouTube videos' audio is usually somewhere between 64 and 128 kbps. tl;dr: 128kbps is low.

It's also important to consider - as was mentioned above - the format of the file. MP3 is the most widely-used standard as its support is almost universal; however, you will occasionally see other formats too... There are a couple reasons for this: MP3 is not an open-source codec, which upsets a lot of the more informed nerds - ya know, the Linuxy types, or the people that hate corporations - whatever. Beyond this, it's not the best audio format; others are more efficient, particularly at certain subsets of audio - there are formats that excel at encoding purely the human voice, formats that excel at compromising quality vs. filesize, etc. However, their advantages are somewhat diminished due to their less-universal support. The most common alternatives to MP3 that fall within the same category (namely, lossless) are Ogg Vorbis (usually *.ogg), Windows Media Audio (*.wma), or Advanced Audio Coding (Apple's format of choice; typically *.aac afaik).

For me, personally... I encode music I download and obtain to CBR MP3 files at between 192 and 256kbps. I use 256 for stuff I really enjoy, 192 (or sometimes even 160) for the rest to save a bit of disk space. Typically, 80 minutes of audio encoded with MP3@256kbps will occupy about 144MB; encoded at 1920kbps, probably around 120 to 130. I personally feel that 320kbps is overkill, but that's just me.

Those are usually the most important characteristics in terms of audio file quality; things like its frequency and whether it's encoded via CBR or VBR are less important... if you would like to know more or have a specific question, feel free to post back here or send me an email. :)

I won't go into much detail right now, but I wanted to throw this into the mix since no one has really mentioned yet:

Whether or not the quality of audio files in lossless format are worth all the extra space they take up -- in contrast to the relatively small amount of space audio files in lossy format need -- somewhat depends on the medium being used to play the audio files.

Lol I once studied to get acces to what.cd, still I don't have acces, but okay heres the thing I learned.

Umm, no offense to the poster - seriously, none is intended... But if you want to understand the differences, do not read a single word this good gentleman wrote.


audio such as mp3, wma (not lossless) and ogg are lossyless audio formats, like mp3 they have bitrates that vary but mostly up to 320Kbps.

What is lossyless? Please don't invent new words that don't mean anything and confuse the issue. There are two kinds of audio encoding:

LOSSY: This method (MP3, WMA, OGG, etc) throws away information that the human ear can't discern, and reduces the amount of space required to store audio as a result. The amount of information thrown away (and therefore, the quality loss) is decided by the bitrate. The higher the bitrate, the less information is thrown away, and the better the audio sounds. It is called LOSSY because there is LOSS of sound quality.

LOSSLESS: This method takes a sound file, and makes it occupy less disk space - but has no effect whatsoever on the audio quality. It does not throw away data. It simply stores the data which is there, more efficiently. The space savings will be less than with lossy encoding, but you will know that the sound quality is the very best it can be. It is called LOSSLESS because there is *NO LOSS* of sound quality.


320Kbps sounds better and fuller than 128Kbps, and sometimes you can hear that really annoying flying bites sound in the background. (you know the annoying sound when you have like a soundfile with only 64kbps.)

This is true. A higher bitrate will always sound better, because the codec is having to make fewer compromises to squash the data into a smaller space. Most audio enthusiasts agree that MP3 at 128kbps is fairly poor quality. Some kinds of music will compress better. The more complex the music (sonically) the harder it will be to compress. 320kbps is STILL LOSSY, and there is still a difference - but it is harder to discern. In listening tests, most people are satisfied with 192kbps or above, and very few individuals can tell the difference between the original and an MP3 at 320kbps.


Now lossless are audioformats like APE, CUE and FLAC, they have bitrates that go over 320kbps and are excellent for publication on a cd.

CUE is not an audio format. It is a text file that contains timings and track titles. It is used in combination with another file (which does contain audio). If you have a CD ripped to one, continuous audio file, you can use the information in the CUE file to split it back into tracks. Classical music (and other kinds of music occasionally) is often distributed like this because MP3 does not (very well) support gapless playback. (IE, if you have a song which spreads over two tracks, and you encode them as two MP3s, there will be a skip in the audio playback - the two MP3s will not play seamlessly.)

The bitrates are not set - they vary, EXCLUSIVELY according to how simple it is to encode a particular piece of music. You can encode perfect silence losslessly - at a minimal bitrate. You can encode very simple sounds (say, a sine wave) losslessly at a minimal bitrate. A lossless codec will largely dictate the bitrate to YOU, although most offer a way to encode *faster* at the cost of you ending up with a larger file. You can choose between slow, efficient coding, and faster, less efficient coding. There is *no difference* between the sound quality of the finished product - the only consideration is that one takes less time to encode than the other.


You can't just convert lossless to lossyless, and offcourse you can't convert lossyless to lossless with the thought that it will be better quality.

You can convert lossless to lossy, and your result will be exactly as if you had ripped a CD to a lossy audio format. Depending on the quality of the lossy codec you use, you will be able to get very good results.

You CANNOT convert lossy audio to a lossless format with the view to "reclaiming" lost quality. If you encode a song off a CD to 128kbps MP3, and it sounds like crap - you *cannot* turn that MP3 into a FLAC, APE, or whatever and expect it to sound like the original CD. It will sound like the MP3 did. It will be an exact, LOSSLESS COPY of what was inside that MP3! And it will be a massively big file. You *CAN* convert lossy audio to a lossless format if you WANT TO, but I'm hard pressed to think of a good reason why you'd need to.


If you want to convert lossless to lossyless, first convert it to uncompressed wave and then to mp3 or whatever format you want. (If you convert it directly to lossyless then you lose too much information at once.)

Absolutely not true.

Lossless and uncompressed wave is exactly the same thing. The audio inside the files is identical.

You can convert lossless audio to MP3/OGG/whatever in one step. Any decent encoder can do this. Do NOT waste time turning it into an (even bigger) uncompressed WAVE - it is a waste of time and disk space. Your quality gain is 0.

Umm, no offense to the poster - seriously, none is intended... But if you want to understand the differences, do not read a single word this good gentleman wrote.



What is lossyless? Please don't invent new words that don't mean anything and confuse the issue. There are two kinds of audio encoding:

LOSSY: This method (MP3, WMA, OGG, etc) throws away information that the human ear can't discern, and reduces the amount of space required to store audio as a result. The amount of information thrown away (and therefore, the quality loss) is decided by the bitrate. The higher the bitrate, the less information is thrown away, and the better the audio sounds. It is called LOSSY because there is LOSS of sound quality.

LOSSLESS: This method takes a sound file, and makes it occupy less disk space - but has no effect whatsoever on the audio quality. It does not throw away data. It simply stores the data which is there, more efficiently. The space savings will be less than with lossy encoding, but you will know that the sound quality is the very best it can be. It is called LOSSLESS because there is *NO LOSS* of sound quality.



This is true. A higher bitrate will always sound better, because the codec is having to make fewer compromises to squash the data into a smaller space. Most audio enthusiasts agree that MP3 at 128kbps is fairly poor quality. Some kinds of music will compress better. The more complex the music (sonically) the harder it will be to compress. 320kbps is STILL LOSSY, and there is still a difference - but it is harder to discern. In listening tests, most people are satisfied with 192kbps or above, and very few individuals can tell the difference between the original and an MP3 at 320kbps.



CUE is not an audio format. It is a text file that contains timings and track titles. It is used in combination with another file (which does contain audio). If you have a CD ripped to one, continuous audio file, you can use the information in the CUE file to split it back into tracks. Classical music (and other kinds of music occasionally) is often distributed like this because MP3 does not (very well) support gapless playback. (IE, if you have a song which spreads over two tracks, and you encode them as two MP3s, there will be a skip in the audio playback - the two MP3s will not play seamlessly.)

The bitrates are not set - they vary, EXCLUSIVELY according to how simple it is to encode a particular piece of music. You can encode perfect silence losslessly - at a minimal bitrate. You can encode very simple sounds (say, a sine wave) losslessly at a minimal bitrate. A lossless codec will largely dictate the bitrate to YOU, although most offer a way to encode *faster* at the cost of you ending up with a larger file. You can choose between slow, efficient coding, and faster, less efficient coding. There is *no difference* between the sound quality of the finished product - the only consideration is that one takes less time to encode than the other.



You can convert lossless to lossy, and your result will be exactly as if you had ripped a CD to a lossy audio format. Depending on the quality of the lossy codec you use, you will be able to get very good results.

You CANNOT convert lossy audio to a lossless format with the view to "reclaiming" lost quality. If you encode a song off a CD to 128kbps MP3, and it sounds like crap - you *cannot* turn that MP3 into a FLAC, APE, or whatever and expect it to sound like the original CD. It will sound like the MP3 did. It will be an exact, LOSSLESS COPY of what was inside that MP3! And it will be a massively big file. You *CAN* convert lossy audio to a lossless format if you WANT TO, but I'm hard pressed to think of a good reason why you'd need to.



Absolutely not true.

Lossless and uncompressed wave is exactly the same thing. The audio inside the files is identical.

You can convert lossless audio to MP3/OGG/whatever in one step. Any decent encoder can do this. Do NOT waste time turning it into an (even bigger) uncompressed WAVE - it is a waste of time and disk space. Your quality gain is 0.
lol Thanky you for explaining.

I fail at audio formats, but honestly, I don't care about bitrates.

Well, neither do I really - if it sounds good, that's enough for me. :)