MP3 versus WAV, FLAC, AIFF, or...

[KLH]

Many beginners ask questions like "which is best, MP3 or ?" I want to give my opinion and open this up to discussion. However, to answer this question properly, you have to understand basics about digital audio and then what works with most DJ software.

[I]Digital Audio Basics

Here's a quick primer on digital audio from the Wiki (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_audio):

A digital audio system starts with an ADC that converts an analog signal to a digital signal.The ADC runs at a sampling rate and converts at a known bit resolution. For example, CD audio has a sampling rate of 44.1 kHz (44,100 samples per second) and 16-bit resolution for each channel... The digital audio signal may be stored or transmitted. Digital audio storage can be on a CD, a digital audio player, a hard drive, USB flash drive, CompactFlash, or any other digital data storage device... Audio data compression techniques — such as MP3, Advanced Audio Coding, Ogg Vorbis, or FLAC — are commonly employed to reduce the file size... The last step is for digital audio to be converted back to an analog signal with a DAC.

So there you have it, digital audio is a representation of analog audio that is limited by how the audio is represented. In the usual form of Pulse Code Modulation (aka PCM), audio is represented by a sample with fixed resolution, called bit depth (16bits for CDs), and a rate of samples, called the sample rate. Together, the sample rate and bit depth determine how accurately the original sound is captured as digital audio. At this sample rate and bit depth, stereo sound uses about 605MB per hour. (http://24bit.turtleside.com/pcm.wav.file.sizes.pdf)

There are many files formats that contain native PCM audio - WAV (popularized on Windows) and AIFF (popularized on MacOS) are just two popular file formats. The common characteristic of PCM audio is that it is large in size. Back in the early 80s, CDs were created to store and playback PCM digital audio.

In the mid 90s, data compression (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_compression_(data)#Audio) techniques became popular that to reduce the amount of data being stored in files. Keeping this simple, two major ways emerged. One was to reduce the amount of data and still ensure that ALL of the original data was recreated - called lossless. The other way was to reduce the data, but not mind so much if some of the original data was lost (reasoning that you wouldn't miss it anyway) - called lossy. Lossless would reduce the file sizes up to 50% (302 MB per hour) and sound the SAME as the original recording. Lossy methods could reduce the file sizes by 80%+... but would reduce sound quality at high compression rates.

Through time the two coding/decoding techniques (called codecs) that became very popular were FLAC for lossless and MPeg 1 layer 3 (aka MP3) for lossy. There are many other codecs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_file_format) for both lossless (i.e. Apple Lossless, WMA Lossless, etc.) and lossy (WMA, M4P, Ogg, etc.).

Skipping how it came to be, let's just cut to the chase and state that MP3 is the most popular of digital audio file formats.

DJ Software Context

Music exists as digital audio files in a variety of codecs - WAV, AIFF, FLAC, MP3, AAC, and more. Many DJ applications playback MP3, WAV, and FLAC. Others playback MP3, AIFF, and AAC. Others still playback MP3, FLAC, and AAC. See the pattern? MP3 is ALWAYS played back by DJ apps. For that reason, most DJs tend to use MP3 as their format of choice.

So Which Is Best?

In terms of recreating the original analag audio with minimal data, technically lossless is best. It has the accuracy of PCM when decompressed AND reduced data size when stored. Still, all DJ apps use MP3s as an accepted format.

So what most DJs tend to do is use the highest data rate in the MP3 format - 320kbps Constant Bit Rate MP3. Doing so is the best compromise between file size and audio quality (assuming that the original recording is of high quality).

So now you know... and knowing is half the battle.

http://cache1.bigcartel.com/product_images/74312121/knowing.jpg

-KLH

[Atomisk]

Good guide. Sticky?

flac/wav ftw. Everything should be in lossless. I see no reason why not - HD space is insanely cheap nowadays.

[miX_]

I buy and rip all my CDs in WAV. External HD [backups] are cheap stuff, good to have. I like to think I'm supporting better quality tracks (from a pure mixdown / mastering standpoint) if labels are noticing people are buying in higher quality. That's what I'd like to promote.

[snoborder101]

The thing is, where are you guys buying your music from? For the longest time I've been buying from itunes 256 AAC. I'd like wav files, but it's expensive enough stocking a library full of music. Beatport is already more expensive than itunes, and then they charge you even more for wav files.

[mrkleen]

Unless you are playing on function one level systems...you are NOT going to hear the difference between a well encoded 320 mp3 and a wav.

[Atomisk]

Unless you are playing on function one level systems...you are NOT going to hear the difference between a well encoded 320 mp3 and a wav.

Lolwut I can hear the difference between 320 and lossless in my HDJ-2000s and those are NOT accurate headphones.

[DJNR]

Good article! I'm waiting for Mostapha's appearance and commentary on this issue :P

[NPC]

Lolwut I can hear the difference between 320 and lossless in my HDJ-2000s and those are NOT accurate headphones.

No, you just think you can. Really mp3@320 rolls off well above most human hearing. Most people can't hear above 17 or 18KHz.

I have a test you can use, I'll dig for it or maybe just make my own. One sec.

[Hamza21]

Lolwut I can hear the difference between 320 and lossless in my HDJ-2000s and those are NOT accurate headphones.

What are saying? You can hear a difference between 320 and lossless version of the same track? Anybody can do that. Or are you saying you can hear a difference an 320 track of one song and lossless track of another song? I highly doubt that! In order for that to be possible you need some frame of reference. If you never heard a song before you definitely can't tell between two different tracks. I've heard Award tour by ATCQ 1,000 of times I couldn't tell the difference between an 320 version or wav version unless played one after the other. I highly doubt you can.

[mostapha]

Good article! I'm waiting for Mostapha's appearance and commentary on this issue :P

Happy to oblige.


No, you just think you can [hear the difference]. Really mp3@320 rolls off well above most human hearing. Most people can't hear above 17 or 18KHz.

I have a test you can use, I'll dig for it or maybe just make my own. One sec.

Last time I did a blind test, I correctly identified the lossless file 100% of the time for 5 tracks with a maximum of 3 listens to the first 5 seconds of each version. It wasn't purely scientific, but the worst score I've gotten was 80%, and that was only allowing 2 listens each to tracks I'd never heard before.

Here's the thing…hard drives, flash storage, and CD-Rs are cheap. The question isn't even whether there's a perceptible difference. There is a difference, hard drives are cheap, and mp3s won't be around forever…so why bother with mp3s? They have no advantages except being supported by everything. All but the cheapest garbage supports wav or aiff as well.


The thing is, where are you guys buying your music from? For the longest time I've been buying from itunes 256 AAC. I'd like wav files, but it's expensive enough stocking a library full of music. Beatport is already more expensive than itunes, and then they charge you even more for wav files.

Boo f***ing hoo. Go look at vinyl prices and come back to me. Beatport is probably the cheapest of the places I shop because most of the rest are either smaller or in the UK.


In order for that to be possible you need some frame of reference.

For me to be 80-100% accurate, yes. But I'm better than random listening to other people's iPods in my car (ripped to wav and put on the iPod vs. bought at iTunes). Never really kept track of it, so IDK if it's significant.

[Era 7]

Good guide. Sticky?

flac/wav ftw. Everything should be in lossless. I see no reason why not - HD space is insanely cheap nowadays.

pff :wang: aiff is where it is at. lossless quality + tags, is recognized by almost any recent software AND is carried as a standard at beatport. WIN. :slayer:

but honestly any lossless format will do. my philosphy is if it is available in lossless then why not? HDDs are huge these days. only a matter of money.

[mrkleen]

Lolwut I can hear the difference between 320 and lossless in my HDJ-2000s and those are NOT accurate headphones.

We are not talking about headphones in your bedroom. We are talking about playing those songs out on loud sound systems in clubs.

If I can get lossless, I do. But 99% of the promos I receive are 320 mp3s. I am on many of the same promo lists as top techno DJs, so if 320 is good enough for Chris Liebing and Carl Cox, it is good enough for me.

[mostapha]

Yeah…it's better to play a bootleg of an awesome track that you recorded onto a walkman in the artist's basement than to not play it…but that's not what this is about either. If it's available lossless, mp3s provide zero benefits. Those tracks aren't available lossless (to you, in that way), so the comparison is moot.

[princesultan]

yup. played on one the other day, 320 still sounds great and all the big time djs play them. no one can hear the difference except maybe tony andrews himself, lol.

[Finnish_Fox]

We are not talking about headphones in your bedroom. We are talking about playing those songs out on loud sound systems in clubs.

So you are acknowledging he can hear the difference in his headphones?

Well, there goes your point... :P

[Finnish_Fox]

yup. played on one the other day, 320 still sounds great and all the big time djs play them. no one can hear the difference except maybe tony andrews himself, lol.

...or anyone that just listens closely.

[mrkleen]

Yeah…it's better to play a bootleg of an awesome track that you recorded onto a walkman in the artist's basement than to not play it…but that's not what this is about either. If it's available lossless, mp3s provide zero benefits. Those tracks aren't available lossless (to you, in that way), so the comparison is moot.

The benefit is it doesnt take a hour to download a track you received from a mate in the UK.

I am all for the theoretical world where Tony Andrews lives - where everyone has 50K dollars for a pair of speakers and flawless tube amps and processing and wav files are the bare minimum, but in the real world, 320 is what most people are playing and it does just fine for 99% of all applications.

[tekno_violet]

Snoborder, on beatport just stockpile the music you want in your hold bin then after a few weeks find a promocode online for around 25% off and buy up whats in your hold bin. That'll make up for the extra cost for loss-less.

[mrkleen]

So you are acknowledging he can hear the difference in his headphones?

Well, there goes your point... :P

Unless you have 500 people inside his headphones, NO that doesnt refute my point at all. :rolleyes:

[mostapha]

The benefit is it doesnt take a hour to download a track you received from a mate in the UK.

Weird. It doesn't take that long to download an 80MB file for me. Maybe if someone's internet sucks. Still…how much of a hurry are you in? Still quicker than mailing them.

[Finnish_Fox]

Unless you have 500 people inside his headphones, NO that doesnt refute my point at all. :rolleyes:

What does 500 people have to do with him being able to distinguish between a .WAV and 320kbps? Wasn't the issue whether a difference could be heard between a lossless .WAV and a 320kbps, with you arguing that no difference can be heard? Seemed to me that, later, you acknowledged a difference could be heard but not on a huge system. :shrug:

Either way, 98% of the general public won't notice a difference.

[mrkleen]

What does 500 people have to do with him being able to distinguish between a .WAV and 320kbps? Wasn't the issue whether a difference could be heard between a lossless .WAV and a 320kbps, with you arguing that no difference can be heard? Seemed to me that, later, you acknowledged a difference could be heard but not on a huge system. :shrug:

Nope. Maybe you should go back and read my first post


Unless you are playing on function one level systems...you are NOT going to hear the difference between a well encoded 320 mp3 and a wav.


Either way, 98% of the general public won't notice a difference.

So now you are agreeing with me? Nice one. :tup:

[Finnish_Fox]

Nope. Maybe you should go back and read my first post

Was this your first post? And here was his response to the post I've quoted:



Unless you are playing on function one level systems...you are NOT going to hear the difference between a well encoded 320 mp3 and a wav.


Lolwut I can hear the difference between 320 and lossless in my HDJ-2000s and those are NOT accurate headphones.

Unless I am missing something...

You: "You cannot hear the difference between a .WAV and a good 320kbps .MP3 unless it is on this one particular soundsystem."
Him: "Umm, I can hear the difference in my headphones, actually."
You: "Yah, but thats not a club with 500 people in it."

So, while your point may have been that the overwhelming majority of people will not notice the difference on a large/powerful/good soundsystem, its not really what you said, at least from what I can tell.

Am I missing something? :shrug:


So now you are agreeing with me? Nice one. :tup:

To play semantics, 98% of the public means that some people can tell the difference which isn't exactly what you said in the first place.

Sounds like we are on the same page overall.

[mostapha]

Either way, 98% of the general public won't notice a difference. 98% of the general public won't notice the difference between a good track and an awesome one either……and it's their loss. Quality should be no different.


You: "You cannot hear the difference between a .WAV and a good 320kbps .MP3 unless it is on this one particular soundsystem."
Him: "Umm, I can hear the difference in my headphones, actually."
You: "Yah, but thats not a club with 500 people in it."

So, while your point may have been that the overwhelming majority of people will not notice the difference on a large/powerful/good soundsystem, its not really what you said, at least from what I can tell.

Am I missing something?

Yes. MrKleen used "you" as a generic 3rd person pronoun–which should technically have been "one"–because American English has pretty much dropped that pronoun from its vocabulary. You inferred the 2nd person singular pronoun.

I also disagree with his post in that it doesn't take nearly a Function One system to hear the difference. I can hear it on my HD-25s and KRK RP5s. I can also hear it on NS-10s and nice, big main monitoring systems. I think I'd be less likely to hear it on Function One, but only because the only ones I've heard are so loud I wouldn't listen without earplugs. And the earplugs obscure the system's noise floor……which would make hearing reverb tails disappear more difficult. I don't know if I could ABX the difference while wearing plugs. And I can't do it at club volumes because I'm not willing to listen to anything that loud without protection.

Then again, maybe I'm missing something. At any rate…it's not relevant.

We've all come to basically the same agreement (that there is a difference and that it's audible to a non-zero amount of people) and just differ on what compromises we're willing to make in the hard drive space and transfer time vs. objective quality battle. I know what I want to do, and I don't really care what other people do except that I haven't yet heard a really good argument for lossy compression. Maybe 10 years ago…but not today.

Lets just say that if Apple made their entire iTunes library available as DRM-Free lossless files…they'd make a lot of money, because I'd probably re-buy my entire listening collection of hip hop and country in one fell swoop.

(disclaimer: I don't just listen to hip hop and country when I'm not DJing, but it's funnier that way)

[Finnish_Fox]

98% of the general public won't notice the difference between a good track and an awesome one either……and it's their loss. Quality should be no different.

True that.


Yes. MrKleen used "you" as a generic 3rd person pronoun–which should technically have been "one"–because American English has pretty much dropped that pronoun from its vocabulary. You inferred the 2nd person singular pronoun.

Well, the other guy did. I was just supporting what he said... Even still, you still doesn't make it 100% of the time. Haha.


Then again, maybe I'm missing something. At any point…it's not relevant. We've all come to basically the same agreement (that there is a difference and that it's audible to a non-zero amount of people) and just differ on what compromises we're willing to make in the hard drive space and transfer time vs. objective quality battle.

/Thread.

[mrkleen]

Unless I am missing something...

You: "You cannot hear the difference between a .WAV and a good 320kbps .MP3 unless it is on this one particular soundsystem."
Him: "Umm, I can hear the difference in my headphones, actually."
You: "Yah, but thats not a club with 500 people in it."

So, while your point may have been that the overwhelming majority of people will not notice the difference on a large/powerful/good soundsystem, its not really what you said, at least from what I can tell.

Yes you are totally missing the point. My point was that unless you are listening on a very very good sound system, or on a critical listening device like a pair of headphones an inch from your ear drum - you will not be able to hear the difference...and even if you can, the difference will be minuscule.

Maybe you play in rooms full of audiophiles, on pristine sound systems....but I doubt it. If anyone on this board has experience with this, it is Prince Sultan - who regularly plays at Stereo in Montreal, one of the 5 or 10 best sound systems in the world.

If HE can not hear the difference and (correctly) states that most guest DJs who he opens for are playing 320 mp3s - then I guess I dont get your point.

Take your average clubber, plop him down in the middle of a dancefloor at 5 a.m. - give him 100 db of sound ratting through a mediocre sound system - 5 Vodka Red Bulls and 2 pills - 1 girl whispering in his ear and 5 mates yelling at him....then add 500 other punters doing the same. You would NEVER hear a difference...and neither would any audiophile.

A bunch of bedroom DJs on this board claiming they can hear a difference between the wav and mp3 version of a song they are listening to in their headphones means NOTHING in the real world.

[Finnish_Fox]

Yes you are totally missing the point. My point was that unless you are listening on a very very good sound system, or on a critical listening device like a pair of headphones an inch from your ear drum - you will not be able to hear the difference...and even if you can, the difference will be minuscule.

That definitely wasn't clear the way you wrote it... even Mostapha misread it.


Maybe you play in rooms full of audiophiles, on pristine sound systems....but I doubt it. If anyone on this board has experience with this, it is Prince Sultan - who regularly plays at Stereo in Montreal, one of the 5 or 10 best sound systems in the world.

I do... First and foremost, I am my own primary audience. If I am not making mixes, I enjoy, I'd stop mixing. I mostly listen to my own mixes in the car or on personal listening devices, so I notice the difference, personally.

Would that stop me from playing 320kpbs files out and about? No... precisely because I know that 98% won't notice it and most soundsystems are not good enough to hear it.


If HE can not hear the difference and (correctly) states that most guest DJs who he opens for are playing 320 mp3s - then I guess I dont get your point.

So, just because one person who regularly plays on a superb sounndsystem can't tell the difference, no one can? Not sure I follow that logic. My point is that the difference is audible to some people in certain situations. You didn't exactly specify the situation in which the difference is noticeable or not which is where the disagreement arose.

Most people won't notice it on most systems...


Take your average clubber, plop him down in the middle of a dancefloor at 5 a.m. - give him 100 db of sound ratting through a mediocre sound system - 5 Vodka Red Bulls and 2 pills - 1 girl whispering in his ear and 5 mates yelling at him....then add 500 other punters doing the same. You would NEVER hear a difference...and neither would any audiophile.

http://t0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSzCiPa14SS-9eUUPi-IShR4yRBa0Qdk51WEHbBFZL_gLjizfc5&t=1

You mean on someone would have a tough time distinguishing track quality through a mediocre source (with or without booze and drugs)? Go figure.


A bunch of bedroom DJs on this board claiming they can hear a difference between the wav and mp3 version of a song they are listening to in their headphones means NOTHING in the real world.

It means nothing except that they notice a difference in their headphones which is precisely what the guy said.

...and get off your "I'm a big club DJ" high horse buddy.

[mrkleen]

...and get off your "I'm a big club DJ" high horse buddy.

....and get off your, I give "theoretical" advice to people because I dont have any practical, real world advice to give horse buddy.

The last thing kids out here need is a bunch of BS about worrying that the songs they get on Itunes and Beatport are not high quality enough to play out with. You guys keep worrying about bit rate...while the rest of us will go out make a living with our mp3s.

[mostapha]

And I've said more than once that a good enough song means "screw quality." But there's still no reason to choose worse quality if you don't have to.

You're right, though…it's not a big enough issue to fight about.

[Moss]

My personal opinion on this is that to really hear the difference in quality , you have to be in the perfect situation. If a club has a djm 800 for example & a decent sound system, you wont hear a noticeable the difference. Your sound quality will be as good as your least good piece of equipment (whether it's cables , sound card , cdj's , mixer , speakers ...). I wish I could get all the tracks I want on wav or aiff , but it ain't the case.

At a club event I did with my buddy , we made a test. He was using his sl-3 and I was using my sl-1. He was always clipping the output of serato and the mixer's channel. Even though his sl-3 is superior in sound quality then my sl-1, I still had a much cleaner output.

(Sorry if my english is not perfect , it's not my fluent language :))

[DJNR]

If you can house the better quality tracks (in regards to space and budget), great, play them because it doesn't hurt. If you can't, no big deal as long as you can get a decent version of a track.

[Smallz]

One thing I want to make note is that WAVs are a little annoying when it comes to tagging the track, so MP3, FLAC and AIFF are better in that instance.

That is all.

[princesultan]

it really is the same debate over and over and over again. there will always be those who claim that it must be .wav or nothing since the difference between 320 is "noticeably" different. if you're gigging, bottom line is this... if 320 is good enough for 98% of the touring djs out there, then it's good enough for anyone on this board. if you're just playing at home, then stick with what makes you happy.