Lossless Vs. Lossy

[elviscaprice]

It's time to start a thread here to explain why lossless over lossy and how to do it. If some of the audiophiles would like to pipe in, please be welcome, since my work tends to focus more on film than audio.

Why lossless in an analog capture? What does this mean?
What I'm really talking about is sampling. In any digital conversion from analog you are really sampling. There is no limit to sampling since you can never reach infinity. Fortunately there is a point where it becomes extremely minute to sample any further.
Is it possible to oversample? Not really if you have the means to handle those samples. Such as some folks here can't even sample to the bear minimum Wav 44.1khz 16 bit file size.
Why is it good to make huge sampled transfers in lossless wrapers?
Such as Wav. Because this will allow the person who goes to remaster more leeway in the mastering process. Thus a better sounding file in the end product.

I am by no means an expert on this subject so I hope some other folks can pipe in on equipment flows to techniques.

[8D] Elvis

[elviscaprice]

Personally, I prefer at the minimum in todays world a lossless audio file. Meaning a lossless wav or flac file. I won't even waste my time with MP3's, for me the sound quality is that much different and very noticeable. As far as miniature audio devices, in todays age with very large hard drives in smaller packages it is very doable to not have to ever use lossy audio files. Devices exist that handle these files.
As far as sharing music files, I guess choosy beggars can't complain. But folks that do share lossless quality files do appreciate similar quality in return. It's like sharing candy, someone gives you a chocolate bar, are you going to hand them a red hot in return or another chocolate bar.

I guess it all comes down to this. Do you care?? If so, then wouldn't you want to make the best possible transfer as possible? Don't you owe it to the original artist? Isn't there a responsibility in making a quality transfer that doesn't make the original recording worse but maybe even better?
We all demand it of the record companies, shouldn't it apply to us also?


[8D] Elvis

[elviscaprice]

The place to start, I think is in the equipment. Besides a quality turntable, I think the most important piece of gear is the ADC, analog digital converter. A good ADC whether stand alone or inserted into a PC, can go a long way to providing a quality transfer. I am cheap, I use an old Creative Labs Sound Blaster stand alone usb hub. Works great for a basic transfer of analog audio to digital in Wav. Here is a newer one similar to mine.

http://www.amazon.com/Creative-Sound-Bl ... er+x-fi+hd
Note:
The sound system features an integrated phono preamp, which allows users to create recordings directly from a turntable. The preamp uses RIAA equalization to minimize loss of quality during analog-to-digital conversion.

I'm hoping someone else can input some information here about quality ADC devices, I'm getting in over my head here, lol.

On the other end of the spectrum, like this Benchmark stand alone ADC,
http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/ ... hmark_adc1

[obs]

FYI, you're mixing up two different things: "lossless" and "compressed". One is not exclusive to the other.

FLAC is lossless AND it is compressed.
Dolby TrueHD is lossless and compressed.
DTS HD is lossless and compressed.

What you're talking about is "lossless" vs "lossy (compression)".

[elviscaprice]

[quote][i]Originally posted by obs[/i]
<br>FYI, you're mixing up two different things: "lossless" and "compressed". One is not exclusive to the other.

FLAC is lossless AND it is compressed.
Dolby TrueHD is lossless and compressed.
DTS HD is lossless and compressed.

What you're talking about is "lossless" vs "lossy (compression)".
[/quote]

Thank you, Obs, for clarifying my terminology.
I have changed the threads to reflect your input.

[the_moth]

Please read this interesting article on the topic, which explains why 24bit/192kHz audio files make no sense over 16bit/44kHz for music playback: http://xiph.org/~xiphmont/demo/neil-young.html

The obscure music that I can find or transfer in FLAC I will of course keep in that format. I like to think that I can hear a difference to lossy formats but deep in my heart I know that I would fail a blind experiment comparing FLAC and 192-320 kbps. I guess it's just superstition [}:)]

[Danielwaver]

Pops and clicks on an old vinyl sound soooo good when listened to in FLAC format. [:D]

[elviscaprice]

[quote][i]Originally posted by Danielwaver[/i]
<br>Pops and clicks on an old vinyl sound soooo good when listened to in FLAC format. [:D]
[/quote]

So you compress the hell out of it with the lossy MP3 codec until you've eliminated enough detail that it takes out the pops and clicks? [:D]
Elvis
Or do you want to learn some remastering techniques so as not to harm the sound you have captured but eliminate the pops and clicks?

[elviscaprice]

[quote][i]Originally posted by the_moth[/i]
<br>Please read this interesting article on the topic, which explains why 24bit/192kHz audio files make no sense over 16bit/44kHz for music playback: http://xiph.org/~xiphmont/demo/neil-young.html

The obscure music that I can find or transfer in FLAC I will of course keep in that format. I like to think that I can hear a difference to lossy formats but deep in my heart I know that I would fail a blind experiment comparing FLAC and 192-320 kbps. I guess it's just superstition [}:)]
[/quote]

Hey Moth, great article. I agree with the listening part of 16 bit/44khz being more than sufficient. Disagree on the capablility to hear the difference of lossless over lossy, which is noticeable in degree depending on the quality of the sound system. (and as the author put, the quality of the encoder used)

But using high sampling transfers is what we are talking about here for the remastering process thus the need for head room. Your article goes on to speak of this as so:

When does 24 bit matter?

Professionals use 24 bit samples in recording and production [14] for headroom, noise floor, and convenience reasons.

16 bits is enough to span the real hearing range with room to spare. It does not span the entire possible signal range of audio equipment. The primary reason to use 24 bits when recording is to prevent mistakes; rather than being careful to center 16 bit recording-- risking clipping if you guess too high and adding noise if you guess too low-- 24 bits allows an operator to set an approximate level and not worry too much about it. Missing the optimal gain setting by a few bits has no consequences, and effects that dynamically compress the recorded range have a deep floor to work with.

An engineer also requires more than 16 bits during mixing and mastering. Modern work flows may involve literally thousands of effects and operations. The quantization noise and noise floor of a 16 bit sample may be undetectable during playback, but multiplying that noise by a few thousand times eventually becomes noticeable. 24 bits keeps the accumulated noise at a very low level. Once the music is ready to distribute, there's no reason to keep more than 16 bits.


[8D] Elvis

[elviscaprice]

And the article even gets better, with a reasoning as to why you don't want to capture and encode on the fly with a lossy format(such as MP3). Especially if a remaster or remix is to be done later.

Under Lossless Formats:

Lossless formats like FLAC avoid any possibility of damaging audio fidelity [23] with a poor quality lossy encoder, or even by a good lossy encoder used incorrectly.

A second reason to distribute lossless formats is to avoid generational loss. Each reencode or transcode loses more data; even if the first encoding is transparent, it's very possible the second will have audible artifacts. This matters to anyone who might want to remix or sample from downloads. It especially matters to us codec researchers; we need clean audio to work with.

[the_moth]

Yes it generally makes sense to keep your files lossless for many reasons and some people might even hear the difference to high-bitrate lossy. But I encourage you to do an ABX-test with good equipment and see for yourself if you can [;)]

[Sundayguy]

Just my two cents, here.
Generally I'm fine listening to (lossy) higher-bitrate MP3s for just "daily listening" but there are a few pieces (mostly my own rips) of
OOP or not (as yet) on CD stuff that I start with .WAV files, for editing or home "remastering"
Those I keep .WAV copies of, raw, but when editing is done I usually down-convert to mp3 just for playing mostly on portable devices.
I can say I don't hear any real noticable difference between the .WAVs and the down-converted mp3s, so long as I keep the mp3 bitrate at at least 256k.
Around 192k or even 160k I think there's some frequency loss, usually on the higher end. There are programs available specifically for "enhancing" some of the frequency lost on lower bitrate mp3s. More or less just some EQ.

[elviscaprice]

[quote][i]Originally posted by the_moth[/i]
<br>Yes it generally makes sense to keep your files lossless for many reasons and some people might even hear the difference to high-bitrate lossy. But I encourage you to do an ABX-test with good equipment and see for yourself if you can [;)]
[/quote]
As far as for listening from a well mastered source that is transferred properly, I will defer from the point of sound quality to the ear from a (Good) lossy codec to a lossless format. I am sure if done correctly it would be hard to tell the difference in quality. But why lossy if you already have a good lossless????

How many poor lossy codecs are used in comparison to good ones? How many folks making their own MP3's here are doing it correctly? Again, why not just play it safe and stay lossless?

For myself it makes much more sense in todays age of cheap large hard drive space to go lossless for remastering and remixing. You never know when you are going to want to reuse or tinker with the audio file.

You still definitely do not want to capture analog music and compress in lossy (MP3) on the fly. Which is the main point of this thread. Without some kind of a remaster it is going to sound poor at best compared to a lossless capture which can always be mastered at a later date.

Once you have lossless files, you have no reason ever to compress into a lossy format. Space is not an issue in todays world. There are plenty of portable devices that play lossless files.
[8D] Elvis

[elviscaprice]

Really like to get off this point of what format is better for listening and back to the real point of this thread, techniques/software/equipment flows for capturing in lossless. I think everyone agrees that lossless captures are the best way to go.

[elviscaprice]

[quote][i]Originally posted by Sundayguy[/i]
<br>there are a few pieces (mostly my own rips) of
OOP or not (as yet) on CD stuff that I start with .WAV files, for editing or home "remastering"
Those I keep .WAV copies of, raw,

[/quote]

Great Sunday, good to know you have those wav files. What is your workflow for capturing? What is your preference for software in remastering?

[8D] Elvis