Best bit rate? iTunes? Amazon? 7Digital?

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indychris


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I love the ability to auto-sync across my macs & iDevices with iTunes, but does iTunes offer the same quality audio as other services? I know that 7Digital offers 320 kbps and I think Amazon is 256. I'm thinking that's what iTunes is as well. Is there a detectable difference between them?

Just curious what the advantages (other than pricing at times) are at considering alternatives to iTunes.
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pendlewitch


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It's 256 kbit/s AAC with no DRM. What it does have encoded in the metadata is your full name and e-mail address...just like any other iTunes track you've downloaded. So it's DRM free with strings attached. You can download bigger from elsewhere and import into iTunes if you want.

At the end of the day it all depends what you are listening on. More kbit/s does not mean better quality. I would concentrate more on your players, amps, speakers and headphones than getting tied up with this issue because it really is a bottomless pit.
 
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indychris


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pendlewitch said:
It's 256 kbit/s AAC with no DRM. What it does have encoded in the metadata is your full name and e-mail address...just like any other iTunes track you've downloaded. So it's DRM free with strings attached. You can download bigger from elsewhere and import into iTunes if you want.

At the end of the day it all depends what you are listening on. More kbit/s does not mean better quality. I would concentrate more on your players, amps, speakers and headphones than getting tied up with this issue because it really is a bottomless pit.
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Thanks. DRM doesn't matter squat to me. I'm pretty much a stickler for copyright infringement and have left more than one friend angry over the years at refusing to copy tapes/disks, etc.

So in terms of quality, do you feel that iTunes' 256 will produce as good a sound as say Amazon or 7Digital?

Obviously iTunes makes it much easier to keep purchased music synced between devices.
 
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pendlewitch


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Yes I agree with you there and have had many a heated discussion about it.

Regarding is it better ? It's a good question but for most people it's so subjective with lots of variables that it boils down to personal preference most of the time. Looking at it objectively without blind listening tests etc you would say that it's better than 128 and not as good as 320.

The following link is typical of the kind of test involved.

PEAQ - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 
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chas_m

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There's an easy way around this problem: don't buy from any of them. Rip from purchased CDs and set them to whatever bitrate you want! :)

All things being equal, 320 AAC is going to be better than 256 AAC, but unless you are into classical or some kinds of jazz or other chamber music, I'm not sure the average person can really hear the difference between the 256 AAC and the CD 99 percent of the time.
 
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I wish I knew if I screwed up, when I got my iMac 14 months ago I spent days importing over 400 cd's into my library. But I set the import rate to MP3. Since then I've burned many mp3's for my vehicles after deciding I wasn't going to pay $140 a year for crappy sounding satelite radio. While my mp3's sound vastly superior to XM/SIRIUS radio I wonder how they would sound compared to the original source?

Guess I need to set up a A/B listening session to know if I screwed up or if these old ears just don't care anymore.

Tom
 
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indychris said:
Thanks. DRM doesn't matter squat to me. I'm pretty much a stickler for copyright infringement and have left more than one friend angry over the years at refusing to copy tapes/disks, etc.

So in terms of quality, do you feel that iTunes' 256 will produce as good a sound as say Amazon or 7Digital?

Obviously iTunes makes it much easier to keep purchased music synced between devices.
Click to expand...

You should probably care more about DRM, because it limits the devices you can play the music on.

The answer to your question is really determined by the quality of your speakers and/or headphones and the acuity of your hearing. Unless you're using extremely good hardware, you'll struggle to hear the difference between 256 and 320 AAC bit-rates. It's a little easier to hear the benefits of a CD, especially using good speakers.

Buy whichever one is easier for you to manage with your hardware.
 
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indychris


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chas_m said:
There's an easy way around this problem: don't buy from any of them. Rip from purchased CDs and set them to whatever bitrate you want! :)

All things being equal, 320 AAC is going to be better than 256 AAC, but unless you are into classical or some kinds of jazz or other chamber music, I'm not sure the average person can really hear the difference between the 256 AAC and the CD 99 percent of the time.
Click to expand...

The vast majority of my catalog is ripped into lossless, but I'm increasingly drawn to downloading for the sake of simplicity, and sticking with iTunes makes the syncing of the catalog that much easier. I've had good results with 7Digital, too, though. Tomato/TomAHto I suppose.
 
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indychris


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Zoolook said:
You should probably care more about DRM, because it limits the devices you can play the music on.
Click to expand...

Yes, I suppose you are correct. I do believe that once I've purchased music I ought to be able to do with it whatever I want, short of distributing it for the use of others, and with the change in formats made by Apple a few years back, I think I've only got a dozen or so tracks that are still DRM restricted. Last time I checked they were still not available for the $.30 upgrade to a non-DRM version. Guess it just hasn't been that big of a deal to me.
 
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pendlewitch


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indychris, shall we regroup ?

You just do what you feel is right.... just enjoy building a library and listening as and when.
 
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chas_m

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The only problem I can see with ripping everything at 256mbps AAC (or "iTunes Plus standard") is that someday, Apple WILL (you just know they will) invent some improvement on AAC or something that will make our 256-ers sound like (relative) crap. :)

Speaking of which, when I signed up for iTunes Match I discovered (to my pleasure!) that a lot of tunes I ripped years ago from CD at lower bitrates can be upgraded to the 256-bit AAC version now offered by iTunes for free with no real effort on my part. SWEET.
 

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