Wilson Wilson
Bluelighter
- Joined
- Aug 6, 2014
- Messages
- 3,750
Anyone else here can't deal with no lossy compression or audio distortion and have good setups for listening to their tunes?
I haven't spent nearly as much time or money on this as many others, but I listen to music daily so I have invested in some high end gear compared to most crappy consumer grade audio equipment (shitty earbuds and Beats everywhere).
First of all the music itself is largely dominated by FLAC more and more. I'm replacing my library with FLAC and any new tunes I get are FLAC whenever possible. I only use lossy formats when there's no other option and the song isn't worth buying a CD for. If it's lossy I at least make sure I use 320kbps MP3 or 256kbps AAC. If I do really like a certain artist I will buy a CD and rip some FLAC off that myself using Exact Audio Copy.
My primary audio player is a Sony Walkman A45. It has a 256GB microSD for storage, works as an external DAC for computers, and the battery lasts about 24 hours of playing FLAC. It also automatically adjusts the EQ for each track really well. It'll even try to upscale lossy formats. Not only does it output much higher quality audio than a smartphone but it also means my phone battery isn't run down by music streaming (my phone gets run down by TikTok instead lol).
As for headphones I went for the classic Audio Technica ATH-M50xBT. A fucking brilliant pair of headphones especially for under £200. Honestly the same or better sound quality than many pairs that cost £250 or above. Absolutely better than the most expensive pair of Beats (£500 last I checked) because Beats are all marketing and objectively shit headphones. You can't even play lossless audio through Beats "Studio" without mad distortion. Protip: no matter how much paid promotion you see in music videos, absolutely no serious musical artist on the planet actually uses those things.
The sound signature from the M50x when plugged into the Walkman is excellent. You might be wondering why bother spending extra on bluetooth headphones if I plug them in. Basically for convenience, if I'm out and about bluetooth is often just easier than a wire. It also means I can use them with my iPhone if I want to stream for music discovery - streaming services are very good for discovering new music I have to give 'em that. Any songs I like, I download in lossless quality later for future listening.
Quality through bluetooth is of course reduced compared to the wire since all bluetooth audio requires lossy compression, but modern well spec'd bluetooth headphones like these keep respectable sound quality for high bitrate lossy sources. There's no point playing FLAC over bluetooth of course, but when using Apple Music which is lossy 256kbps AAC anyway, there's basically no difference between bluetooth and the wire.
This for me is a nice flexible setup. One pair of headphones I can use for both wireless casual listening and music discovery on my phone and with a cable for the dedicated music player that offers true lossless. I could technically connect to the Sony with bluetooth too, but again, it'd make using FLAC pointless.
This is hardly super impressive by audiophile standards, I know guys with a few grand worth of pro equipment, but if I am being completely honest there is definitely a point where you reach diminishing returns and people who are proper into this are doing it more for the sake of the hobby than to get better audio. "Prosumer" audio equipment is really all you need unless you are actually trying to produce music to studio quality rather than just consume it. Just make sure you get equipment by proper audio companies not "fashion brands" like Beats.
Because people always ask: yes, I think pretty much anyone will notice a significant increase in quality by upgrading from standard headphones to a decent mid-range studio pair from a proper audio company (such as the ones I own), using lossless audio files, and playing the music from a device with a good DAC. It's like going from DVD to 4K Bluray. But going beyond that provides no practical benefit for the vast majority, like going from 4K to 5K. Technically better yes, but a minor improvement you won't actually notice except in your wallet.
Tell you what though, listening to FLAC music from the basic portable setup I have, I can seriously notice details in the audio I just can't otherwise with normal headphones and lossy sources. With good headphones you also quickly notice just how dogshit YouTube is for music since all of it is compressed to 128kbps. Spotify free is the same. Spotify Premium is a more reasonable 320kbps. Tidal offers lossless streaming for £20 a month but you need to make sure your hardware supports it properly to make it worthwhile. Personally I prefer having a separate physical device with a local library but that's me. With the right Android phone you can easily enjoy lossless audio from local FLAC files or Tidal streaming without any fuss. iPhone is possible too but more convoluted and of course expensive.
Anyway, just felt like rambling about my hobby really since I got chatting about this in detail with someone at work earlier. Anyone else an audio nerd?
I haven't spent nearly as much time or money on this as many others, but I listen to music daily so I have invested in some high end gear compared to most crappy consumer grade audio equipment (shitty earbuds and Beats everywhere).
First of all the music itself is largely dominated by FLAC more and more. I'm replacing my library with FLAC and any new tunes I get are FLAC whenever possible. I only use lossy formats when there's no other option and the song isn't worth buying a CD for. If it's lossy I at least make sure I use 320kbps MP3 or 256kbps AAC. If I do really like a certain artist I will buy a CD and rip some FLAC off that myself using Exact Audio Copy.
My primary audio player is a Sony Walkman A45. It has a 256GB microSD for storage, works as an external DAC for computers, and the battery lasts about 24 hours of playing FLAC. It also automatically adjusts the EQ for each track really well. It'll even try to upscale lossy formats. Not only does it output much higher quality audio than a smartphone but it also means my phone battery isn't run down by music streaming (my phone gets run down by TikTok instead lol).
As for headphones I went for the classic Audio Technica ATH-M50xBT. A fucking brilliant pair of headphones especially for under £200. Honestly the same or better sound quality than many pairs that cost £250 or above. Absolutely better than the most expensive pair of Beats (£500 last I checked) because Beats are all marketing and objectively shit headphones. You can't even play lossless audio through Beats "Studio" without mad distortion. Protip: no matter how much paid promotion you see in music videos, absolutely no serious musical artist on the planet actually uses those things.
The sound signature from the M50x when plugged into the Walkman is excellent. You might be wondering why bother spending extra on bluetooth headphones if I plug them in. Basically for convenience, if I'm out and about bluetooth is often just easier than a wire. It also means I can use them with my iPhone if I want to stream for music discovery - streaming services are very good for discovering new music I have to give 'em that. Any songs I like, I download in lossless quality later for future listening.
Quality through bluetooth is of course reduced compared to the wire since all bluetooth audio requires lossy compression, but modern well spec'd bluetooth headphones like these keep respectable sound quality for high bitrate lossy sources. There's no point playing FLAC over bluetooth of course, but when using Apple Music which is lossy 256kbps AAC anyway, there's basically no difference between bluetooth and the wire.
This for me is a nice flexible setup. One pair of headphones I can use for both wireless casual listening and music discovery on my phone and with a cable for the dedicated music player that offers true lossless. I could technically connect to the Sony with bluetooth too, but again, it'd make using FLAC pointless.
This is hardly super impressive by audiophile standards, I know guys with a few grand worth of pro equipment, but if I am being completely honest there is definitely a point where you reach diminishing returns and people who are proper into this are doing it more for the sake of the hobby than to get better audio. "Prosumer" audio equipment is really all you need unless you are actually trying to produce music to studio quality rather than just consume it. Just make sure you get equipment by proper audio companies not "fashion brands" like Beats.
Because people always ask: yes, I think pretty much anyone will notice a significant increase in quality by upgrading from standard headphones to a decent mid-range studio pair from a proper audio company (such as the ones I own), using lossless audio files, and playing the music from a device with a good DAC. It's like going from DVD to 4K Bluray. But going beyond that provides no practical benefit for the vast majority, like going from 4K to 5K. Technically better yes, but a minor improvement you won't actually notice except in your wallet.
Tell you what though, listening to FLAC music from the basic portable setup I have, I can seriously notice details in the audio I just can't otherwise with normal headphones and lossy sources. With good headphones you also quickly notice just how dogshit YouTube is for music since all of it is compressed to 128kbps. Spotify free is the same. Spotify Premium is a more reasonable 320kbps. Tidal offers lossless streaming for £20 a month but you need to make sure your hardware supports it properly to make it worthwhile. Personally I prefer having a separate physical device with a local library but that's me. With the right Android phone you can easily enjoy lossless audio from local FLAC files or Tidal streaming without any fuss. iPhone is possible too but more convoluted and of course expensive.
Anyway, just felt like rambling about my hobby really since I got chatting about this in detail with someone at work earlier. Anyone else an audio nerd?
