What is better iTunes or 320kbps? Are they the same?

[DaveyDave]

i always get itunes when i can but go for 320 when itunes isn't available. my right ear only works about 20% and has done all my life so i don't get a lot of the high frequency sounds, can't understand or even hear words out of that ear so it doesn't make that much difference to me about the bitrate i just don't want some shyt.

 

[grazazaza]

i always get itunes when i can but go for 320 when itunes isn't available. my right ear only works about 20% and has done all my life so i don't get a lot of the high frequency sounds, can't understand or even hear words out of that ear so it doesn't make that much difference to me about the bitrate i just don't want some shyt.

Damn



damn breh

 

[Barney Rubble]

FLAC > M4A > MP3. I use a high end headphone DAC and AMP with Sennheiser hd800s and you can hear when a nikka has gum in his mouth it's so clean but you can also hear when an MC is using a shytty mic or the engineer is garbage.

 

[FloorGeneral]

tl:dr, 256m4a > 320mp3

Now, the reading part:

Speaking for lossy files, M4A/AAC > MP3. Atleast when it comes to sound quality. This is basically accepted fact, though the difference is sorta negligible to most ppl's ears (and/or listening equipment). Like someone said, get yourself a good pair of headphones/system and open your ears to a new world. MP3 is more compatible and has been around longer, so it's still the standard. Well, and ppl (re: elitists) love to hate whatever Apple does, so that doesn't help the cause.

Anyways, 320kbs is purely overkill, and completely unnecessary. To be honest, CBR (Constant Bit Rate) is kinda pointless, after VBR (Variable Bit Rate) was fine tuned. The Lame VBR encoder (best out there) detects which parts of the song requires more bits and adjusts accordingly. For instance, why would you encode silence at the same bit rate as you would an audio intensive part of a song? Of course you wouldn't, thus making 320 (and CBR) pointless (as songs don't maintain the same exact fidelity throughout, encoding it at a constant rate is counterproductive) . It's why the (ripping) scene uses Lame -V0 as the standard. The Lame -V0 switch is widely accepted as creating the best quality MP3 possible. If gives you the (believed) superior quality of a 320 while keeping the file size smaller.

Of course the same limitations of a 320mp3 apply to a 256m4a (nevermind the superior sound quality the m4a provides), but alas, that's the world we live in. iTunes also has a whole other mastering process with their 'Mastered for iTunes' files, but thats probably too much for this convo. Plus, audiophiles tend to look down on iTunes for some reason. Of course, if they (well, we? I'm pretty picky when it comes to music myself) had it their way, music would only exist in lossless (FLAC/ALAC and the various other lossless containers). Of course the problem with that is file size and convenience. Anyways, I'm rambling, so again:

tl:dr, 256m4a > 320mp3

 

[JetLife]

tl:dr, 256m4a > 320mp3

Now, the reading part:

tl:dr, 256m4a > 320mp3

and if you're a visual learner, mp3 compression sometimes has kilohertz cutoff points and shelf points that are "logical" ways to save space (320kbps usually cuts off/shelfs around 20 kHz since most people can't hear above 20 kHz etc.), but it's essentially hindering the potential fidelity of the file to the true master recording. iTunes masters don't cut data in this way.

Explanation of cutoff points and shelf points

Here's a spectral analysis of The Weeknd ft. Future - Six Feet Under in iTunes mastered 256 AAC/m4a. You can see the song fills up every frequency from 0-22 kHz

Here's a spectral analysis of The Weeknd ft. Future - Six Feet Under in 320kbps MP3 compression. You can see the soft shelf at 20 kHz where it's sometimes cutting data.

Odds are 99% of people, based on their listening habits and equipment, wouldn't be able to tell the difference, but I like grabbing iTunes aac/m4a just to know I'm getting closer to the master file recording even if I can't tell the difference.