MP3 Players

[amoergosum]

With that said, I'd actually encourage you to dump mp3 and move to a better quality, such as flac.

I agree 100%.
The only downside is that flac files drain the battery faster.

[Juan Expósito]

...If you don't have cassette player. buy an FM trasmiter and it will trasmit the audio to 88.8 on your radio. No wires.

I tried that, in order to connect my mp3/iphone to the car audio system, but the sound quality is bad (at least in my case, and the brand of the accessory was good). A lot of "SSSSSSSSSS" in the background.
I returned it in the same day.

[deseipel]

that could've been your FM reciever, not the transmitter. But yeah, it's kinda hokey.

[amoergosum]

I'd actually encourage you to dump mp3 and move to a better quality, such as flac.

I just started to convert my favorite cds to flac files.



+



+




= FANTASTIC sound

[Christopher]

I despise listening to mp3 files anymore. Especially anything ripped under 320.

Got an iPad last year and made a point of only loading lossless files onto it. It’s a 64GB model so it can hold quite a bit, even in the larger Apple lossless format.

I’m looking into getting a portable FLAC player, since the iPad is too big to throw in your pocket and I like the “open sourceness” of FLAC better.

Here’s a list of some of the newer FLAC players.

http://www.squidoo.com/portable-flac-player-comparisons

Amoergosum, do you get alot of outside bleed on those Sennheiser PX 200 headphones?

[amoergosum]

Amoergosum, do you get alot of outside bleed on those Sennheiser PX 200 headphones?

I get some outside bleed...I feel comfortable with the amount of isolation. By the way...I use version I.
The successor is called Sennheiser PX 200 II >>>
http://www.amazon.com/Sennheiser-PX-200 ... 512&sr=8-1

or Sennheiser PX 200-II i (with 3 Button Control for iPod, iPhone, and iPad):
http://www.amazon.com/Sennheiser-PX-200 ... 730&sr=1-3

[S.P]

Can any .mp3 be converted to a higher quality lossless version such FLAC/ALAC without the original file having been in a lossless format?

For example, if I download an .mp3 album and convert that to Apple Lossless, does that give me a better quality? Is .Wav file format lossless as well?

[DSOP]

if I download an .mp3 album and convert that to Apple Lossless, does that give me a better quality?

No. You can't go from jpg to raw either. Once you've compressed it, you lose information. It's not like a zip file compressing a text document or multiple documents. MP3 is much more involved as far as the compression algorithm.

[S.P]

So even though iTunes allows me to convert .mp3 files into Apple Lossless codec files, the actual audio quality is not getting better?

What happens if I rip a CD straight into Apple Lossless?

Thanks, just though I've been experimenting with switching to listening to stuff on lossless audio formats and I have been trying to understand the technical aspects.

p.s. I still listen to Pastrami Standards, I love your guys take on "Red" and "Teen Town"....killer drum sound on that CD!

[cnath]

hi SP,

Apple Lossless will take whatever file you convert and give you a new file with the same quality as the one you had before - if it's a CD ( which are Wav files,with each song typically around 35 to 40 megs each)ripping to Apple Lossless you will get the same CD quality, but use about half the hard disc space ( maybe 15 to 20 megs each )... if you take an MP3 file ( already much smaller, say 4 or 5 megs at 160 ripping quality) , all you'll get is the same MP3 quality , but a larger file ( will still be 15 to 20 meg - much more than the original MP3...)

basically, best quality: CD to wav, AIFF(Apple version of wav), or Apple Lossless..
MP3 - for convenience - to me less than 320 quality kinda sucks...

No point in ever converting MP3 to wav, AIFF, or Apple lossless - no better quality, just larger files, defeating the whole purpose of MP3...

Also, converting a, say, 128 MP3 to a 320 MP3 will be worse than the original 128 file ( it's recompressing the file a second time)

Hope that helps,

Cnath