CD or high resolution streaming?

[listercruz]

In reality high-definition audio (as in true 24-bit and 96-192 KHz) never really caught on our ears
Mostly because the improvement is not audible to the human ear. The humble CD is capable of storing pretty much anything you can hear and not much more. It was designed that way. With high-definition audio, you’re literally paying for quality improvements that you can’t hear.

The signal on a CD is recorded by sampling the original audio signal 44, 100 times per second (44.1 kHz). The Nyquist–Shannon sampling theorem, on which all digital audio is based, states that this will EXACTLY preserve a signal that contains nothing higher than half the sampling rate — 22, 050 Hz in the case of a CD. Human hearing tops out around 20, 000 Hz, and that’s for a young person with healthy ears.

96 kHz will exactly preserve sound up to 48, 000 Hz, and 192 kHz will preserve up to 96, 000 Hz. Unless you happen to go “woof, ” you can’t hear anything between 22, 050 and 48, 000 Hz. And even a dog can’t hear much higher than that — maybe a rodent or an insect could hear the extra frequencies preserved by 192 kHz sampling.

Similarly, using 24 bit samples looks very good on paper, but it doesn’t really preserve anything extra that you can hear. Using 16 bit samples, which is the standard for a CD, gives you 65, 536 (2^16) possible values to which any given sample in an audio signal can be rounded. Using 24 bit samples gives you 16, 777, 216 (2^24) possible values.

The rounding of samples to the nearest available value creates what’s called quantization noise. That noise is measured by the dynamic range, which is the volume in decibels to which you must turn the loudest sounds in order to just barely hear the noise. The dynamic range for 16 bit audio is 96 dB; for 24 bit audio it is 144 dB.

Now, consider that a very quiet room in a typical home has about 30 dB of background noise. That means that to hear any quantization noise on your 16 bit recording, you’d have to turn the volume up so that the loudest sounds are at 126 dB. That’s about the threshold of pain for most people. So unless you plan on playing your music so loudly that it makes your ears hurt (and you have equipment that can produce that volume), 16 bits is plenty. Note that the 174 dB you’d need to hear quantization noise with 24 bit is loud enough to literally KILL you!

Double-blind studies have been done that show listeners, including audio engineers, can’t reliably tell the difference between 16/44.1 and formats like 24/96 or 24/192.

This applies only to the final copy of the recording, however. If you will be doing post-production, equalization, dynamic range compression, or other edits, the audio needs to be at least 24 bit and 192 kHz in order to prevent distortion from multiple rounding errors. But there’s no advantage to using higher sampling frequencies or bit depths than used on a CD on the copy used by the masses.

High-def recordings do sometimes sound better than the regular CD, but this is due to better mastering and production on the high-res version. For example, the high-res version might not have been victimized by the loudness wars.

If you really want higher fidelity sound, you’ll want to (1) use better speakers/headphones, better amplifiers, add a headphone amplifier if you don’t have one, etc. (2) use a better format for your music. MP3 is tolerable when used at high bitrates, but if you have the space and support for them, use something lossless like FLAC or Monkey’s Audio and (3) seek out older pressings of CDs at used CD stores and online. Anything made prior to about 1994 or so is likely to sound considerably better than a modern CD because the loudness wars weren’t yet in full swing back then. Alternatively, you could try vinyl if that’s your thing.

[maidvices]

streaming are for city folks with great connection... CD and FLAC RIPS are the way to go for countryside folks

[clothyardshafts]

I can name a half dozen CD producers whose output, through my PS Audio Memory Player and Directstream DAC, is simply sublime. I’m never going to give up on CD. For sure, most my streamed music sounds excellent and I agree with Paul, the stored and played DSD files are peerless.

[hermannschmidt]

Yes to everything. High-res for the mainstream is just a marketing instrument to pull more money out of pockets. The quality of the devices and the mix is more important. Only in controlled environments like Paul described an objective discrimination of format quality is feasible.

[ZiggySheppardUK]

SACD beats CD. I love my Marantz SA-KI Ruby SACD/CD/DAC and love it even more when listening to a SACD's on it. Such a shame that the discs you can buy are very limited. Fortunately, it's a brilliant CD player too. :-)

[birdscds]

I have often wondered about this very question; hi-resolution with basic D-A converters, versus CD (44-16) played through fantastic D-A converters.

[careylymanjones]

CD has one great advantage over ANY streaming service. Streaming music is played back through a computer, at some point. Computers are not high fidelity audio devices. They WILL add noise to your signal. You can try to filter the noise, you can try to electrically isolate the computer, but some noise will get through. CD player/transports ARE high fidelity audio devices. They feed a cleaner signal to your preamp/amp. And that is where they make up the difference in sampling rates.

[davidviner]

I've played CDs on a new Denon system I bought and listened to streamed music on it and actually preferred the CDs, although I only tried Deezer free streaming, i kept getting Ads popping up telling me the subscription version has better sound. Lets just say I haven't bothered to subscribe as I have no idea if it will sound better so I will try Tidal etc and see what sounds best. Incidently I have a 27 year old (bought from new) Denon D90 bi wired to Castle Inversion 50 speakers. CDs sound stunning as they always have done

[ridirefain]

Agree, it really depends on the expertise put into the recording and its mastering. However, I have not heard much superiority from a high quality stream over a well mastered CD. I listen to a lot of both, and cannot tell much of difference. The later generation CD players can retrieve a lot from a red-book CD. Their sound has evolved enough, where many no longer have that crystalline edge, that so plagued players of the mid 80's and 90's.
I do stream more often though. Not because the sound is better, but due to the convenience. You really can not beat it. The fact that you can setup playlist and listen to an selection of quality recording for hours, without having to get out of your chair is an major plus. That being said, streaming totally sucks when the internet goes offline. So I have kept my library and still deal with the hassle of changing them. With CD you never have to worry whether or not your internet bill been paid up.

[TheLtData]

I stumbled upon this video but had this question for a long time. Great explanation. Besides that: what ever you buy, your ears are the final 'receiver' and they will never be as good as when we were kids. I enjoy my cd's every day. Do buy good recordings! I like classical music and most music is available in different versions. It's worth buying a good recording, not just for the performers but for the effort put in making the recording and producing. I have made live recordings in both studio's and churches, music halls. Some recorded on hard disk, some on dat-tape. The final product was a cd. It all sounded fine due to the effort of the professionals in the recording room.

[V-gw]

Just buy the cd, import songs to computer, transfer files to phone. That way you can have the original cd and a digital version of the album as well.

[dwightballard]

I've listened to some Master recordings on Tidal, and I have to say it can sound pretty amazing. I generally think my Sooloos/Meridian gear is better in terms of portraying a holographic sound stage. Streaming is important because of the range of titles that can be accessed. Artists I love but I haven't been able to source their recent work.

[phrtao]

I've tried most of the High def streaming services ( the most recent being Amazon). What I found was that the audio had been mixed to take out the dynamics and seemed to have some kind of volume normalisation across all recordings. Comparing the streamed version to a file ripped from a CD was almost always worse quality. I played back both the stream and the CD rip on the same software, computer and DAC. I even tried ripping a stream or downloading a file and the same was true. I mainly listen to classical music but the thing that broke my heart was the 50th anniversary re-issues of the Grateful dead albums ("Anthem of the Sun", "Aoxomoaxa"). The early 2000s CD versions (mastered using Plangent and issued on HDCD format) are better every time. It is very sad that the potential of 24/96 audio is not being realised.
Another great video - can't wait to see (hear) what your new streamer does.

[WhirlOmar]

Glad I found your channel. I came here because I was considering selling or giving away hundreds of classical music CDs that an old friend of mine collected. I inherited them. He is no long here. I listen to them but I’m not an avid classical music listener as he was. But I still enjoy them. Anyway, that’s what made me think about questioning the quality. Whether they are obsolete. Whether I should depart with them or keep them. Thanks.

[TheTyjah]

When you stop paying the streaming subscription all of the music is gone. If you have the physical copy you don’t have to worry about that and you can listen to your favorites as long as they last and you have a player.

[Gabriel-of-YouTube]

Should you wish to buy the CD/medium then you can keep its contents (although I've heard that in certain countries is illegal to rip your own discs). Streaming is fine, but it stops whenever you choose not to pay the subscription. Probably best of both worlds is to use free streaming for casual listening and buy the music you really love...

[theduck]

My theory on why the CD format is superior as a playback medium is that only data you can hear is being processed, processing a lot of data that you can not hear will always make the sound muddy even on the best playback system. 24/192 is a studio format that is used as a RAW file for head room not for sound quality. i've heard the 5 vs 22 microsecond theory, but that is on the top of the list in the "Snake oil" chart... :-)

[hubert]

I love good high res recordings and stream a lot of 24/96 FLAC from Qobuz and also MQA from Tidal Masters. But one of the best sounding recordings I ever listened to is in 16/44 (CD Quality).It’s Patricia Barber‘s album “Cafe Blue“. It‘s neither available in HighRes FLAC nor in DSD, and I don‘t care. Why does it sound so good? The name of the mastering engineers is Gus Skinas and Nick Prout.

[OceanSoul]

I hate streaming. I’ll stream some new music to see if I like it before I buy it, but give me a physical copy any day!

[Chrisspru]

we can hear past our in ear 20 khz limit by the property of resonances. fast taps can induce a slower resonance. this happens with in speakes as well as our physical body as well, shaping the sound through modulation. it can also interact with other sensory cells that start to vibrate.
for sub 20 hz bass the higher order resonances are audible, while we also feel the physical air pressure.

high res is only better if the supertreble is indeed musical, and not interfering with the main resonances or direct sound.
streaming is also only better if its buffered and ran on a local clock afterwards, as otherwise phase issues, low hz bass issues and data completeness issues can arise.