Nah, Wayne, you're not a dumb ass! You're a pioneer venturing into new waters.

Keep us posted. We'll learn from your experiences.

Happy listening at 128 or whatever!

Rick

Thanks Bro Rick,
You are too kind!!!!!
So I am listening to "The Brahms Project: The Complete Piano Quartets" in DSD 128 fs.
The SQ is great, and I am looking forward to hearing these in surround sound. Not quite sure how I will pull that off yet.
But the music is just solid, good piano, violin, viola and cello playing.
Lovely Sunday afternoon when there is NO FOOTBALL to watch, lazy music.
Nothing to write home about, IMHO.
But I will listen more and IF it grows on me, will report back.
God Bless,
Wayne
More exciting, the rambutan tree behind our house finally is producing some great, luscious, delicious fruit, taste is similar to lychees.

Man, I had to go digging for this thread, it has gotten lost.
Last night I downloaded some new and older music from HDTracks.
Leonard Slatkin and the Detroit Symphony playing Rachmaninov's 3rd Symphony and his Symphonic Dances.
Also Pink Floyd's "Division Bell", this one I had already, but wanted to compare Hi Res to my normal, redbook CD quality file.
The Rachmaninov is a NAXOS recording, and in FLAC 192/24 it sounds glorious!!!! But I have nothing to compare it to, lesser sound quality wise. I can just say the sound is RICH, refined, deep bass and warm, musical, lyrical, enchanting.
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.
Oh course I already had Pink Floyd's Division Bell, the song "High Hopes" which ends the album is one of my all time favorites.
So, to begin my comparison, I listened to it first, my CD to FLAC 44.1/16 transfer. And then the higher resolution one I just bought, at 96/24. I was surprised when I listened with earphones, and listened closely for micro detail (one area I was hoping would be greater, more detailed on the Hi Res version) and I could not believe what all I had taken for granted and MISSED before. I was literally hearing things I never heard before. And that was with the normal CD version. There was a lot to discover there.
Then I switched to the Hi Res version, and honestly, I could not hear any difference in detail. Nor in "smoothness", nor richness, musicality. If I am honest, I could not hear any difference at all. Of course I did not have any way to switch quickly back and forth between the two. And this is not the highest resolution.
BUT, what to listen for guys? What are the things I need to hear as being better about Higher Resolution recordings?
Maybe I just need, better, mo Golden Ears!!!
Thanks,
God Bless,
Wayne

Hi Wayne,

Just a thought or two about Hi Res vs standard CD. It may be possible that, the more complex and dense the music is, the greater the potential sound difference as you move up in resolution. Thus, you might typically expect to hear greater differences between versions of a full symphonic recording.

I have also wondered about hi res versions of recordings which were originally made in analog formats. I downloaded a complete set of the Beethoven symphonies, recorded by Herbert von Karajan and the Berlin Philharmonic in the 1960s. These recordings are considered to be a legendary traversal of the Beethoven symphonies. I don't have other versions of these recordings to compare against, but I can say that, though these hi res transfers are nice, they don't stand out in sonics as compared to other recordings I have.

All the above having been said, there are certainly differences in sound as resolution increases. Consider the best MP3 or MP4 versus standard CD.

Best,

Art

Hey Bro Art, thanks for your comments.
Yes, I agree that we know from listening to MP3s and CDs that resolution does count, SURE.
But perhaps my perception or hearing is not acute enough, or astute enough to pick out the differences after a certain point, say the already good level of CD resolution?
Funny and very interesting to me that you mention the set of Beethoven done by HvK and the Berlin Philharmonic.
I bought that box set on vinyl to give to my Dad. Turned out, he did not really like classical music (even though he tried to get me interested in it--for my own good I guess). So I got the set and played them several times, NEVER liked those at all. And never liked Karajan after that either, though that might have been unfair.
Odd, but we must be on the same page musically, at least somewhat.
God Bless,
Wayne

I'll put in my 2 cents worth here. (2 cents ain't what it used to be!)

It is always possible that the "hi res" file you download is merely an upsampled low-res file, so you wouldn't hear much difference. That's why I was testing using music that was known to be recorded at hi res. This aspect is also a part of what MQA is all about, the A for authentication.

And, I do wonder how good those early 1960s vintage analog master tapes were. I'm sure they did the best they could when they remastered to digital, but if the ultrasonic content (more than 20 kHz) was missing from the tapes, no amount of digital fiddling will restore that.

Another possibility is the transparency of your system. I just got a pair of Audience Au 24 SX RCA interconnects, and they seem to resolve more detail than my Morrow Elite XLRs. I am hearing small details that I hadn't noticed before. When I listened to 176.4/24 files, the difference was more obvious than it had been before.

Using the RCAs instead of balanced XLRs means that I'm bypassing all the splitting/inverting/recombination circuitry that balanced uses. Maybe part of the difference I'm hearing is the simpler signal path that RCA single-ended provides.

There are lots of links in this chain.

Charlie