Yes, Bro Art, it is frustrating and confusing why seemingly the same music offered on files is more expensive, especially IF offered at 24 bit. Now at 24/192 scientifically speaking at least we OUGHT to be able to hear the difference, well some of the younger anyway. But your point Charlie is well taken concerning the noise floor. With my A/C on the fritz in my home theater at the moment, with TWO fans on and I am still suffering (Plasma TV and tubes!!!!!) my noise floor is WAY up there!!!!
Have any of you compared your normal redbook resolution to DSD quality???? I struggle to hear a difference until I get up to 24/192 FLAC, but DSX or DSD 64 and 128 seem to be better, noticeably better. But once again, not a lot, and not sure it is worth the extra cost.
Any more thoughts welcome. Or great example music????
Talk about noise floor, problem is for me, my music files are ONLY for outside walking, exercise time. On the road. And all the best is classical unless someone knows any other. And please not David Elias who just does NOT CUT IT for me!!!!!
God Bless,
Wayne

charliehatch wrote: Bottom line seems to be that 16/44 is adequate for most people, and the advantage of 24/96 is probably only experienced by a few.

Charlie

Sorry, I can't agree with much of that and i wouldn't want our members to take it as fact. While it is true the 16 bit depth is probably not the major factor, 44.1KHz sampling most certainly is ... keep in mind the 16/44 standard was created ONLY because of storage limitations of the day. One of my favorite and telling quotes from a respected member of the audio community goes like this: "CD resolution reimagines the analog waveform, HD audio recreates it". I have sat through far too many comparisons that very clearly showed the fidelity improvements of 24/96 and 24/192 over "full resolution" audio CDs. The skilled listeners got it right 100% of the time, including me, when doing a blind A/B which consisted of listening to about 60 seconds of the same track in standard rez and in HD. The source recording was originally an analog master tape.

WayneWilmeth wrote: ... With my A/C on the fritz in my home theater at the moment, with TWO fans on and I am still suffering (Plasma TV and tubes!!!!!) my noise floor is WAY up there!!!!

Wayne, because those concerned with this thread are already splitting hairs between 16 and 24 bit, 96 and 192 oversampling, etc., it is worth pointing out - and I think you will or should find this reply to your liking - that your two fans are not part of your noise floor. Noise floor as I understand it is specific to your audio equipment. The noise from your fans is "quiescent noise", an entirely different thing.

Interesting discussion here.
I've done some A/B testing (not blind) with friends comparing mp3, cd-quality, hi-res, and vinyl.
Of course mileage varies, etc.

Overall we thought that mp3 was obviously the worst, cd next in quality, and then hi-res.
Vinyl came in either worse than hi-res or better, depending on what we were listening to.
That is, the best vinyl sounded better than the hi-res.

My listening preference at the moment is vinyl but I do enjoy hi-res and CD quality too (if I don't have the music on vinyl or in hi-res).
The problem with hi-res is that it's still relatively expensive...
So I'm currently buying lots of new and used vinyl .

When I was talking about noise floor, I was talking about noise in general, not just electronics. Any noise from the environment will tend to obscure the low level audio signal that might be there. Cooling fans will do this, as will traffic noise coming in from the outside.

I am curious whether anyone has measured the noise level in their listening room. I do know that when I went to a friend's house many miles out of town, the noise level there was way below what I measured at home.

Good topic, all.

I stream, through SONOS/Deezer Elite, 16/44.1 FLAC music, then reclocked and upsampled via a Wyred 4 Sound Reclocker to a 96k sample rate, still 16 bit. It's better than before the reclock/upsample add. But still not as smooth, natural, dynamic as native 24/96 or 24/192 SACD stuff I play through the OPPO 105.

For streaming, I'll upgrade the SONOS's CODEC "guts" next with a Wyred 4 Sound fix, but it'll still be 16 bit, and would LOVE to see 24/96 streaming become more available. (C'mon, SONOS, join the Hi Res bandwagon!!!).

Rick