Best Option for Sound??? Pick our of these 3... How do you do it?

[bizmord]

Hi all,


So, I have 3 ways of listening to music. Before I start setting everything up etc, I just want to know what you would pick.


Source:
I get my music by downloading it from different sites and quality is great. Goes from something like 44100khz (1411kbps) 40mb file to as high as 192000khz (5200kbps or something) 180mb FLAC files.


Now ... question is what to do with them for best quality out of my decent home theater.




Option 1.
Take my downloaded FLAC music burn it on regular CD WAV (so that gets downgraded to 44100 I believe) and play CD through my SACD/CD player connected to receiver only for AMPing. So sound gets processed in the CD player (i like this). This would be STEREO ... no sub (sometimes I feel like my speakers give me all I need without the use of a subwoofer)


Option 2.
Place these high quality FLAC files on to USB and play them through a bluray player connected via HDMI cables to Receiver where receiver processes them. Most likely will do a 2.1 system including the sub. (Pure Direct mode on receiver). I am assuming this way 192000 quality won't get downgraded.


Option 3.
Record these files on to a DVD and once again let BlueRay player now play this disk. May sound better than playing files through USB port.


So which one do you think will sound the best??? If not any of the 3 options listed above, is there a better way???


thank you.

 

[3db]

Hi all,


So, I have 3 ways of listening to music. Before I start setting everything up etc, I just want to know what you would pick.


Source:
I get my music by downloading it from different sites and quality is great. Goes from something like 44100khz (1411kbps) 40mb file to as high as 192000khz (5200kbps or something) 180mb FLAC files.


Now ... question is what to do with them for best quality out of my decent home theater.




Option 1.
Take my downloaded FLAC music burn it on regular CD WAV (so that gets downgraded to 44100 I believe) and play CD through my SACD/CD player connected to receiver only for AMPing. So sound gets processed in the CD player (i like this). This would be STEREO ... no sub (sometimes I feel like my speakers give me all I need without the use of a subwoofer)


Option 2.
Place these high quality FLAC files on to USB and play them through a bluray player connected via HDMI cables to Receiver where receiver processes them. Most likely will do a 2.1 system including the sub. (Pure Direct mode on receiver). I am assuming this way 192000 quality won't get downgraded.


Option 3.
Record these files on to a DVD and once again let BlueRay player now play this disk. May sound better than playing files through USB port.


So which one do you think will sound the best??? If not any of the 3 options listed above, is there a better way???


thank you.

Option 1 is a poor choice. Option 2 will work fine, Option 3 is better than option 1 but still involves burning. Option 4 (assuming you have no wireless/network connections on your BluRay player) is to purchase a USB hard drive and a media streaming device such as a Western Digital (that accepts USB connections) and use that to store and stream your music. That's what I have done and it works great.

 

[cpp]

I use dBpoweramp or EAC to rip my CD's to FLAC which is stored on a NAS drive. I also store FLAC on a thumb drive and play those files via my OPPO105 or my AVR (direct or pure direct depending on the sound I'm looking for) using a USB port.

Regardless of the option, the key is the overall sonic quality of the CD or download your adding to your music system, crap in crap out. A poor recording or a poor remaster equals poor sound.

 

[bizmord]

Option 1 is a poor choice. Option 2 will work fine, Option 3 is better than option 1 but still involves burning. Option 4 (assuming you have no wireless/network connections on your BluRay player) is to purchase a USB hard drive and a media streaming device such as a Western Digital (that accepts USB connections) and use that to store and stream your music. That's what I have done and it works great.

Thanks for reply,.

Just curious why Option 1 is a bad choice? I felt like playing music from CD player that's connected with analog connector would sound better than letting some USB player (I use WD media streamer) play music files. Is it because those high quality 192000khz get downgraded to CD quality and if I use USB drive they remain high quality files? But then so many people say that human does not hear a difference between 44100 and 192000.

I have no problem of burning a disk. It is actually faster for me to turn on my CD player with set up versus the USB stream.

 

[3db]

Thanks for reply,.

Just curious why Option 1 is a bad choice? I felt like playing music from CD player that's connected with analog connector would sound better than letting some USB player (I use WD media streamer) play music files. Is it because those high quality 192000khz get downgraded to CD quality and if I use USB drive they remain high quality files? But then so many people say that human does not hear a difference between 44100 and 192000.

I have no problem of burning a disk. It is actually faster for me to turn on my CD player with set up versus the USB stream.

I had to reburn all of my CD-R collection because I found that after 5 years, the CDs started skipping. After 2 reburns, I went to a USB drive and a WD and never looked back. USB sticks are awkward and easily lost.

I doubt you could tell teh difference between the CD format and that same file stored on a USB drive going through a WD.

 

[PENG]

Thanks for reply,.

Is it because those high quality 192000khz get downgraded to CD quality and if I use USB drive they remain high quality files?

Please understand there is no such thing as 44100kHz 192000kHz sampling rate. I think everyone knows you meant 44,100 Hz=44.1 kHz and 192,000 Hz = 192 kHz but still, let's get that right.

As far as your concern about high quality files, it is important to realize that high quality sound has much more to do with the recording and mastering process than the sampling rate, bit rate and bit depth. The sound quality of many of my CDs are superior to those of some of my SACD and 24 bit 192 kHz HD track files. So if you are after high quality sound files, search for high quality recordings. I have actually originated a thread on high quality sound recordings for this very reason, to create a list of known high quality recording music, be it in the form of CD, BR, SACD, DVD-A, Vinyl, or digital files, and regardless of sampling rate, bit rate and bit depth.

 

[PENG]

If you have time, here's an interesting read on the topic of sound quality, sampling frequency and bit depth etc.

24/192 Music Downloads are Very Silly Indeed

I am not saying that the guy is right about everything, but it is a good read none the less.