Does anyone use digital music

[Sparkus]

I dont want to bore everyone with a life story, but as it is, I have no CD player and have listened to digital for a long time...years. I haven't listened much on a system in years...again...but that is what I have now. As I upgrade and get good equipment, I would like a good CD player for the CD's I have but now stuck with digital. Learning a lot about that and wonder if anyone else relies or even uses digital music. I'm playing with ripping, low end(?), and some editing software as I build so, just curious.

 

[TheWarrior]

I still happily get up to change CDs, but my player also allows iTunes streaming over wifi, for when I want that "one song."

 

[Pogre]

Almost exclusively now. I ripped my whole libray to wav and flac files and use foobar2000 as my music player. I've spent some time a/b'ing between my cd player and digital with same songs and could not detect a difference in quality. Haven't fretted about it since.

 

[Sparkus]

That's awesome. Again, learning but I grabbed Audacity and EAC and those have taught me quite a bit in a short time. When I was young, vinyl was all that existed. When I was a teen, 8 track was awesome...now...holy cow. One of the fixes to the RTi's, Pogre, was upping Windows sound settings to 192khz. That made a huge differance. Again, still doing a lot of learning and experimenting.
What do you rip with?

 

[sholling]

My guess is that most but not all of the regulars made the switch from mainly physical CDs to collections of lossless digital music years ago. On the other hand I'm not big on lossy formats like MP3 except for use in the car where road noise will mask any imperfections.

 

[Pogre]

That's awesome. Again, learning but I grabbed Audacity and EAC and those have taught me quite a bit in a short time. When I was young, vinyl was all that existed. When I was a teen, 8 track was awesome...now...holy cow. One of the fixes to the RTi's, Pogre, was upping Windows sound settings to 192khz. That made a huge differance. Again, still doing a lot of learning and experimenting.
What do you rip with?

I used Foobar to do the ripping too, tho there are probably easier (better?) programs for the job. I did it all before I discovered other ways of doing it but I don't think any of my music suffered for it. My neighbor used plain ol' windows media I think and his sounds pretty good too.

Just keep an eye on this thread for more replies. Ripping cd's is not one of my strengths, lol. Quite a few guys use Foobar as a player, if not a ripper tho. It's free and works pretty well. iTunes seems to do the job well also, but I'm not an apple guy so...

 

[Pogre]

My guess is that most but not all of the regulars made the switch from mainly physical CDs to collections of lossless digital music years ago. On the other hand I'm not big on lossy formats like MP3 except for use in the car where road noise will mask any imperfections.

Yes, this too. Lossless files. I can hear a difference between lossy (MP3, AAC, etc) and lossless (WAV, FLAC, ALAC, etc).

 

[Bucknekked]

I dont want to bore everyone with a life story, but as it is, I have no CD player and have listened to digital for a long time...years. I haven't listened much on a system in years...again...but that is what I have now. As I upgrade and get good equipment, I would like a good CD player for the CD's I have but now stuck with digital. Learning a lot about that and wonder if anyone else relies or even uses digital music. I'm playing with ripping, low end(?), and some editing software as I build so, just curious.

Welcome to the forum and welcome to the zoo.
Asking a question like "anybody doing digital music" is like asking car guys if they use premium fuel. The answer isn't just yes, its hell yes and lets have a competition to see who can be the geekiest and most OCD about how and where they get their files.

If you've got questions, we've got you covered 6 ways from Sunday.
I have been sitting pumping out some super fine jazz for about two hours now. All without lifting a finger or looking at media. All digital, all file driven, all at the touch of a finger on an ipad.

This is one of my favorite topics.

 

[Sparkus]

That's what I've been doing with Audacity...FLAC and a copy in MP3 320 kbps. For Earbud type listening. I've been using Exact Audio Copy for the rip but again, just getting going. I will absolutely check out Foobar...using WinAmp for listening...although Win Media has an appealing sound at times...I'm curious how things might tie together with a quality CD player. Have only surfaced the DAC the computer may have...but that's on my mind too...how to improve the DAC, or is it unnecessary.

 

[Sparkus]

Well, Buck, I've had no choice for years...and while I love music I'm not a "If it ain't vinyl it ain't music" type of people...so wanted to soft step, just in case. I've found, in recent couple months how badly some rips can be and also how bad some CD's can be as far as clipping. Wow. But at the same time...if it's quality...it sounds the same to me. I think my equipment could improve...but really, I'm not hearing a difference between a rip and an original CD

 

[Bucknekked]

That's what I've been doing with Audacity...FLAC and a copy in MP3 320 kbps. For Earbud type listening. I've been using Exact Audio Copy for the rip but again, just getting going. I will absolutely check out Foobar...using WinAmp for listening...although Win Media has an appealing sound at times...I'm curious how things might tie together with a quality CD player. Have only surfaced the DAC the computer may have...but that's on my mind too...how to improve the DAC, or is it unnecessary.

Just my two cents, but, once you have a ripper and a file format, you are pretty much good to go. EAC is pretty good. Consider that once you have an "exact audio copy" of a CD, how much more can you expect? Other rippers won't improve the rip. Once you get one that's spot on, your journey is pretty much done. Unless you don't like the UI on EAC.

Formats are pretty much the same. If you are doing FLAC you're pretty much home free. Its got all the CD info in it and other formats won't improve on that (unless you want WAV containers).

Players are another area people squak about but I'm not sure there is much of a difference there either. It falls in to the category if you like the sound of one player better than another, well, you've found your player. I've tried 3 or 4 players and don't sense much of a difference using the same files. YMMV, have fun sifting through them.

DACs are a non-topic for most of us. A DAC is designed to be sonically invisible. If a DAC is doing its job properly, its just moving bits. No sonic imprint, no sound changing. A $200 DAC will do the same job as a $2000 DAC. The DAC in my Mac Mini has been carrying the load and it doesn't even have a name.

This entire topic is YMMV when it comes to what you think you hear. If you like something better than another option, ride that horse.

 

[Sparkus]

Gotta ride the horse you like...no doubt.
What I did find with a recent batch of CD's I bought to rip was ripe with clipping...and very obvious to the ear.
Researching that lead into endless threads on "loudness war" and "sound engineering" arguments...I even checked the same CD's on Spotify which to my understanding has a good kbps rate. Same...bad production because it sounded terrible. With Audacity you can actually see the clipping...apparently sometimes close calls show up...but this was like 1/4 of the wave was highlighted...so something was ugly. That's where I wonder about DAC. High end CD's seem about the same, 192 khz 32 bits....so question is; is a higher quality DAC going to make a difference?

 

[Pogre]

That's what I've been doing with Audacity...FLAC and a copy in MP3 320 kbps. For Earbud type listening. I've been using Exact Audio Copy for the rip but again, just getting going. I will absolutely check out Foobar...using WinAmp for listening...although Win Media has an appealing sound at times...I'm curious how things might tie together with a quality CD player. Have only surfaced the DAC the computer may have...but that's on my mind too...how to improve the DAC, or is it unnecessary.

Do your homework. DAC's are a fun one too. I think it's more in the awesome numbers than what you can hear. The differences (in numbers) are there and measurable but from what I've been reading and hearing after a point it all becomes inaudible anyway. You run into diminishing returns a lot quicker with electronics than you do with speakers and subs (tho they have their point also). Yes you can find better DAC's that spec awesome. Whether you can hear the difference..? I find it very unlikely. Not worth my dollar.

Like I said, subs sorted first. Get your sub situation squared away and maximize what you have now before you spend any more big coin. It's sounding like you're starting to warm up to the lsi's and by most accounts I've seen they're pretty good speakers. You've improved your sound quality already and you're just now getting familiar with the electronics. I think you're in for a pleasant surprise with a new sub (or 2!). As a possible scenario, IF you maximize and find that you're happy with your current electronics you could get a second sub. It's not about volume, (tho you will gain 3 dB). It will smooth out your bass response even better and more evenly throughout the room. Once you hear good, clean bass you won't look at it the same again. That was my experience and I felt the way you did when I got here. I swear it made my entire system sound better from top to bottom.

Lots of little variables to consider. Keep learning and I recommend staying objective. There's a ton of woo-woo pseudo-science techno babble that take real science and twists it for their nefarious purposes (getting you to buy their expensive gear).

Brilliant Pebbles

Okay, that one is pretty far out there, but I think a lot of the super cable, power conditioner and other super expensive gear with inaudible differences won't do much better when it comes to putting your money into it.

 

[lovinthehd]

Well, CD is digital. If you can rip your CDs to computer, I wouldn't worry about getting a player unless you just like getting up half as much as for an LP

 

[Sparkus]

I think the advice I've found here is solid. I'm not looking to buy quality, gotta earn everything. Theory chat is good though...gives me perspective. The sub is a go...I'll up the sub first. Still, gotta tinker, it's fun and we learn from bouncing ideas off the experienced walls of others.

 

[Sparkus]

Exactly...CD is digital...so, does the DAC make a difference? Is a cheap, low quality DAC as good as a higher quality DAC? Is the end result the same? If I rip a CD with a low quality DAC, regardless of it's tech claims, can I get better audio from a higher quality DAC? Like, if my computer was made in 2007, is my DAC the same quality reproduction as a computer made in 2019?

 

[lovinthehd]

I don't use a computer for a DAC myself. What other gear do you have, tho? Do you have an avr?

ps Why and how would you use a DAC to rip?

 

[Bucknekked]

Gotta ride the horse you like...no doubt.
What I did find with a recent batch of CD's I bought to rip was ripe with clipping...and very obvious to the ear.
Researching that lead into endless threads on "loudness war" and "sound engineering" arguments...I even checked the same CD's on Spotify which to my understanding has a good kbps rate. Same...bad production because it sounded terrible. With Audacity you can actually see the clipping...apparently sometimes close calls show up...but this was like 1/4 of the wave was highlighted...so something was ugly. That's where I wonder about DAC. High end CD's seem about the same, 192 khz 32 bits....so question is; is a higher quality DAC going to make a difference?

There are lots of questions and comments around clipping and loudness. And lots of questions and comments about vinyl sounding better than CD sounding better than........ Most all of these things boil down to two simple things.
1. A bad recording is a bad recording and format and equipment will not save it
2 A good recording trumps format and just about anything else.

Bad recordings, and they are out there in droves, sound bad no matter how you try to dress 'em up. Good ones will shine through just about anything but definitely shine on great equipment. One of the hallmarks of a lot of audio buffs is the "aha moment" when they realize that they can improve the sound coming out of their systems with great recordings much easier than with any other variable. The future then becomes the hunt for great recordings that you love.

DACS, and other gadgets and hardware are at the very tail of the audio dog. There are much bigger influencers of your sound than those techno details. Great recordings are the easiest. Great speakers probably come in second. Pretty much everything after that is small incremental differences.

Have fun along the way. Its a journey and a process. It never really has an end point

 

[Sparkus]

I have an Onkyo TX RZ820 AVR. I have an old Dell, my favorite, 17r n7110 linked to it with HDMI, a Dell OptiPlex 790 i5, 3550 connected HDMI as music computer...used for nothing else. That was a recent decision and the music computer, WIN 7 64 has never been used for anything until recently.
The sub, PSW 108 Polk Audio, I bought to add to a 20 year old Technics system...before the RTi's A7's I bought to replace the SB A38 Technics I had with that 20 year old system. Beat to poop but they still sound pretty good...the Technics.
Got a Sony CS-SS8 as a center...a replacement to the Technics center before the RTi's
Then Yamaha a635a 3 way studios I've used as surround for 20 yrs...don't even remember where I got them or why I replaced the technic surround.
That's it...unless I can brag about the super cool LED light strip under the shelves that hold it all...it has mic

 

[Sparkus]

Got little life and nothing better to do, Buck...