Deciding which sound file is the best quality?

[brasarehot1]

I have 6 music files that are the same song and I'm trying to decide which one sounds better. I have mp3, mp4, and flac files.
Some files sound louder, but I'm not sure if the quality is better.
Is there a way to look at the properties of each file and compare some numbers to determine low/high sound quality; any ideal values I should be looking for?

*Please no super technical lingo unless explained - I am not a computer person.

If certain numbers associated with the file do represent audio quality, this is the type of answer I'm looking for (something specific and to the point)...

* Example of an answer I'm looking for [If you play the sound file on VLC, and go to Tools, then click Codec Info, then click the Statistics tab, you will see a number associated with "Demuxed data size". The higher the demuxed data size the better the sound quality. An ideal value for demuxed data size for an audiophile is 27]

Thank you for your time and consideration

 

[bikemig]

I had a friend who had two high end racing bicycles that were exactly the same in every way except that one was red and the other white. He trained on the white bike but raced on the red. He was convinced that the red bike was faster. I never argued with him because he could (and did) kick my b**t on a regular basis (except of course when I let the air out of his tires before a training race, . The point is that there are a ton of threads out there on which format is better and none of them make much, if any sense, but if the file format makes a difference to you, then that's cool and I'm not going to argue with you.

You'll be able to hear the difference in a decent system between a low resolution file and a higher one. How "high" you need to go is open to lots of disagreement. I suspect that it is impossible to hear that difference once you hit 320 kbps or the 256 kbps variable bit rate used by Amazon. Some claim that they can hear the difference between a high quality MP3 and a lossless format; perhaps they're right or perhaps they just like red bikes better than white.

Personally, I rip all my music to a lossless format (pick your poison, flac or alac). I may not be able to hear the difference between a lossless format and a 320 kbps MP3 but why not have a bit perfect copy of your music file on your computer? Space is cheap. Plus you might want to turn your lossless files into a MP3 file one day because you are using them on a device like an iPod. You can go from lossless to MP3 but not vice-versa (you can't add back in what has been taken out).

 

[j_garcia]

Agreed, once you get to lossless, the file format is irrelevant. At that point quality is in the recording (and/or lack of). A bad recording will still sound like a bad recording in lossless vs MP3.

 

[Grador]

The above advice is spot on, listen to it above the more direct answer I'll give you:

It's really difficult to determine which file has the best quality, though it's most likely the FLAC file as it is lossless. Both MP3s and ACCs work by attempting to remove detail in a manner that your brain will not notice [called psychoacoustics]. What this means is that if you attempt to look at the amount of information lost [which is easy to do] you'll find that there is in fact quite a bit of it, but what does that man? Well that's a more difficult question to answer, if the codecs did their job perfectly, even if you notice all this information missing it shouldn't make any difference in what you hear.

Given the level differences, one thing you might want to look at is peak level. In any digital format there's a number that is the largest you can record, representing the loudest sound that can be recorded. If you attempt to record a sound louder than this any information is lost, where the sound waves will be flatted out on the top and bottom [see picture link below]. If the peak level of some [but not all] is 100% then those files are probably not as good.

Beyond that it really is difficult [or impossible] to really have a program tell you quality level.

File:Clipping 1KHz 10V DIV clip A 5ohms-1-.jpg - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[brasarehot]

Thanks everyone!

 

[Hobbit]

I had a friend who had two high end racing bicycles that were exactly the same in every way except that one was red and the other white. He trained on the white bike but raced on the red. He was convinced that the red bike was faster. I never argued with him because he could (and did) kick my b**t on a regular basis (except of course when I let the air out of his tires before a training race, . The point is that there are a ton of threads out there on which format is better and none of them make much, if any sense, but if the file format makes a difference to you, then that's cool and I'm not going to argue with you.

You'll be able to hear the difference in a decent system between a low resolution file and a higher one. How "high" you need to go is open to lots of disagreement. I suspect that it is impossible to hear that difference once you hit 320 kbps or the 256 kbps variable bit rate used by Amazon. Some claim that they can hear the difference between a high quality MP3 and a lossless format; perhaps they're right or perhaps they just like red bikes better than white.

Personally, I rip all my music to a lossless format (pick your poison, flac or alac). I may not be able to hear the difference between a lossless format and a 320 kbps MP3 but why not have a bit perfect copy of your music file on your computer? Space is cheap. Plus you might want to turn your lossless files into a MP3 file one day because you are using them on a device like an iPod. You can go from lossless to MP3 but not vice-versa (you can't add back in what has been taken out).

Great advice. BTW, back in my past life I was Cat I. Now I ride for fun, but still like to put the hurt on sometimes About colors, I have seen studies where people can lift more in certain color rooms (blue over pink), are calmer in certain color rooms (Intel used to paint the walls percimon for this reason), and people with red cars drive fasters. So who know!

 

[cpp]

I use FLAC

 

[BMXTRIX]

Red - Red always goes faster. This is a proven fact.

 

[bikemig]

Red - Red always goes faster. This is a proven fact.

Yeah that's what I kept telling myself when he'd kick my b**t . . . .

 

[lsiberian]

Red - Red always goes faster. This is a proven fact.

This is the empirical data.

 

[PENG]

Some claim that they can hear the difference between a high quality MP3 and a lossless format; perhaps they're right or perhaps they just like red bikes better than white.

I am not sure if red bike is better than white but I will claim that I can hear the difference between a high quality MP3 and a lossless format that is also of high quality. I cannot hear the difference between my amps though.

 

[PENG]

Agreed, once you get to lossless, the file format is irrelevant. At that point quality is in the recording (and/or lack of). A bad recording will still sound like a bad recording in lossless vs MP3.

If you refer to bikemig, I don't think that's what he said about the difference in SQ between MP3 (he did say high quality) and loseless.

 

[lsiberian]

Better great song compressed than bad song lossless.

 

[PENG]

Better great song compressed than bad song lossless.

Of course, though a bad song for one may not be bad for another person.

 

[Julf]

Better great song compressed than bad song lossless.

Better great song compressed by a file compression algorithm than a great song compressed by a clueless producer and "engineer".