Highest Quality music Droid will play?

[monsterenergy22]

Saw an interesting post the other day that said the Droid supposedly can only play 128 kbp/s as the higest quality of music?
http://androidforums.com/all-things-root-droid/90257-sd-card-phone-full.html#post856329

Can anyone confirm this?

 

[shadowdude777]

It's the weekend; tomorrow, I'm going to run some tests on some songs I transcoded from FLAC, but I seriously doubt that 128 and 192 are going to sound identical. 128 is horrid.

 

[johnlgalt]

None of my music is less than 192, and I usually get 256 or better. Everything I have in MP3 format plays on my DROID.

I just haven't transferred a lot of my music b/c 1) I can fit 80 GB of music on 16 GB SD Card, and 2) Pandora is a friggin *beast* when it comes to playing the music I want to hear.

 

[IxI Dan IxI]

I can fit 80 GB of music on 16 GB SD Card,

Oh really?

 

[nstallion]

Oh really?

I think he meant "can't" judging by the context of that sentence.

 

[Fabolous]

With custom ROMs, you can play FLAC if you want.

I know for a fact that some of my albums are 320kbps, and have no issues playing.

 

[dmodert66]

I downloaded the 2010 Lakers Anthem 2 days ago. It was 320k and it played fine on my phone. While I have FLAC support through root, I've never tried it..Guess I should...

 

[johnlgalt]

Yes, I meant can't

 

[mobrienjr]

most of my music is 320 or higher and it plays fine on my *non-rooted* droid

 

[monsterenergy22]

But is it true that above 128 kbp/s the music will sound the same? If that makes sense, lol

 

[mobrienjr]

nope, I can tell the difference is how the audio is when played through my aux port in my car. The lower the quality, the higher I have to increase the volume. Also, if memory serves me right 192 is the standard for CD's?

 

[messenger13]

I REFUSE to listen to mp3s at lower than 192 kbps. I can tell the difference INSTANTLY and it drives me nuts. Just for giggles, I just compared 192 kbps files played on the DROID to 128 kbps. The difference was obvious, as I expected.

Also, if memory serves me right 192 is the standard for CD's?

This is not correct. The 'standard' for CDs are (.wav) files with a resolution of 16-bit stereo, and a sample rate of 44.1 kHz. In other words, 65,536 levels of data being played 44,100 times per second.

I could go on & on about compression types and filetypes ... but I'll spare you the boredom. Suffice it to say that the DROID supports .mp3 files all the way up to 320 kbps. However, I am of the opinion that any .mp3 file compressed at a higher bitrate than 192 kbps will not be discernible to 99% of the ears out there. Especially when you consider that one is listening to a compressed filetype in the first place. If quality is one's main objective, then one should listen to .wav files and trash the whole .mp3 concept altogether. The purpose of .mp3 files is to conserve space on portable devices and for faster download/upload times on the internet. If space and bandwidth were unlimited, we'd scrap the whole compressed file concept and be done with it.

 

[shadowdude777]

However, I am of the opinion that any .mp3 file compressed at a higher bitrate than 192 kbps will not be discernible to 99% of the ears out there.

192? No way, that can definitely be improved upon with good headphones and a good soundcard. I can tell the difference between a WAV file and an MP3 encoded at 256kbps on my computer. With better equipment I could probably discern 320 from lossless, but that would be terrible because then I'd have to start keeping everything as FLAC!

Personally, I keep everything as MP3 V0 because it's pretty much like 320 except you don't waste more bits when you don't need them. Since the Droid's sound card is inferior to computers' sound cards, I'd say MP3 V2 would probably be a good way to go for it.

That's just my two cents.

 

[messenger13]

192? No way, that can definitely be improved upon with good headphones and a good soundcard. I can tell the difference between a WAV file and an MP3 encoded at 256kbps on my computer. With better equipment I could probably discern 320 from lossless, but that would be terrible because then I'd have to start keeping everything as FLAC!

I have three Sonorus STUDI/O sounds cards (totally 48 inputs) in my DAW (digital audio workstation) that can play files up to 24-bit / 96 KHz. I also have several pairs of studio quality headphones and near field monitors. It takes a really good ear and audio equipment to discern a 320 kbps .mp3 file to the original wav file.

I'm not a betting man ... but I'd bet you a fair amount of money that what you're saying could be proven wrong if you were to come to my home studio. I'll play you 50 sample files, from 192 kbps .mp3s, to .ogg files, to flac, to .wav files. I'd bet you could NOT tell the difference of more than 40 of them.

I have tested filetypes, resolutions, and bitrates ad nauseam. To each his own ... but I know of what I speak. And I'm very confident about it (as if you couldn't tell).

 

[shadowdude777]

I have three Sonorus STUDI/O sounds cards (totally 48 inputs) in my DAW (digital audio workstation) that can play files up to 24-bit / 96 KHz. I also have several pairs of studio quality headphones and near field monitors. It takes a really good ear and audio equipment to discern a 320 kbps .mp3 file to the original wav file.

I'm not a betting man ... but I'd bet you a fair amount of money that what you're saying could be proven wrong if you were to come to my home studio. I'll play you 50 sample files, from 192 kbps .mp3s, to .ogg files, to flac, to .wav files. I'd bet you could NOT tell the difference of more than 40 of them.

I have tested filetypes, resolutions, and bitrates ad nauseam. To each his own ... but I know of what I speak. And I'm very confident about it (as if you couldn't tell).

Maybe I couldn't discern 320 from lossless, but I'm definitely interested in if I can tell 256 from lossless consistently. I only tested 2 songs, but I almost never got it wrong after a friend played me one or the other about 10 times. Yes, I realize I need a larger sample set.

I shouldn't try it with my music though. Most of it is death metal from bands with equipment that probably sucks. Maybe I'll use some classical.

My sound card is a Creative X-Fi XtremeGamer (good card, but the company is composed of assholes with no respect for the open-source/Linux community. I can't recommend it even in the slightest as a result). My headphones are Grado SR-80i's, which are a great budget audiophile pair of headphones at $80. They aren't too accurate but they're "colored" well for the type of music I listen to. So my equipment isn't bad, but it certainly isn't studio-quality.

 

[johnlgalt]

Some people have better ears than others, but I'm with Joe - 99% cannot discern the difference.

The rest of us, however, DGAF about file size as long as the music is clean.

 

[bufftallica]

@shadowdude, try the experiment with Godsmack...their recording studio is amazing.

 

[shadowdude777]

The rest of us, however, DGAF about file size as long as the music is clean.

Haha, I can't argue this! I'm fine with songs taking up 30MB each as long as they sound nice. Of course, if MP3-320 is still transparent I'll encode in it.

@shadowdude, try the experiment with Godsmack...their recording studio is amazing.

Thanks, I will be doing that later tonight!