Dac Questions from an Analogue guy :
If you lent CDs to your friend, I don't think he can turn them into any hi-resolution files, he only has 16 bits and 44khz to start with. As I said he may do some upsampling, but that won't make them into what I'd consider to be a hi-rez file. For your basic question, you'll need more help from people who know about downloading and computer audio, I'm not good at that. |
Vinylmad814, I have a computer based front end, and have done extensive research in the areas of redbook CD playback and upsampling. The CDs you gave your friend can all be ripped to FLAC, or WAV, or AIF, all of these are lossless formats. WAV and AIF can be played by pretty much any software player out there, FLAC cannot be played back on iTunes to my knowledge. High-res files, i.e. 24/96 or 24/192 files you buy on HDtracks.com, can also be formatted into these same file types. What you will get from your friend ripping your CDs will be 16/44, which is the standard for CDs. 16/44 can still sound very, very good; like everything else, it is all about the quality of the recording. Upsampling is not the same as playing a high res track. Your DAC upsamples the signal to 24/96 or 24/192, but the music signal you are sending the DAC is 16/44, if you are using the CD rips your friend is providing. Upsampling is pretty much what all modern DACs do, it re-samples the 16/44 track at a much higher rate, and it is supposed to push noise artifacts beyond the range of human hearing. Highs are supposed to "smooth out." I cannot really test the difference between a 16/44 track played at 16/44, and that same track upsampled to 24/192, because my current DAC upsamples only, I don't have the choice of non-oversampled playback. So I cannot say that upsampling sounds good or bad, I got into this computer-based-audio thing kind of late. I can say that my PC-rig mops the floor with my Denon changer in sound quality, but the cost differential makes that comparison unfair. If you purchase iTunes music in 256K mp3 format, those are *not* high res files. the MPEG3 codec cannot push high-res data at that low of a rate (256K). |
Thanks for the info folks. I just had a chance to go and see a high end audio provider who's main focus is analogue but has been impressed with some of newer digital advances in the past couple years. He is now a dealer for Weiss, a manufacturere of high end Dacs. Like 6 or 7 K!!! Anyways, I just learned of how these high res masters come. With the Weiss Dac a DVD disc with 24/176 files. No player can play these files, so they have to be downloaded to a computer and played through some type of media player of some sort to utilize these files. I must say they sound absolutley fantastic. The best digital sound i have ever heard, hands down. Mind you this is played on a $7,000 dollar Dac with files that have been mastered utilizing this high bit/res rate. From what he understands alot of the material available is not originally mastered at this high level which in turn goes through an upsampling process. Apparently some of these files do not sound all that good and are not worth the cost over its 16/44 counterparts. So buyer beware. Well i am going to have to press on further and actually to a sound test. I can't believe the digital realm has me mildy stoked. lol |
This is a good place to start: http://thewelltemperedcomputer.com/index.html Then go here: http://www.computeraudiophile.com Good luck |
