----- Original Message -----
From: "Tom" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, January 02, 2016 4:10 PM
Subject: Re: 320kbps radio audio available via MPEG-DASH
As far as I know no-one has ever been able to tell the difference between
CD and DAB let alone higher bitrates in double-blind testing.
DAB is not in any sense inferior bitrate-wise though otherwise its a
complete con.
Tom
Rubbish. At the current 128kbps MP2 that is used for DAB, it sounds pretty
awful on good hifi. All life has been squeezed from the music, it just
sounds dead. Comparing to CD is hard because you don't know what CD they're
playing.
What I have done is compared Radio 2 FM vs. DAB vs. 128kbps AAC internet,
and I can assure you the DAB is clearly the worst sounding. The FM vs.
128kbps AAC internet are different, neither is better or worse and it does
depend on how good your FM feed is.
I can do the FM vs. DAB comparison double blind, because my Arcam FM/DAB
tuner has a button to switch between FM and DAB last stations. If I press it
many times very quickly and don't look at the display I lose track of which
it is playing and there's nothing to give it away if I cover the display
with cardboard. Then I listen, make decisions about the sound, and remove
the cardboard. I can always tell which is DAB and which FM, with the
exception of Radio 3 when it's DAB is running at 192kbps MP2 and then I
can't tell which is FM or DAB. Which clearly demonstrates the problem with
DAB currently is the bit rates are far too low.
--
Owen Smith <[email protected]>
Cambridge, UK
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