mortslim;461566 Wrote: > Here is part 2 of the article: > > > Update: Dave over at Cognitive Daily has answered my prayers by > carrying out a nicely designed test of performance at discriminating > different bitrates. In a nutshell, his results confirm the ones reported > here Although there participants rated the 64 kbit/s tracks as > significantly poorer in quality, no differences appeared between 128 and > 256 kbit/s. Read the complete write-up here: > http://scienceblogs.com/cognitivedaily/2007/11/few_listeners_can_distinguish.php. > > http://phineasgage.wordpress.com/2007/10/16/hearing-limitations-pt-2-distinguishing-mp3-from-cd/
I clicked on the link and read the write up. Suprise - your synopsis of the survey distorts what it said. Yes, most listeners didn't differentiate. But, and I quote: "There was, however, a small, significant correlation (.09) between listeners who had purchased their own (presumably better) external speakers and ability to discern the difference between the Copland recordings." "Those rating themselves as more extreme audiophiles were more likely to be able to detect the difference between the different data rates of the Santana MP3s. This was not attributable to their having better headphones; they simply appear to have better knowledge or hearing ability than those who aren't audiophiles. Even so, the correlation between audiophilia and ability to detect the better Santana recordings, though significant, is not very strong: just 0.17. Part of this may be due to the particular excerpts I chose for the study. As many commenters pointed out two weeks ago in the survey thread, the easiest way to discern artifacts due to MP3 encoding is in the cymbals, and neither the Copland nor the Santana had cymbals. I suspect the acoustic guitar in the Santana has some of the same properties as cymbals, which is what made encoding differences easier to detect there than in the Copland." In short, the authors of the study confirmed: (a)that their methodology and choice of music was possibly flawed; (b)that some individuals (such as audiophiles) appear to have better knowledge and ability to detect differences. So actually this study proves the points I've been making, and not yours. -- firedog Tranquil PC fanless server running SqueezeCenter; SB Duet through Empirical Audio Pace Car; TACT 2.2XP; MF X-150,Sonus Faber Concerto; Mirage MS-12 sub; Dual 506 + Ortofon 20 (occasional use); sometimes use PC with M-Audio 192 as digital source. SB Boom in bedroom. Arcam CD82 which I don't use anymore, even though it's a very good player. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ firedog's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=11550 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=67679
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