En La Clandestinidad
Telford, PA by way of Kansas City, MO and Milwaukee, WI, Phoenix, AZ and East Greenbush, NY Posts: 3,650
Not to me, I used that extra five bucks towards a second show and they sound great. I don't have a good enough ear to notice a difference I guess.
Formerly Brew Crew Tix “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world.
0
81
Needing a ride to Forest Hills and a ounce of weed. Please inquire within. Thanks. Or not. Posts: 58,276
tough call.
i can tell the difference on mp3's. if they are low bit rates, they sound muddy on my car stereo. if i go with a high bit rate, they sound alot better. wiht ipod ear buds, i can't really tell the difference.
I got over 750 pj shows and if i convert any of them (flac/shn) to mp3 then i dont notice anything, i obviously encode them slowly for high quality and use highest quality setting...
In a way, .Flac is like DVD and .MP3 is like VHS ( not 100% true, just trying to give an easy example )
The average consumer cannot tell the difference, especially with the advent of IPods and Mp3 players and tiny headphones...
~~~~~~~~~
The main difference with .Flac is that the higher frequencies are preserved, whereas with MP3 the higher frequencies are deleted... This affects sounds like vocals, guitars, cymbals...
Post edited by LiteTheMatch on
A child's rhyme stuck in my head...
It said "Life is nothing but a dream."
I've spent so many years in question
To find I'd known this all along.
0
En La Clandestinidad
Telford, PA by way of Kansas City, MO and Milwaukee, WI, Phoenix, AZ and East Greenbush, NY Posts: 3,650
The average consumer cannot tell the difference, especially with the advent of IPods and Mp3 players and tiny headphones...
?? The difference between VHS and DVD is HUGE compared to FLAC and MP3. IMO
Formerly Brew Crew Tix “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world.
The average consumer cannot tell the difference, especially with the advent of IPods and Mp3 players and tiny headphones...
?? The difference between VHS and DVD is HUGE compared to FLAC and MP3. IMO
Lol yea I agree... But video and audio are completely different things... I'm just trying to give a metaphor that explains the difference quickly and easily.
Generally, we take in in more of reality with our eyes than our ears.
Post edited by LiteTheMatch on
A child's rhyme stuck in my head...
It said "Life is nothing but a dream."
I've spent so many years in question
To find I'd known this all along.
The average consumer cannot tell the difference, especially with the advent of IPods and Mp3 players and tiny headphones...
I wouldn't go that far. Like 81 said, if you have an mp3 at a high bit rate, it's hard to tell the difference.
I agree.. I think the mp3s are encoded at 224 kbps? There should be a noticable difference between those and .Flac. If they were at 320 kbps it'd be a bit more difficult to tell the difference.
A child's rhyme stuck in my head...
It said "Life is nothing but a dream."
I've spent so many years in question
To find I'd known this all along.
0
En La Clandestinidad
Telford, PA by way of Kansas City, MO and Milwaukee, WI, Phoenix, AZ and East Greenbush, NY Posts: 3,650
256kbps I believe for MP3's. At least thats what our boots are.
Formerly Brew Crew Tix “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world.
I got over 750 pj shows and if i convert any of them (flac/shn) to mp3 then i dont notice anything, i obviously encode them slowly for high quality and use highest quality setting...
I got over 750 pj shows and if i convert any of them (flac/shn) to mp3 then i dont notice anything, i obviously encode them slowly for high quality and use highest quality setting...
What do you use to encode them?
DBpoweramp.
0
81
Needing a ride to Forest Hills and a ounce of weed. Please inquire within. Thanks. Or not. Posts: 58,276
256 is the rate for the mp3's
not terrible, but not great. i rip my cd's at close to 1,000 to try and preserve as much as possible.
my ipod is 120 gigs, so it can still hold a lot at the higher levles.
It's a common debate is this one. Boils down to the fact of "how" you're going to listen to the music. If you've got a high-end system don't play low bit-rate MP3s as you'll notice the difference between them and FLAC.
If you've got an iPod, or any of the more popular players then FLAC is useless to you anyway as you have to convert to MP3. Plus the fact you'll be listening to them through tiny ear-buds. Any quality that would be gained by having FLAC is lost.
Even if you've spent £150+ on a pair of speakers for your computer and £100 on a soundcard, don't bother with FLAC.
The only reason to buy FLAC (in my opinion) is if you plan to fire them through a decent system, or if you want to rip them at a higher bit-rate than those available, or even for archiving purposes.
Remember, FLAC is a lossless codec, but files are around half the size than if they were straight ripped to WAV from a CD. They're the same quality, but smaller for file sharing purposes.
:: Caesaria - Israel 1995, Wembley 1996, Manchester 2000, Leeds 2006, Manchester 2009, Manchester 2012, Manchester 2012 (EV), Leeds 2014, London 2018 ::
Just got both Chicago shows on mp3 and they sound AMAZING!!! Two of the greatest music nights of my life!
Los Angeles - Sep 11, 1992
Memphis - Aug 15, 2000
Chicago - May 16, 2006
Chicago - Aug 23-24, 2009
Columbus - May 6, 2010
Noblesville - May 7, 2010
Manchester - June 20-21, 2012
Amsterdam - June 26-27, 2012
Berlin - July 4-5, 2012
0
81
Needing a ride to Forest Hills and a ounce of weed. Please inquire within. Thanks. Or not. Posts: 58,276
It's a common debate is this one. Boils down to the fact of "how" you're going to listen to the music. If you've got a high-end system don't play low bit-rate MP3s as you'll notice the difference between them and FLAC.
If you've got an iPod, or any of the more popular players then FLAC is useless to you anyway as you have to convert to MP3. Plus the fact you'll be listening to them through tiny ear-buds. Any quality that would be gained by having FLAC is lost.
Even if you've spent £150+ on a pair of speakers for your computer and £100 on a soundcard, don't bother with FLAC.
The only reason to buy FLAC (in my opinion) is if you plan to fire them through a decent system, or if you want to rip them at a higher bit-rate than those available, or even for archiving purposes.
Remember, FLAC is a lossless codec, but files are around half the size than if they were straight ripped to WAV from a CD. They're the same quality, but smaller for file sharing purposes.
i agree with most, but i (like a lot of peope) use my ipod in the truck. not a top of the line set up, but above average. to me an ipod means not havnig to carry tons of cd's.
There is a very noticeable difference between the two if you have a higher end stereo setup and are listening at a decent volume, especially in the bass. If most of your listening will be through headphones or some other medium it is probably not worth it.
I have a decently setup stereo in my daily driver, so I will be getting the flacs. If your stock car stereo sounds fine, pick up the .mp3s, the flacs won't really make a difference.
Download and install the codec and frontend. Flac frontend will decode them to .wav, which can be burned to a cd just as you would a .mp3.
if you are using Vista or Windows 7, you will have to run frontend as administrator when you decode or it will throw up an error.
I have had other programs that have clipped pieces out of the file...not saying that all of them are like that, but I can vouch for this one, having decoded flacs for years using this problem.
I prefer FLAC. Sounds better on the home and car stereo.
MP3 is great for portable systems though.
At least you can turn a flac into an mp3, but you can't do vice versa (well you could, but it'd be pointless).
If all you're going to use it on is a portable device them mp3's are find. If you're going to use them in half decent home/car stereos, then flac would sound better.
I went to both Chicago shows and wanted to get them. Is FLAC really worth the extra $5/show over MP3?
If you plan to listen to the bootlegs through a really good pair of headphones, or through a good speaker setup, then FLAC is definitely worth it. If you plan to listen to it mainly on your iPod or MP3 player, then just get the MP3 version.
Thanks for the help everyone, but I just went ahead and got the mp3, didn't want to wait Sounds great to me so far on my computer speakers, haven't tried the cd's I made in my stereo or car yet tho...
FLAC is better, it will also take up more room on your hard drive maybe 1gb or 1.5gb, it is cd quality, and you will notice a difference in quality, i use optical digital out my mac run it to a DAC headphone amp, then to my AKG 701 headphones and WOWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!, Here is a test, if you have the resources on your computer, down load Backspacer @ 256 or even 320mbps and listen to it, then download it at a lossless format and you here a difference if you have good quality headphones.
I prefer FLAC, because its SEEMLESS, and i think thats the ONLY way to listen to concert bootlegs. I can't stand to listen to MP3 bootleg concerts, with those GAPS between songs.
Comments
“If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world.
i can tell the difference on mp3's. if they are low bit rates, they sound muddy on my car stereo. if i go with a high bit rate, they sound alot better. wiht ipod ear buds, i can't really tell the difference.
The average consumer cannot tell the difference, especially with the advent of IPods and Mp3 players and tiny headphones...
~~~~~~~~~
The main difference with .Flac is that the higher frequencies are preserved, whereas with MP3 the higher frequencies are deleted... This affects sounds like vocals, guitars, cymbals...
It said "Life is nothing but a dream."
I've spent so many years in question
To find I'd known this all along.
?? The difference between VHS and DVD is HUGE compared to FLAC and MP3. IMO
“If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world.
Lol yea I agree... But video and audio are completely different things... I'm just trying to give a metaphor that explains the difference quickly and easily.
Generally, we take in in more of reality with our eyes than our ears.
It said "Life is nothing but a dream."
I've spent so many years in question
To find I'd known this all along.
I wouldn't go that far. Like 81 said, if you have an mp3 at a high bit rate, it's hard to tell the difference.
Pearl Jam bootlegs:
http://wegotshit.blogspot.com
I agree.. I think the mp3s are encoded at 224 kbps? There should be a noticable difference between those and .Flac. If they were at 320 kbps it'd be a bit more difficult to tell the difference.
It said "Life is nothing but a dream."
I've spent so many years in question
To find I'd known this all along.
“If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world.
What do you use to encode them?
DBpoweramp.
not terrible, but not great. i rip my cd's at close to 1,000 to try and preserve as much as possible.
my ipod is 120 gigs, so it can still hold a lot at the higher levles.
how do you rip to 1,000? I've never seen that option before.. Which program do you use?
It said "Life is nothing but a dream."
I've spent so many years in question
To find I'd known this all along.
itunes. it's somewhere in the ripping settings. dig around and if you can't find it, i'll post instructions.
If you've got an iPod, or any of the more popular players then FLAC is useless to you anyway as you have to convert to MP3. Plus the fact you'll be listening to them through tiny ear-buds. Any quality that would be gained by having FLAC is lost.
Even if you've spent £150+ on a pair of speakers for your computer and £100 on a soundcard, don't bother with FLAC.
The only reason to buy FLAC (in my opinion) is if you plan to fire them through a decent system, or if you want to rip them at a higher bit-rate than those available, or even for archiving purposes.
Remember, FLAC is a lossless codec, but files are around half the size than if they were straight ripped to WAV from a CD. They're the same quality, but smaller for file sharing purposes.
Memphis - Aug 15, 2000
Chicago - May 16, 2006
Chicago - Aug 23-24, 2009
Columbus - May 6, 2010
Noblesville - May 7, 2010
Manchester - June 20-21, 2012
Amsterdam - June 26-27, 2012
Berlin - July 4-5, 2012
i agree with most, but i (like a lot of peope) use my ipod in the truck. not a top of the line set up, but above average. to me an ipod means not havnig to carry tons of cd's.
very easy..... you just need a program, which is free.
FLAC to WAV
I use one called CD Wave Editor
convert them to .wav and burn!
It said "Life is nothing but a dream."
I've spent so many years in question
To find I'd known this all along.
I have a decently setup stereo in my daily driver, so I will be getting the flacs. If your stock car stereo sounds fine, pick up the .mp3s, the flacs won't really make a difference.
Download and install the codec and frontend. Flac frontend will decode them to .wav, which can be burned to a cd just as you would a .mp3.
if you are using Vista or Windows 7, you will have to run frontend as administrator when you decode or it will throw up an error.
I have had other programs that have clipped pieces out of the file...not saying that all of them are like that, but I can vouch for this one, having decoded flacs for years using this problem.
MP3 is great for portable systems though.
At least you can turn a flac into an mp3, but you can't do vice versa (well you could, but it'd be pointless).
If all you're going to use it on is a portable device them mp3's are find. If you're going to use them in half decent home/car stereos, then flac would sound better.
If you plan to listen to the bootlegs through a really good pair of headphones, or through a good speaker setup, then FLAC is definitely worth it. If you plan to listen to it mainly on your iPod or MP3 player, then just get the MP3 version.
http://www.caraudio.com/forum/showthread.php?t=114272
Just remember that on a stock car stereo, most headphones or cheaper computer speakers you most likely will never hear the difference between the two.