Hello everyone, you've probably downloaded music on the Internet more than once, and now you've come across such words in the title as lossy and lossless, now it's time to find out what this is. So there are people who just listen to music sometimes, are not particularly music lovers and they don’t see the difference between lossy and lossless, it’s understandable, where do ordinary people get expensive headphones? After all, it is in them that you can hear the difference! Or on expensive speakers...
So, lossy is the usual sound quality, it can be called household, but lossless is already high quality, you can hear it if you use some kind of expensive equipment or at least above average. My opinion is that the difference between lossy and lossless can be noticed at least if you really love music, if it really brings you pleasure.
I’ll be honest, I notice the difference; lossless is more pleasant to listen to. It’s difficult for me to explain by ear personally. When I had sound from the motherboard, that is, from a regular Realtek chip, I couldn’t notice the difference, but now it’s worth sound card Asus Xonar DX and the difference is noticeable. And one more thing, I only listen to music on headphones, I never listen to speakers, and I don’t even have them. But believe me, in expensive headphones, well, those that cost at least $150 and with a DAC for the same amount, the difference is easy to notice, but not for everyone. As I already wrote, in order to notice such a difference, you need to have a special attitude towards sound in principle, you need to have some kind of love for it or something... In short, you need to be some kind of audiophile. I don’t consider myself like that, but I think that I’m a music lover, hehe.. Sound is important to me, and if the sound is at least a little different from what I need, then I won’t listen to it. Strange, but this only applies to headphones. I just recently bought headphones for $50, fell for the marketing, and the sound is shorter, seems to be normal, but does not reach the level of the old headphones, in short, I gave these new headphones to my mother, she seems happy..
But to put it roughly, there is no huge difference between lossy quality, for example 320 kbps mp3 format, and lossless quality, for example FLAC. That is, audiophiles will notice it and it will be noticeable to them. And if you take regular speakers for $50 or something music center, then you are unlikely to notice the difference there. It’s not for nothing that mp3 is so popular: it preserves the quality to the maximum and greatly reduces the file size...
So I found a picture, it’s certainly not about music, but the difference in music between lossy and lossless is about the same:
It’s cool, but on the one hand there is a difference, but on the other hand it’s barely noticeable
So, we have already found out that for the average computer user, there is almost no difference between lossy and lossless, right? Yes, that’s right, we were talking about quality here. But if you take the file size.. Oh, guys, then lossless weighs much more than lossy and I think this is very important factor. An album of a group in lossless quality can easily weigh 500 megagrams, while in lossy mode the weight will be 3-4 times less. These are the pies guys
That's all, this is my short note, I hope I wrote everything in an understandable and accessible language. Good luck
20.07.2017Translated from English, the word Lossless means “without loss.” If the sound is compressed using special lossless audio codecs, then, if desired, it can always be restored with absolute accuracy. For example, if you take an ordinary AudioCD with sound in analog format, then you will record it in WAV format for uncompressed audio, then compress WAV using lossless, and then decompress the resulting audio file into WAV and, as a result, you can record the resulting result on regular blank CD. This way you will get two completely identical AudioCDs. The advantage of the lossless format for storing audio is that the quality of the recordings is much higher than that of lossy codecs. However, they take up much less space than uncompressed audio. However, lossy files are much smaller in size than other lossless music files. Most modern software players can play lossless format. Programs that cannot play similar format, can easily learn this using the lossless plugin. What are losseless audio formats?
Sound without loss of quality
It is unlikely that a true music connoisseur will be satisfied with the sound of music recorded in MP3 or OggVorbis compression formats. Of course, if you listen to audio recordings on household equipment, then the shortcomings in the sound will simply be impossible to catch by ear. But if you try to play each compressed file on a high-quality hi-fi device, you will immediately notice all the audio flaws. Of course, creating a collection of quality music on vinyl records or CDs is not easy. However, there is a reasonable alternative to this for lovers of quality sound. This is music in lossless format. Such music can be stored on a personal computer in a form that allows the original parameters of the music to remain unchanged, even if compression has been used. This path At the same time, it also allows you to solve the problems of high quality music and its compact storage. Today, audio equipment for listening to music is quite affordable.
Uncompressed audio formats without loss of quality:
- CDDA – CD audio standard;
- WAV – Microsoft Wave;
- IFF-8SVX;
- AIFF;
- IFF-16SV;
Compressed formats:
- APE - Monkey's Audio;
- M4A - Apple Lossless - high-quality music for devices manufacturer Apple;
- WV - WavPack;
— LA – Lossless Audio;
- WMA - Windows Media Audio 9;
- TTA - True Audio;
FLAC format
One of the most common formats today is the FLAC format. What distinguishes it from lossy audio codecs is that when used, no data is removed from the audio stream at all. This allows you to successfully use it to play music on Hi-End and Hi-Fi equipment, and also use it to create an archive of audio collections. The big advantage of this format is its free distribution. For musicians who record their own music, this is important. Recently, this format has gained great popularity. Therefore, its support is included in most media players.
APE format
For the APE format, unlike FLAC, there are only plugins and codecs that are designed for the Windows platform. Other platforms have their own expensive solutions from third-party manufacturers software. This algorithm can achieve compression without loss of audio information by approximately 1.5-2 times. The compression process consists of three main encoding steps. Only one of them is based on the use of properties inherent in sound for compression. All others are practically no different from conventional archivers. Despite the fact that the compression algorithm is distributed free of charge, the license restrictions are such that it is practically inaccessible to amateur musicians.
Apple Lossless Format
Lossless quality music can be easily listened to using an audio compression codec without compromising quality on Apple devices. This format was developed by Apple for use in its own devices. This format is compatible with iPod players that have special docking and latest firmware. This format does not use specific tools for managing DRM rights, but the container format contains such capabilities. It is also supported by the QuickTime application. In addition, this format is included in libraries that are freely available. This makes it possible to organize listening to files in applications of the Windows operating system. Apple released the source codes of the format in 2011. This opens up broad prospects for this codec. In the near future, it may well be able to compete with other formats. In tests, this format shows pretty good results. Compressed files have compression from 40 to 60% of the size of the originals. The decoding speed is also impressive. This justifies the use of this format for mobile devices that are characterized by low system performance. The main disadvantage of this codec is that the extension of the audio files matches the AAC audio codec. This leads to some confusion, because in essence the AAC format is not a high-quality music format. Therefore, it was decided to store information in an MP4 container with the .m4a extension. Among other formats, it is worth mentioning Windows Media Audio 9 Lossless, which is included in Windows applications Media. It works with MacOSX and Windows. However, users do not speak very favorably of it. The fact is that quite often certain problems arise with codec compatibility, and the number of supported channels is limited to only six.
Another freely distributed audio codec is the WavPack format. It allows you to compress audio information without losing quality. WavPack integrates a special, exclusive combination mode that allows you to create two files. In this mode, one of the files is created in a relatively small size with loss of quality.wv, which you can easily play yourself. The second .wvc file can correct .wv. In combination with it, it allows you to fully restore the original. This approach may seem promising to some users, because then they do not have to choose between two types of compression. Both will always be realized. The Lagarith lossless codec video codec with high-quality audio also deserves attention. This video codec works quite efficiently and quickly.
Software for listening to lossless audio
Software players did not immediately begin to work with specific lossless codecs, which can reproduce sound without loss.
This player can handle almost all music playback formats without loss of quality. What is a good player for the lossless format can be explained using its example. This software player is quite capable of correctly processing individual tracks in lossless format. For APE or FLAC codecs this is quite typical problem. It consists in the fact that the entire sound disc is digitized at once. It is recorded as one file without division into tracks.
The problem of dividing into tracks can be solved by an additional file that has the .cue extension. It contains a description of the access parameters for each album track. A regular player will play the entire lossless file.
Player for lossless files
The AIMP player is great for playing most audio formats and recognizes tracks in lossless format.
Players supporting lossless formats
Users respond well to the digital players Foobar 2000, jetAudio, SpiderPlayer. There are no fundamental differences between them. The choice of device will be based on the user’s subjective opinion about the convenience of the interface for playing the lossless format. You can find out what the lossless format is by testing all these players. AppleLossless format is playable when using iTunes. This codec is also supported by the popular video player VLC. Owners of Apple-compatible PCs can easily use two interesting programs– Cog and Vox. These programs support the following lossless formats: FLAC, AppleLossless, MonkeyAudio and Wavpack. There is also a lot useful features. For example, Last.fm services are supported. Owners of computers with operating system Windows can easily use any application that is compatible with music codecs without loss of quality: WinAmp and Foobar 2000. The Winamp application requires special plugins. Lossless music can be played back perfectly using KMPlayer players and iTunes. The benefit of the iTunes app is that it supports tags.
Compatible with lossless devices
It is unlikely that the owner of a music library will want to waste time converting FLAC files to MP3 in order to be able to listen to these recordings on his gadget. A tablet or smartphone has limited capabilities that cannot be compared with a personal computer, but many mobile devices Today they allow you to play lossless formats. For example, owners of devices running the Android operating system can use the andLess player. It can play files in APE and FLAC formats, as well as uncompressed Wav and other formats supported by the operating system. Android system. The situation is somewhat worse for owners of devices based on the Blackberry platform. Only owners of the Bold 8900 and 9000 models can listen to the lossless format. Owners of Apple devices can use the ALAC codec without any problems. This format is supported by the iPod player, iPad tablet And iPhone. To play the FLAC format, you can download the FLACPlayer program from the AppStore. SamsungGALAXY devices and some SonyEricsson smartphones, as well as iriver players also support the FLAC codec. FLAC support is also supported by desktop devices from many manufacturers. Media centers and media players make it easy to do without using a PC when listening to songs in lossless format. Full support for absolutely all formats is still a long way off, but this is quite enough for the media player to accept the FLAC codec, which is the most common codec for high-quality lossless music. What is lossless playback equipment?
Equipment for listening to lossless format
To get from high-quality sound a real pleasure, you need to use special equipment: amplifiers, speakers and headphones. Things are easiest, of course, with headphones. If you intend to enjoy music while sitting at your computer, then these are best for you. Users speak well of Sennheiser and Koss products. Particular attention must be paid to the size of the membrane. The larger its size, the better the sound quality. In this case, it is important not to be deceived; many manufacturers put a small membrane in large ear pads. These headphones look pretty solid, but the sound is only suitable for listening to MP3 files. It is difficult for lovers of high-quality sound to recommend something specific. The choice in this area will be limited only by tastes and budget. Owners personal computers who choose high-quality acoustics for themselves, it would be best to choose budget columns for a computer from any popular brand. Users respond well to speaker systems produced by Microlab SOLO series.
If suddenly ordinary person“brings it” to a forum where those who consider themselves experts in high-quality sound gather, he will find that 80 percent of the audiophiles there are talking about the problem of bitrate. “Can a real music lover distinguish a recording with a good bitrate from a “lossie” file or not” - debates on this topic with arguments for and against have not subsided for quite some time. This proves that it is difficult or almost impossible to force people to abandon their beliefs, to step over their “ego,” even if the facts testify against their delusions. In our article, we will give you some information about bitrate and how it relates to practical music listening experience.
What is bitrate?
If you love listening to music, you've probably heard the term "bitrate" before, so you probably have a general idea of what it means, but we'll try to refresh your memory and give you the "official" definition here. So, bitrate (from the English bit rate) is, in fact, a stream - the speed at which bits of information pass through, i.e. the amount of data processed during a certain period of time. In audio it is usually measured in kilobits per second. For example, the music you listen to on iTunes has a stream of 256 kilobits per second.
The higher the bitrate of a track, the more space it will require on your computer. Therefore, it has become common practice to compress audio CDs so that more music can be placed on your hard drive (or on a cloud drive, such as Dropbox, or any other). This is where the legs of the long-term dispute about the quality of music from “lossy” files and “lossless” files “grow.”
What is the difference betweenlossy andlossless?
When we say “lossless,” we mean that we didn’t change anything during the rewrite. source file, and it sounds like the original CD track. More often than not, however, we save music “lossy.” A typical lossy album (MP3 or AAC) is probably 100MB or so. The same album in a lossless format such as FLAC or ALAC (also known as Apple Lossless) would take up about 300MB. For this reason, “lossy” notation is common for fast download and save more disk space.
The problem is that when you compress a file to save space, you remove blocks of data. For example, when you take a PNG image of your computer screen and save it as a JPEG, you get a “flaw” in certain parts of the image, making it look essentially the same, but with some loss of clarity and quality. Consider the image below as an example: on the right it has been compressed into JPG format, and its quality suffered as a result (if you look closely at the color of the car, the details and the background). The same thing happens with music files that are “compressed” into MP3, if this comparison is correct. Quality losses that are noticeable to the human ear or eye are called compression artifacts.
It is clear that lossy files are a compromise, but a very significant one when we talk about the hard drive space that can be lost. great value for 32 GB iPhone. But there are also different levels of lossless: 128 kilobits per second, for example, takes up very little space, but will be of lower quality than a 320 kilobits file, which in turn has lower quality than a 1411 kbits file (which is considered true lossless). However, there are many arguments that most people may not even hear the difference between the two bitrates.
Is bitrate really that important?
As storing files becomes easier and cheaper, high bitrate music is becoming more popular. But is it always worth your time, effort and disk space?
The answer to this question is not simple, and audiophiles are still fighting in battles, trying to solve an equation with two unknowns. The first part of the equation depends on technical implementation. If you are using expensive headphones or speakers good quality, then you can listen to music in a wide range of sound. This is where the low bitrate becomes noticeable and you can tell that low-quality MP3 files are missing a certain level of detail, subtle background tracks may not be audible, highs and lows won't be as dynamic, or you may simply hear other significant audio distortions. In these cases, the lossless format is justified.
But if you're listening to your favorite music through a pair of cheap and generally crappy headphones on your iPod, you won't notice the difference between a 128-kbit file and a 320-kbit file, let alone comparing a 320-kbit file to a lossless one. file 1411 kbit. Remember that picture with the car? The music coming through your headphones looks like a smaller image, and you won't hear any compression artifacts because the headphones don't have enough range.
The other part of the equation is your own ears. Most people simply don't pay enough attention or have the listening skills to tell the difference between two different bitrates. This skill can be developed to some extent over time, but sometimes not. In this case, it doesn't really matter what bitrate to use, does it? The fact of the matter is that it is very difficult to hear the difference between a lossless file and a 320 kilobit MP3 unless you are a sound engineer or musician with perfect pitch. For the vast majority of people, 320 kbps is more than enough for listening.
It would also be a big misconception to think that the higher the bitrate, the better the quality of the track, since simpler audio signals will be compressed better and have a lower bitrate, and more complex ones will be worse. This is why classical music in lossless files has a lower bitrate than, for example, rock music. The ideal is to record with a variable bitrate, but with high quality. Therefore, the bitrate value is by no means the main indicator of the quality of the audio material.
Let's summarize. Lossless files are more promising in the sense that you can always "compress" the music, but you will never be able to get the quality back, so you will have to re-record it from a CD. This is the problem with online music stores and music libraries: if you've built up a huge library of iTunes music and then decide you want the same thing but at a higher bitrate, you'll have to start all over again. But MP3 has been an excellent audio standard for exactly 20 years now, and that's unlikely to change anytime soon, so unless you're planning on becoming a militant audiophile, there's no need to worry about the quality of recordings of your favorite songs.
I recently received the following letter:
Hello site, MP3 is the most popular audio format, but there are so many others such as AAC, FLAC, OGG and WMA that I'm not really sure which one I should use. What is the difference between them and which one should I use to store my music?
The question is quite popular, I will try to answer it simply but clearly.
We've already talked about the difference between lossless and lossy, but in short, there are two types of audio quality:
- lossless: FLAC, ALAC, WAV;
- lossy: MP3, AAC, OGG, WMA.
The lossless format preserves full audio quality, in most cases CD-level, while the lossy format compresses files to save space (of course, the audio quality is degraded).
Uncompressed data storage formats: FLAC, ALAC, WAV and others
- WAV and AIFF: Both WAV and AIFF store audio uncompressed, which means they are exact copies original audio. The two formats are essentially the same quality; They just store data a little differently. AIFF is made by Apple, so you may see it more often in Apple products, while WAV is pretty much universal. However, since they are uncompressed, they take up a lot of unnecessary space. If you don't edit audio, you don't need to store audio in these formats.
- FLAC: Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC) is the most popular lossless audio storage format, making it a good choice. Unlike WAV and AIFF, it compresses the data slightly, so it takes up less space. However, it is considered a format that stores lossless audio, the quality of the music remains the same as the original source, so it is more efficient to use than WAV and AIFF. It is free and open source.
- Apple Lossless: Also known as ALAC, Apple Lossless is similar to FLAC. This is a lightly compressed format, however, the music will be preserved without loss of quality. Its compression is not as efficient as FLAC, so your files may be a little larger, but it is fully supported by iTunes and iOS (while FLAC is not). So, if you use iTunes and iOS as your main software for listening to music, you will have to use this format.
- A.P.E.: APE - has the most aggressive compression algorithm for lossless music storage, that is, you will get maximum space savings. Its sound quality is the same as FLAC, ALAC, but there are often compatibility issues. In addition, playing this format puts a much higher load on the processor to decode it, since the data is highly compressed. In general, I would not recommend using this format unless you are limited on available memory and have software compatibility issues.
Compressed audio storage formats: MP3, AAC, OGG and others
If you just want to listen to music here and now, chances are you'll be using a lossy format. They save a ton of memory, leaving you with more room for songs on your portable player, and if high enough, they will be indistinguishable from the original source. Here are the formats you are likely to encounter:
- MP3: MPEG Audio Layer III, or MP3, is the most common lossy audio storage format. So much so that it has become synonymous with downloadable music. MP3 is not the most efficient format of all, but it is certainly the most well supported, which makes it best choice for storing compressed audio.
- A.A.C.: Advanced Audio Coding, also known as AAC, is similar to MP3, although it is slightly more efficient. This means you can have files that take up less space but have the same sound quality as MP3. The format's best evangelist today is Apple's iTunes, which made AAC so popular that it has become almost as widely known as MP3. For very for a long time I've only had one device that couldn't play AAC, and that was a few years ago, so you can safely use this format to store your music.
- Ogg Vorbis: The Vorbis format, known as Ogg Vorbis due to its use of an Ogg container, is a free alternative to MP3 and AAC. Its main feature is that it is not limited by patents, but you as the end user are not affected at all. In fact, despite its openness and similar quality, it is much less popular than MP3 and AAC, which means that fewer programs support it. Thus, we do not recommend using it to avoid software compatibility issues.
- WMA: Windows Media Audio - proprietary Microsoft format, similar to MP3 or AAC. It doesn't offer any advantages over other formats, and it's also not very well supported outside of the Windows platform. We do not recommend that you rip CDs to this format unless you know for sure that all music will be played on the Windows platform, or on players compatible with this format.
So what should you use?
Now that you understand the difference between each format, which should you use to rip or download music? In general, we recommend using MP3 or AAC. They are compatible with almost every player, and both are indistinguishable from the original, if . Unless you have special needs that dictate otherwise, MP3 and AAC are your best bet.
However, there is something to be said for storing your music in a lossless format like FLAC. While you probably won't notice higher quality, lossless is great for storing music if you plan on converting it to other formats later, since converting a lossy format to another lossy format (such as AAC to MP3) will result in When files appear, they appear to be of noticeably lower quality. Therefore, for archival purposes we recommend FLAC. However, you can use any lossless format as you can convert between lossless formats without changing the quality of the file.
Sound engineer
“Here, of course, the question is not about the difference between the MP3 format and FLAC, it is broader: how do lossy compression formats (MP3, AAC, WMA, Ogg Vorbis and others; that is, lossy) differ from “lossless” (FLAC, ALAC, APE , WavPack and others; that is, lossless). Actually, with this formulation, it becomes clear that in the first group of formats, the original data is not completely preserved, while the second can be restored to the original format (for example, Wav or Aiff, extracted from a CD) without loss. What exactly is lost and in what proportions depends on specific type lossy files and their bitrate, that is, the degree of compression. But to say that all MP3s sound lousy and flakes sound perfect is the height of arrogance and incompetence. Audio formats with quality losses have been developed for more than twenty years; serious research laboratories have been working on this (the Fraunhofer Institute, for example, in addition to working on MP3, is also famous for the invention of the most efficient solar battery) and groups of enthusiasts. The mathematics of encoding is constantly improving, and these days it is no longer so easy to distinguish between files produced by different codecs by ear.
I would immediately make a reservation that not only the files themselves are important, but also the equipment on which they are going to be tested, the environment during listening and the listening experience of the examiner. In MP3 of any low bitrate, Ariel Pink will sing in the voice of Ariel Pink, there is no doubt about it. It is quite possible that for a person who listens to music-as-a-melody through white headphones in a subway car, this will be enough for his eyes, and the difference in codecs will come down to a comparison of file sizes for him. A disc jockey, who is ashamed to buy or look for lossless, will also think that with his MP3 everything is fine. in perfect order, while he prepares a set in “Tractor” on the built-in speakers of a laptop. True, during a party on a large, loud and clear-sounding club audio system (these are sometimes found, believe me), it suddenly turns out that the guy performing immediately after, for some reason, the music became big, clear and cool. Lossy formats are being developed for the convenience of transferring files over the Internet, for storage on portable audio players, and for personal playback, finally. Agree, it’s stupid to watch a one-gigabyte AVI movie on a big screen. Even in home theater it's not quite decent. It's the same with MP3. On an iPod, listen to your heart's content (although AAC from iTunes definitely sounds better), but if you go to a disco, get lossless, even if you play Skrillex. And when you listen to Christmas jazz with your fiancée's parents on their big lacquered speakers, please also buy FLAC or ALAC. With MP3 you risk getting into an awkward situation. In theory, after a bitrate of 256 kbps, it will be quite difficult for your future audiophile father-in-law to tell whether it is playing lossy or lossless. However, there are several points that can spoil your cloudless future.
Video showing the difference between WAV and MP3 formats
Usually, when you see an MP3 file, you don't pay attention to anything other than the bitrate. If you already think of yourself as a person with a taste for music and sound, then you should still look in the file properties for the data of the codec that was used during conversion. Suppose you see the inscription “Lame 3.99” there, this means that the latest MP3 codec was used and you are in luck. But next to it is “Joint Stereo”, and this is no longer great. This means that in order to save a couple of percent of file size, the codec was allowed to put some things in mono, although the recording is stereophonic, and the sound picture lost a little in depth and clarity. There are also completely botanical CBR or VBR, ABR and UBR, but if you are ready to dig that seriously, then please dig it yourself. Well, you’ve figured out the file properties, everything is simple there. The tricky part is this: you almost never know what your 320 CBR Stereo is made of. Ripped from internet radio? Made from the original Japanese CD without remastering? Recoded from 192? There is a lot of music in torrents or Soulseek, but there are few guarantees. Another difficulty is that lossy formats slightly increase peak values sound signal. The so-called overshoot is thousands of micro-overloads along the entire length of the file. Again, you won’t notice this on the train with an iPod. And the future father-in-law may hear.”
Video showing the difference between MP3 and flak
sound engineer, worked with Sergei Lazarev, Roman Kenga, Joseph Kobzon, Irakli Pirtskhalava, Anita Tsoi
“When compressed by the MP3 codec, part of the spectrum data that is indistinguishable to the average person on the average equipment is simply removed. High fidelity equipment makes it possible to appreciate the disadvantages of this type of compression; artifacts become audible even to a less average listener. But the vast majority of household acoustics, by definition, do not reproduce the entire audio spectrum linearly; they easily mask the shortcomings of MP3 compression. So nothing will disturb us, average listeners.”
