CD ripped sound quality VS . officially digitized WAV

[ChunYinZi]

I've recently noticed that user ‘Christopher-2010’ has been making a lot of requests for CD album rips at LTM.

Those of you who know me well know that 99% of the albums I've actively released have been ripped from my CDs.

Whereas in the old days, if a user asked for an album that was represented by APM Music or Universal Productions, I used to download it electronically and give it to them, because it was quick and easy, and I had a lot of CDs, but I didn't have to give CD rips to everybody,

So I'm going to tell you the difference, as I understand it.


1. In some cases, the volume of the music on the CD may be different from that of the electronic version, it may be louder or lower.

2.In some of the electronic versions of the data, I don't know if it's an official ripping error, but some of the music starts with a current sound or a stuttering sound.   And CDs don't have that problem

3.The spectrogram of a CD can reach up to 16bit 22&44100HZ. The spectrogram is very full and can reach the highest point
 whereas an electronic WAV, which usually reaches up to 16bit 24&48000HZ, often doesn't reach the highest point.  I have no way of knowing what means the electronic versions of those wav's had to go through to get them up in frequency, did they own the masters? Cai. Remixed? I don't know.


4. if you have an electronic wav that doesn't have any of the problems I've mentioned above, such as loudness or broken sound, then I don't think there's any reason to be obsessed

Because the human ear can hear in the range of 18 HZ, and I'm 30 years old, but my hearing is still very good, and I have a professional music listening device, so I'm very confident in my hearing.

I buy CDs just because I like the album so much, and I'm willing to buy the original, and I like scanning the covers, and only whether or not I'm going to rip it depends on my mood,

After all, a lot of the CDs in my collection are off the shelves and out of production, or there's no way to listen to them, so buying the CDs is the only way to go.

So do you guys prefer the CD rips or the officially available electronic versions? Tell us your answer.


And finally, I'm gonna do a little test.

User Christopher-2010' mentioned wanting to rip some of Sonoton Music's CDs, including all of the Dramatic Workshop Series albums!

I happen to have a CD of it, SCD 553 DRAMATIC WORKSHOP 22 - THE PROMO SOURCE.

I really liked one of the tracks on it, so I just bought the CD for my collection.

Now I'm going to do a test, I'm going to wav rip one of my favorite tracks from SCD 553.

And then, I'll download the same track in wav from various Sonoton Music sites.

You can compare them and see if they're different or not, I swear I won't handle any metadata, I'll be fair and impartial.

I don't have any opinion, but it's up to you to decide if you can tell the difference or not.

Thank you.


(According to the data I've seen from the spectrograms, the spectrums of the singles downloaded by APM MUSIC and Sonoton Music are exactly the same

The spectrums of the other downloads are not exactly the same

I have no opinion on this, it's up to you. )


Of course, there are a lot of websites where you can download SONOTON MUSIC, I've just listed some common ones, but I don't think there's a need to download the rest of them.

When you're done listening to these wavs from different sources, you can leave a comment with your thoughts or opinions.

mega.nz/folder/plJVAIAC#TkWQvPjOCRlakY21w-SkBg

[Yohanes Salomo]

That's what i was going to try to do anything for @Christopher-2010, Chun. I tried everything to cheer him up for BWP and everyone, but i don't understand why.

[DoctorDoodle19]

I personally like CD rips better.
They just sound better. I think some original/official WAV files from music are good, but I don't know, they don't hit the same way.

[nidostar]

Thank you for this contribution ChunYinZi. Personally I find very little difference between the various samples. The CD version may just (just) have the advantage. But I find there's very little to choose between them. Certainly not enough to warrant dismissing  the other versions.

As I've said before, for me it's all about the music. To be honest I find it sad that there are those out there who analyse pieces of music to the finest degree to determine whether a particular version of an album is technically better than another. I know things have changed over the years in that we have become obsessive about wanting FLAC versions rather than lossy alternatives. Though that's understandable because, to me, there is a real difference between the two formats. FLAC is obviously superior in sound quality. But while I find this discussion interesting I really think it's becoming a little extreme. At the end of the day consider what are the limitations of the human ear. Whether a version of a track can reach frequencies beyond the range of human hearing is not relevant. Similarly, I simply don't believe the human ear can support claims that a lossless version of an album from one source is more compressed than another. I doubt that conclusion could be reached without the aid of analytical software.

Call me a dinosaur but I still listen to MP3 versions of albums which I've not yet upgraded to lossless. And I enjoy them. Those who are looking for 100% perfect versions of albums have my sympathy. You have completely missed the point of this forum and the joy of listening to the music we share.

[redwave]

I was wondering whether the intended use of production library music might be a reason for slightly lower audio quality?

It is noticeable how active some labels have been with a large number of releases over a relatively short timescale. Also, a lot of tracks were influenced by popular music styles of the time and no doubt you’ve heard examples that are a little too like the originals? Far better to get the product out there even if the  quality isn’t quite to the standard of audiophiles. I’m sure that’s not a usual procedure however, money is only made when media producers use the music in a production.

Also, I believe that in the days of mono tv and film soundtracks a slightly lower quality sound would be sufficient. Library music is often just background music with other audio dubbed onto the tape and in many cases goes through lots of editing. I’d also expect some music to be heavily compressed and it was certainly fashionable a while ago for mainstream music to be mastered at a high overall volume. There’s many books , articles that look in depth at the ‘loudness’ war, particularly for CDs from the 1990s onwards.

The perceived audio fidelity probably matters more now as the listening devices have improved. It’s notable how the majority users of streaming services are oblivious to the compression of low bit rate of the music files. Quality, takes bandwidth and that costs money. I can double the number of files in 320 MP3  in a 10TB cloud and that’s expensive as it is.

Okay, so low bit rate MP3s sound tinny and lack depth and even I can hear the difference in quality. The BBC used to use WAV files , though I expect that has been downgraded.


I like to listen to music for enjoyment and while reasonable quality is a bonus , it’s not the first thing that I think about. That’s a personal preference and others might have a higher expectation. I can certainly hear audio glitches in some music that has been recorded and mastered digitally and it amazes me that this passes the quality threshold.