I kept blind testing a playlist of songs in their AAC vs ALAC versions often enough and now I can't unhear the difference and finally Lossless ain't so worthless anymore ; )
I'm a car audio enthusiast and to those people who are interested in going down that road. This video summed it up well about lossless and why it's important. Personally I think car audio is better than home audio for one specific reason, space! It's a smaller enclosure and the woofers and the sub woofers can move air a lot better than if you were in a 10 by 20 room. That close quarters experience is a lot more dynamic and can really immerse you in your favorite song. The secret to that sauce is a DSP (Digital Sound Processor). It will control everything from time alignment to polarity and it will center stage your favorite artist while you drive. I recommend going to a car audio show and take the chance and sit a SQ build, your outlook on audio will completely change.
Really enjoyed this video, great, concise explanations. To get the best experience with lossless, I’ve been using an EarMen TR-Amp and Audeze headphones. USC-C to C connections from my iPad and Mac. Just thought I’d throw that out there for anyone looking for what is, at least for me, an endgame setup. I canceled Spotify.
I already noticed the difference. I gobbled up most of my new phone’s memory by having the WHOLE music library in Lossless instead of just my newer downloads in Lossless. Now my phone’s library is back to AAC, the stuff I had in Lossless now sounds flat and disappointing. I regret not getting the 1TB hard drive for my phone. It’s totally worth the memory it takes up for the sound quality.
Update: I switched back to Lossless format for downloads and re-downloaded only a select few of my favorite albums in Lossless format. I am glad I did and your video motivated me to do it! 😂
First timer here. I really enjoyed, and learned, from your video. Your visual and description of the difference in sound between lossy and lossless was inspired! Just received my Christmas present from me to me an iFi Hip Dac 3 for use primarily with my home stereo. It streams (and confirms) hi-rez directly from my 2020 iPhone SE direct (just an included wire, no additional adapters necessary) without an issue and sounds better in all metrics than the infamous Apple dongle, even though I always thought the dongle was…🧐…it worked.
So it’s 2023 and I listened to astrothunder by Travis Scott with AirPod pros (1) and even when comparing downloaded from aac to hi res lossless, I still hear a super difference in the bass at the beginning and no, it’s not spatial audio, it genuinely sounds better and makes a difference
I find Apple 256kbps AAC files with the ‘Apple Digital Masters’ (formerly known as Mastered For ITunes’) mark indistinguishable from lossless/hi-res lossless. Using Philips XR2hr headphones with a Teac HA-P50 headphone amp/dac. There is a very slight difference between older AAC files without the ‘ADM’ tag and its lossless equivalent. Yet it is very small and you have to listen very intently. It’s been proven many times that AAC at 256kbps sounds fantastic even through great quality gear.
Absolutely right but there are android fanboys and they say AAC is garbage. They don’t know ,AAC sounds million times better on an iPhone/iPad than on an android device and there are so many android devices out there with crap soundchips. I use an iPad Pro 12,9 M2 with hiby FC3/4 and Meze 109 Pro ( Apple Music ) for the cable solution and it sounds just fantastic. For Bluetooth solution i use AirPods Pro 2 ,Sony XM4 and Sennheiser Momentum 4 and it sounds fantastic too because Apple know how to use AAC and get the best from it. I have some expensive android devices too and aac don’t sound good on them . I tested ldac,aptx hd aptx adaptive and for me there are no differences between AAC. ( if u play AAC on an Apple Device 😊)
@@skyhero1888 My humble (by audiophile standards) equipment is still good enough to show deficiencies in recordings and I’d like to think I have healthy hearing for a 48 year old. I agree with you that Apple put a lot of effort into their audio chips, although my TEAC will be by-passing the iPhone 13 dac, yet I recall my old iPhone 6 from 7 years ago having fantastic sound just from its inbuilt headphone jack. I’ve listened to a 20 sec samples of albums on Apple, turning off lossless so as to just get the AAC version, then compared the same samples turning on lossless and then moving up to hi-res lossless if an album is tagged as such. My ears are telling me that everything I’ve posted in my original comment is true. There is a weird ‘fear’ of lossy audio in some circles.
I agree, i hear a tiny improvement, but not enough to be blown away like others claim. Before anyone accuses me of faulty gear i run mosconi class A/B amps and Focal Utopia speakers.
I finally understood lossless and got feedback on my experience listening lossless. Yes darn right you teach well sir and I enjoyed your sense of humor😂
Great job explaining lossless and for mentioning the Apple lightning to 3.5mm headphone jack adapter. Here is my set up and mostly because I'm a newbie to lossless music, not an audiophile and do not have expensive wired headphones: iPhone 13 mini-i recently purchased the $9, 3.5mm headphone jack adapter because I learned it features a built in DAC or the $39 Belkin lightning audio + charger because it features a built in DAC So with my Apple EarPods I can use either adapter to get lossless music, yeah? I also reviewed my MacBook Air set up to make sure the music playback settings were correct. They were not. When plugging in my 3.5mm Apple EarPods they were previously set to AAC audio(rookie move). I just changed the setting to lossless and now I can see the lossless icon next to the song title. I guess I could purchase an external DAC for much more money but do I really need to?
The problem with Lossless is that it still requires a wired connection from a headphone jack to get the benefits. All of these "hi-res streaming" providers are selling snake oil. The best bluetooth coed is LDAC and even that can only manage 900kb/s which is a far cry from 16bit's 1400kb/s. No one's getting 24bit music streamed from their phone to their AirPods, the file might say 24bit but it'll be compressed to 300kb/s because that's AAC's limit. If you stream or use anything wirelessly, don't bother - you may as well convert down to LC-AAC which is roughly 500kb/s (5mb per song).
Lol it's called Tidal and I get all the benefits with Samsung S23 Ultra paired with Galaxy Buds 2 Pro....modern era of music listening wireless is INCREDIBLE
Wow , so your comment is to just copy everything the fellow said in "HIS" video ? Except that you're calling it snake oil because you can't use it on your wireless eyebuds which he already told us about.
I do this very often with my iPad Pro 12,9 M2 ,Hiby FC3/4 (and other Amps Dacs) with Meze 109 Pro Headphones. For Bluetooth is use AirPods Pro 2 ,Sony XM4 and Sennheiser Momentum 4 . I can say there is a little difference but not much ,both sounds fantastic.
@@skyhero1888 that's great to hear!! I keep all my music on my phone in 320 AAC and I think it sounds great, but always hope im not missing out on higher quality. when I hear strange things in songs and think it might be the compression ill go and listen to the original lossless version and it'll have the same issue so most issues in music is in the mastering.
you can choose the bitrate in iTunes/Apple Music when ripping your own CDs or on other audio conversion platforms. I rip all my music at 320 AAC from CDs and from FLAC Lossless files. I have software that lets you go to 192 per channel which is 384 but I stick to 320@@skyhero1888
I found this video because I was trying to see what is the difference between cds and mp3. Last year I started buying cds (when you’re a kpop fan you eventually start doing it, regardless of your finances). I thought I was buying the albums for the photobooks, photocards, stickers, even the box, I didn’t expect to get much value from the actual cds, since I already had access to the songs, but I was so pleasantly surprised by the quality of the audio, it was definitely different to what I had always listened to. I decided to stop paying for streaming and continued to buy the albums. I never listen on shuffle, btw, and always listen to either individual songs at a time or to the whole album. I also don’t like “discovering new music”, I deliberately search and listen to the music I already know I love.
Man you are on the first RU-vidr that I have subscribe straight away, the way you drive the subject, the way you deliver is nothing more than perfect spice! Good job and hopefully I will see more content from you like this one. I wouldn’t consider myself and audiophile not because I don’t want to but because my wallet is simply to thin to even think about it, one thing I have noticed in my car is that the audio quality of aac over Bluetooth is worse than wired in the car via cable (maybe the conversion thing you talked about) can’t wait to test lossless in my car (EV so not much will interfere with the sound quality except outside noise). The way you described the sound difference is also a very matching my experience, on my brain it kind of triggers the same spotlight of “wow never noticed this sound before”. Again good work but the way you deliver it is beyond extravaganza 😂.
just switched from spotify to apple music in 2024. plus apple one gives a bunch of extra services for not much more than the spotify family plan. thanks for the tip on using wired headphones!
There is really no audible difference if you downsample correctly. The difference could be noice introduced by inaudible frequencies creating distortion in audible frequencies.
I have a 11.2.4 in my main zome and a 7.0.2 in zone 2... Dolby sounding ES**spatially** crystal. Edit. I sure can but most. Most of the time im easily enjoying the wonders of binural low frequency... Or just letting a combined hoisrhold media zfs pool shuffle throughout both zones
Maybe last month I listened to Enya's A Day without Rain album. It was my first real CD. As for losless hell yeah I prefer CDDA audio or Blu-Ray better yet. I've been lurking on HDTracks to see what they have. The only drawback I find is you're forced to buy the whole album. Well in the case of Mandy Moore's Silver Landings that's fine. I'm a Mandy fan anyways. It's avaiable in full 96 KHZ 24 bits. But then again there are albums where at most I only would prefer to have the songs in HD but I don't particularlerly wana have the whole thing. So it would in those said cases be from 14 to almost 30 and some bucks waisted just cause I want a song or some songs in BD audio.
Mixing and mastering makes a bigger difference to "depth". Dynamic compression in new music and reissues destroys it. Apple and friends have now reinvented what they had in the little house on the praerie decades ago.
there is nothing wrong with apple's earbuds or headphones, just none of the wireless headphones can handle hi-res or lossless sound, because of bluetooth restrictions. non of LDAC or aptX can help with it, it's just a marketing when some brand says, that their wireless headphones can handle lossless. and yes, apple's dongle supports up to 24/96 kHz.
No, the Apple Headphone dongle is limited to 24/48. Admittedly, though there is an audible difference between 48 and 96kHz sampling, it is fleeting and takes your full attention to detect.
@@jackdanyal4329 Not superhuman, just methodical. The recording must be 100% 24/96 from microphone input to the final file. Any upsampling, downsampling or scaling of different tracks in the mixing/mastering process will obliterate any differences, even if the final file is distributed in 24/96. On direct to 2 channel recordings kept at the original 24/96 sampling rate, downconverting to 24/48 - and especially to 16/44 - can reliably be heard. That’s a lot to ask, which makes the Apple dongle, still limited to 24/48, just fine for most people.
The way you're explaining is very clear and great 👍👍👍 I have a question though, does the aptx Adaptive codec support lossless streaming in Apple Music for Android on 24bit 48khz quality?
aptX Adaptive Lossless (Snapdragon Sound) can transmit up to 1.2Mbps (compresses that 1.4Mbps down a bit w/o losing any music, akin to FLAC). You need to invest in one of the phones (Android only) & headphones that support Snapdragon Sound w/ Lossless (i.e. Asus Zenfone 9 and NuraTrue Pro earbuds) - not cheap... hoping prices will go down over time. No chance to get 24bit 48khz (2.3Mbps) transmitted through Bluetooth yet... However, progress has obviously happened, and Bluetooth bandwidth will continue to grow over time.
Bro I want ask one question How can we download any youtube music/song in originally quality Without loosing their original quality of song Like lossless song
Right?! I’ve wondered the same thing! Or it’d be great if they supported 5.1 surround for those RU-vidrs who could mix in that format (like myself, hahaaaa!). 😄🤘
I love the idea of hi res lossless, but my dealbreaker is, it doesn't work over bluetooth because the pipeline of the signal bandwidth is so minuscule to fit hi res. I don't have time to listen to music like I was young and I fit on those who landmaw their yard or wash the car or caring my children and doing most of things with wireless earphones on. Unless bluetooth 6 comes with the necessary bandwidth to support it, hi res lossless is a lost battle for me, unfortunately 😢
Yo! How weird, just talking about bluetooth 6 yesterday not knowing when it would be released and suddenly it came out today! This is crazy. The sad part is: it only focuses on the 'Find my device' feature. To my understanding this still doesn't carry the data transmission enough to bring hi res lossless audio. Better luck with Bluetooth 6.1 👀
Please answer. Why digital audio represent in sine wave. It doesnt mean that the speaker are moving forward and backward right? In my mind, speaker are only moving forward when it got signal! It bothered me and I don't know where to ask.
i bought a converter, i hear no difference. My ears were tested to be good up to 13khz which is normal for my age. Maybe my dog or a bat would appreciate the higher resolution.
I'm not sure. And I haven't researched enough about Sony's LDAC technology which supposedly transfers hi-res audio even over Bluetooth. So, at least with what they are advertising, you can still get premium audio quality even over a wireless signal. Sounds cool, but I haven't heard it for myself in person. I hope to at some point, though!
The impression lossless audio goeroes want to give is that it sounds better then a lossy file. This can be true when audio chain is up to par, but even then the improvements are very small and for most people even neglectable . The assumption is that the higher the sample frequency is and the higher the bit depth the file must be better… 😂 But conversion errors are created in high res files also and the errors are even more frequent and accumulative contributing to an non-error free conversion. Trust only your ears; not those bit nerds 😊
Hi I really enjoyed your video, I learned so much from it, I wish it could have been even longer. Do you have any sources for audio novices to learn more about the subject?
Thanks for those kind words! 😊 I honestly just scoured the internet as I was doing research for it. Sites like WhatHiFi and TechRadar had good articles. But here’s a few more from Crutchfield as well. 👇 www.crutchfield.com/learnsearch/lossless_audio.html
Beavis and Butthead, I love it! I just tried spatial audio on my Apple airpod pros thru my iPhone, wow! I bet their headphones are nice, but damn pricey!
Bro! But where did the (M4A) format come from? It's 128kbps but some people said M4A better than AAC and MP3... Is that real? Please do a video and teach us thx🙏
Hello there, i am using Apple music on my Galaxy S10+ phone and mostly i stream it do my tv which it connected to my Samsung HW-Q990B soundbar. It support Dolby Atmos, i'm wondering which settings is the best. Thanks :)
I have no clue, sorry. I bet there’s a music setting on that soundbar. I’d try that first? Otherwise, Dolby Atmos music tracks are hit and miss, so it largely depends on the song if it sounds good or not. 😁🤘
So my question would be is it possible to download or find single tracks such as rare or unreleased or some type of bonus track in lossless format? That's my biggest thing is I'm a metal head and alot of the bands I follow have released songs that do not exist on an album so I'm forced to find that on the web somewhere in mp3 format because I cannot purchase the song through any kind of streaming service or cd. Any thoughts?
Huh…yeah that’s a pretty specific issue there. Maybe the bands have their own website for exclusive downloads, or their own SoundCloud or Bandcamp where you might be able to find more rare stuff in a lossless format… 🤷♂️
No, not yet. There’s a newer Bluetooth codec soon coming out that will support lossless (CD quality) wirelessly, but wireless Hi-Res lossless is still being developed
@@Zhorellski I’m not sure which devices you’re referring to, but yes - snake oil I would assume, since the Bluetooth commission itself hasn’t officially announced lossless support by any particular product just yet. 🤷♂️
Qobuz and tidle are the only drugs i need in my sad little life. Last album i listen to in full that i really enjoyed where in flames foregone code orange the above and whitechapel kin ohh and slipknot/iowa iam addicted to em drumms and kick your mum drown the stairs vocals and sic ass dj mixing/scratching
Great video. I have a Denon AVR connected by earc HDMI. Apple music is set to Lossless which sounds great when streamed from my iPad or iphone, but if I listen to Apple Music from my Apple TV that is also set to Lossless it doesn't sound as nice. Any thoughts on that Ealan?
@@andymantoronto Yes, I understand. So when you're listening on iPhone or iPad, it's on headphones, right? And when you listen on your AVR...in what way does it sound worse? There are a lot of factors with room acoustics when dealing with AVRs...
@@ealanosborne The audio play back through my AVR with my iPad or iPhone are outstanding, it's when I play back using the Apple Music app with my Apple TV 4K 2017 is when the sound quality is poor, I have adjusted the settings on the Apple TV to lossless but the quality is not the same as the iPad or iPhone....BTW, thanks for the replies! I'm new to your channel and really enjoying and learning from your content.
@@andymantoronto It actually depends on the equipment your using.... here is probably one of the best examples.... use the Apple TV4K and hook it up to a Smyth A16 via HDMI... then put on your cans ( HD800s) and now you are listening to Lossless Audio the way it should sound.... and guess what... the A16 emulates any speaker of your choice... got a $20K speaker... then the A16 will replicate that speaker to be exact.. in your cans.... now how about the fact that the A16 also replicates that $20K speaker in a ATMOS configuration of 15.1.8 yep... thats 24 of those $20K speakers... or a $480,000 sound listening room from your cans.... now listen to the spacial lossless music via Apple Music or Tidal and walla... you now know what lossless Audio sounds like in glorious 24 channel Atmos..... any questions ???
@@ealanosborne i already got my dac dongle its so nice hear lossless music. id research this for so many years my goal is to get lossless music without spending too much money 🙂this is the time😁
Hey guys does anyone know of a good APTX Lossless codec transmitter (so I could plug it into my phone or tablet to send APTX lossless to my Sennheiser Momenum 4 headphones?)
You would think...but they don't. The technology is finally available to manufacturers as of maybe July 2022, but now developers are scrambling to be the first to actually use it in a consumer product for the masses.
Fantastic video. One question though. I have heard Wireless Apple Carplay which initially connects via Bluetooth, but "streams" over wifi, is the same as being wired at the same bit rate or sampling, or whatever as wired headphones (although not as great as a USB DAC would give you). At least that was what I heard via BMWs iteration of Wireless Carplay. Am I correct in my understanding? Like and subscribed.
As far as I know, I believe lossless (at least CD quality lossless) is possible over bluetooth as long as your device supports AptX tech. In this forum post (link below) it says basically the same thing. Although I'm pretty sure Hi-Res Lossless is still not possible over a wireless signal, just CD quality (for now).
@@ealanosborne I was talking about wifi actually, as that is how carplay gets the music to the carplay adapter in the car. Carplay only uses bluetooth to establish the connection between the phone and the carplay adapter. once the connection is established, the music is transmitted in the car by wifi. I believe wifi supports lossless.
I how a sound system in my car with a kenwood radio that has a digital audio wire. Will Hi-Res Lossless work or would I need to plug my phone into the aux and get a dongle?
Thats a great audio with plenty of info elan👌👌 my doubt is there a way to stream lossless audio frm iPhone to denon avr !?! What cable to use and wht setting to be made!? Is there a way lik tat!?
Well, Apple AirPlay does support lossless over wi-fi (at least it's claimed to support up to 16 bit/44.1 kHz), and Denons support AirPlay. So there's that!
Movie in AAC or AC3 is a big difference. DTS even bigger. DTS is a format, that is a minimum for real expering the movie, now that TRUE-HD and Atmos ar knocking. Half of the Movie is sound.
I recently bought a pair of bowers and Wilkins px8s wireless headphones. I’m wanting to understand how to maximise their potential and achieve lossless listening. Is it enough to just use the cable provided and hi-res streaming from option from Apple music/Tidal or do you recommend using a dongle DAC (if on the move) or amp/DAC like the ifi zen dac v2 (if at home)? Is there a noticeable difference in sound quality? Cheers
Dongle DAC for sure. 🤘 Noticeable improvement when listening to Hi-Res music, like I could hear the sonic qualities of the microphone the vocalist was using in the booth. Wild stuff.
Hey Ealan I wanna ask you that I had a EarPods by apple which had lightning connectors and I had iPhone 12 mini which runs on ios 17.1 so can get lossless audio through my EarPods with lightning connectors???
According to Apple, it should support lossless since it’s a wired connection, although I don’t have any EarPods to test it out for sure. The new USB-C wired EarPods apparently support lossless… 🤷♂️
Great video. I clicked on it as I'm in a dilemma if it's worth to listen to lossless audio. I usually have my private music library with some bought online and some ripped from CD. Recently I ripped them in ALAC quality but they were in AAC for a long time now. Even though I couldn't tell the difference between AAC and MP3 320 kb/s back then. Not sure I can tell between AAC and ALAC. On paper I see there is. But in practice... maybe the bass comes out better here and there, maybe the cymbals sound more present.... or am I just noticing things I haven't before because I'm more actively listening now? I only have an average loudspeaker for PC. Dunno. Thanks for the effort though.
No, don't get fooled. You listen with your ears, not with your eyes. This is a nice phrase saying that reading a spectogram does not matter much when you don't have the ears (natural ting and degradation when you grow older), the equipment, the good masters et cetera. So this is basically low chance * low chance * low chance. People at Fraunhofer are/were professional scientists. They knew they'd only remove things nobody can hear. Lossless people are mostly going: "For the peace of mind" or confirmation bias (both vodoo basically). Lossless is like asking for including infrared images in your media - you can't see it, but hey, you want it for... reasons.
Hey Ealan...do you think it's worth it if we use apple music lossless thru PC since I don't use apple??? I used Tidal but it cost more but I like Apple's price's. what do u think?
Well, music is subjective, but I sure think it's worth it. :) You get the first 3 months for free when subscribing to Apple Music, so you can check it out and see if you like it first. I'm currently reviewing a DAC and that Hi-Res Lossless is no joke. And you don't have to pay extra for it on Apple Music. Woot!
@@ealanosborne yeah I have a Class D DAC and I already ordered the BasX PT1 Stereo Preamp/DAC/Tuner I'm still waiting for it. I'm gona do the apple Music then. thanks Ealan and good video and I shared it too to other's already
@619villian You have to have an individual or family subscription to Apple Music, and then if you have that, you should see the Lossless text and logo on certain albums on Apple Music. You should also be on iOS 14.6 or later.
ummmm I understood all of this, kinda, but I still don't get why on my iPhone and AirPods the music sounds different than it does in RU-vid for instance or when I stream the music to Alexa... it's like it is equalized to enhance the voice of the singer but the back up voices are suppressed. why? I don't like this
I guess, but what got my attention is that I am just breaking in these new AirPods and started listening to a song I've know for years, same version and all, and it did not sound at all as I remembered it... then I payed closer attention and a lot of songs just sound like equalized or something... @@ealanosborne
As far as I know (although I’m not positive about the latest M4 silicon chip) Macs can still only output up to 48kHz lossless audio. So if you really want true Hi-Resolution Lossless audio (up to 192 kHz), you would still need an additional DAC.
Does anybody remember CDLA mode by leeco they introduced losless way before I still have me 5 year old le 2max and leeco earphones just to enjoy the losless audio 😁
Been using the 14 pro max with hi res lossless audio. I have some Sennheiser hd 650s with a DAC and it sounds amazing. Also have AirPods Pro 2nd gen for more casual listening and for notifications and calls. Got some Sennheiser momentum 3s for traveling and to use when the AirPods aren’t doing it for me and I don’t want to pull out my hd 650s
