Enno <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>That's exactly the point. Of course you can *measure* a difference
>between CD an minidisc, because minidisc audio is compressed an CD
>audio is not. But most of the people cannot *hear* that measurable
>difference, because that's what psychoacoustic coding is all about -
>to compress audio in a way we can't hear. And, in my opinion (and
>that's all I need to know), ATRAC has done it's job exceptionally
>well.
AM radio sounds as good as FM Stereo... on a system that isn't good
enough to reproduce the differences in sound quality.
MP3's sound as good as MiniDisc... on a system that isn't good enough to
reproduce the differences in sound quality.
MiniDisc sounds as good as CD... you get where I'm going with this ;-)
But to be honest, it doesn't take much to hear a noticeable difference
between CD and MiniDisc. I have a Sony MRZ-50, and an old (1993)
Realistic 3400 portable CD player. I should note that many people think
the 3400 is one of the best-sounding portables ever, so maybe it's not a
fair comparison, but listening to the same album through a pair of Grado
SR60s ($59 headphones), there is an easily discernable difference in
sound quality between the CD and MD.
The basics of my relatively modest home stereo, averaging seven years old
(it was bought one piece at a time), are the following: $200 speaker
system (PSB), $300 amp (NAD), $250 CD player (NAD). That's a $750 system
-- not a Circuit City shelf system, but it didn't cost a fortune by any
means. Yet even my friends who aren't into audio can immediately hear the
difference between a CD and an MD with the same album (played through my
MZR-50's line out). I'm sure that the MD sound might be a little better
if played through a dedicated component player, but not enough to offset
the obvious differences in sound quality.
Don't get me wrong -- I'm a huge MD fan. I use my MD player on a daily
basis, and have pursuaded at least five friends and relatives to buy MD
since last year. I just think that people should be realistic about the
format. If you have a pretty good system or headphones, many people will
hear a difference. But even if they do, it may not matter to them. On the
other hand, if your equipment is average (or the average consumer
system), you'll probably live in ignorant bliss of the differences in
sound quality (which is often a good thing ;-)).
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