Apple Engineer Addresses Lack of Lossless Support on New AirPods Pro

[HDFan]

Even the Grammy Recording Academy can't change that (most) humans are not able to hear beyond 20 kHz.

Yes. But get this - there is a singer who hits 25 kHz!

A singer’s impossible peak

You might imagine Mariah Carey or Maria Callas would top the scales, but Brazilian soprano Georgia Brown set the bar by hitting a G in the high 10th octave. Musical experts later confirmed the note, which translates to about 25,000 hertz, earning Brown a Guinness World Record in 2004.

The highest note a person can sing, and other sound records — Popular Science

BY PURBITA SAHA ILLUSTRATION BY JOSIE NORTON HUMAN HEARING has its limits. Frequencies as high as 20,000 hertz (think of...

apple.news

does it matter for the average person sitting in their home and listening to music. For them 44.1 kHz and 16 bit is more than good enough. There also won't hear the difference between 44.1 kHz/16 bit CD and that CD converted to 256 kbps AAC files.

44.1 and 16 bit is maybe the sweet spot in sampling rates for the cost/benefit ratio. Yes, a lot of people don't care - but some do, a lot. Disagree about 256 kbps though. With the proper equipment and source the difference is generally very obvious.

Not so long ago after going though a bevy of headphones at various price ranges I finally decided to end it all by purchasing the ultimate, for me, headphones which turned out to be Focal Stellia. Can't believe the difference they made with tracks I had heard hundreds of times, all the things that I had missed earlier such as conversations between musicians in the background which were audible, just barely, with the headphones. None of these would be audible in a 256 kbps source.

Maybe a different mastering, also DTS-MA supports surround sound, it would certainly sound differently. There are million things which can influence the sound.

True, but the results are the same even if it is just a stereo track, or if it is a SACD recording.

Since I can't actually hear the highest frequencies it is a bit of a mystery why I see such a difference.

I think the source is this.

Yes, looks like that's the 2017 version. The one I quoted (probably exactly the same) is dated 2018.

Tidal for example is touting what they sell as superior.

And it is if you compare Tidal lossless to other services lossy tracks. I find when listening in my car Tidal lossless sounds better than Apple Lossless. Not sure why.

 

[Boidem]

I watched something on TV last night (Altered Carbon) using the APP2s, and I have to say I was very impressed. Spatial Audio means the sound is like you're not actually wearing any earphones, particularly when you move your head. Very clever. Very impressive sound stage. Very good dynamic range. Excellent reproduction of all sorts of sounds. Probably the best listening experience I've had with them so far, better I have to say than my failed B+O headphones. I'm so impressed, I'm going to have to review my music collection; one thing I've noticed with some of it, is that better audio equipment exposes any inadequacies in audio files. I also felt this when I first heard my Focal Aria speakers on my hi-fi. It's clear that many older recordings, on CD, aren't up to the same standard as more modern stuff, technically. I suppose it's all in the mastering. So basically, I think APP owners needn't worry too much about lossless; a lot of music is mastered to sound good on less than perfect equipment, and a lot of older stuff isn't optimum anyway. Having amazing sonically perfect ear/headphones will only make you sad because the source is imperfect.

 

[macsound1]

It's clear that many older recordings, on CD, aren't up to the same standard as more modern stuff, technically. I suppose it's all in the mastering. So basically, I think APP owners needn't worry too much about lossless; a lot of music is mastered to sound good on less than perfect equipment, and a lot of older stuff isn't optimum anyway. Having amazing sonically perfect ear/headphones will only make you sad because the source is imperfect.

You’re right that older music doesn’t sound as good. But it’s usually because of the original recording, not the mastering.

At the end of the age when 2” tape was used in studios, the quality of the tape itself had improved so much since the early day, but also the recording engineers knew how to work with it. They understood bleed through and dynamic range and other minutia about the magnetic tape specifically that became a skill to exploit for a particular sound they wanted.

When recording studios first started recording digitally, they hadn’t yet learned how to best use the format, so music from the early 2000s typically lacks depth because they’d overdrive digital preamps which sound thin at the top of their dynamic range, vs analog which may sound richer or warmer. They saved files at bitrates that were good for distribution, but too low when they were going to apply effects after the fact and re-export.

Once computers got fast enough, hard drives got big enough, and engineers had time to experiment and fail and learn the ups and downs of digital vs tape recording, we got digital music that sounded as good as, and sometime better than the music from the prime 70s-90s that was recorded on tape.

The reason I say it’s probably not the mastering is because mastering has always sorta followed the same principles. It’s gotta sound good in a car, a grocery store, and on free-with-purchase earphones. Those are the primary markets and no matter the genre, you can’t assume anyone owns equipment that will reproduce sound very well. And there’s not usually a different cut that radio djs get compared to what you buy on iTunes, stream on Spotify, hear in a club or buy on CD. So it’s gotta sound good regardless of playback device.
That’s the secret sauce Apple can apply with AirPods because they know their physical extents. They know which frequencies will distort first sound harsh or boxy. And they can use the phone they designed to make those adjustments on the fly when a certain Bluetooth device is detected.

Bose has been doing this forever in the analog realm, dynamic eq + multiband compression. Essentially boost or cut certain frequencies up to a certain volume and then limit.

 

[Boidem]

You’re right that older music doesn’t sound as good. But it’s usually because of the original recording, not the mastering.

No, a lot of older stuff sounds great; Kraftwerk for eg. The digitally mastered versions of their music I've found to be generally excellent. And lots' of classic albums have been remastered at some point, rendering better quality audio. So whilst it can be trie that older recordings can suffer from lower quality original recording, that's more down to the original studios/labels I find. I do get the point that audio quality has generally increased over time though.

Quite a lot of more 'niche' music has been recorded on cheaper equipment; a lot of late 80s/early 90s dance stuff suffered from this. A lot of EQ had to be used in club sound systems to compensate for this. Trying to get a decent sound out of a good hifi from recordings, was often very difficult. Most kids listening to it didn't care though, nor had decent kit anyway.

 

[Boidem]

The reason I say it’s probably not the mastering is because mastering has always sorta followed the same principles. It’s gotta sound good in a car, a grocery store, and on free-with-purchase earphones. Those are the primary markets and no matter the genre, you can’t assume anyone owns equipment that will reproduce sound very well. And there’s not usually a different cut that radio djs get compared to what you buy on iTunes, stream on Spotify, hear in a club or buy on CD. So it’s gotta sound good regardless of playback device.

Much of what I listen to isn't pop music, so falls outside of this realm. And by pop, I mean all sorts, from Rap/Hip Hop, 'RnB', Billy Eyelash, Addle or Ed Shearer etc. A lot of that stuff has excellent sound engineering. It's just that the actual content is often lacking in any real substance. That said, I'll have a bit of Gaga on, and that sounds great. No; I find it quite random what sounds good and what doesn't. Listened to some Muse the other day; dreadful sound quality. Everything turned up to max, so loads of distortion etc. Deliberate, but not relaxing. But I'd rather have that than any dreary pop by numbers bilge, no matter how good it sounds.

 

[bommai]

There’s no excuse for a tech company making a supposedly modern multimedia device not to support an incredibly common modern file format. In fact they already claim to “support” it on their device, it is listed in the specs and the hardware can decode it. Apple is only blocking you from actually adding the files to the device. IMO this is false/misleading advertising and should be grounds for a lawsuit.

Seriously, this would take a single intern a fraction of their daily lunch break to add support and push out an update to iTunes if they were given the task. This is a trillion dollar company. No other company has this problem. Nobody should be making excuses for them.

Imagine if the Photos app didn’t support JPEGs? If the Books app didn’t support PDFs? I wonder if the sycophants would still find a way to justify deliberately crippled software and anti-consumer behavior from daddy Tim.

While I agree FLAC format should be supported, I am pretty sure by this time, there are more people using ALAC than FLAC. In fact, I converted my entire music library from FLAC to ALAC. ALAC is now open source and all kinds of hardware support ALAC now. My Denon receiver using HeOS, and Yamaha receiver using MusicCast play ALAC. ALAC is playable in my car, on my Sony Blu-ray player, PS4, etc.

 

[honglong1976]

i already talked about it in the airpods 2 pro before presentation forum
For now, its impossible to have a good lossless support wireless
Maybe in 3-4 years

Kleer
- lossless, no lag
- had a pair of TDK earphones over 10 years ago that used Kleer

 

[I7guy]

Kleer
- lossless, no lag
- had a pair of TDK earphones over 10 years ago that used Kleer

Just another format that competes for the same bandwidth as WiFi and Bluetooth but incompatible to both.

 

[MrMojo1]

This confuses me, because I keep reading everywhere that the first gen AirPods Pro had had really great ANC for the first month or so (like the second gen), and then it was greatly reduced, for unknown reasons.

Is this true or are people exaggerating? I have the second gen but didn’t have the first.

Had the 1Gen APPs and the ANC was very good until Apple released the updates.
It was even reported here in MR and elsewhere on many tech forums and boards.
The ANC just deteriorated afterwards, even though it worked, it blocked less external noises.

The current 2Gen APP's ANC is terrific. Swap out the silicone ear tips with some decent foam tips and the ANC works very well.
Buy the 1Gen APP for the lower cost with mediocre ANC or pay more for the 2Gen for the better ANC, at least until Apple decides to mess up the ANC in future updates like it did with the 1Gen.

Every few months or so, the average sale price of the 2Gen APP is ~$200 from many retailers like Bestbuy or Costco. Costco also discounts Applecare when bought with the APP.

The APP's ANC is much better than the Beat Fits Pros' ANC.

 

[drumcat]

The APP's ANC is much better than the Beat Fits Pros' ANC.

Absolutely agree.