So just how lossless is Apple Lossless? (A short test)

[Luap]

I thought this was a really stupid post at first. Of course its lossless! But then of course I read the rest of it, which turned out to be very informative and interesting..
Thanks for the info 🙂

 

[Ptown Bopper]

Thanks!! I'm currently 130 CD's into converting some 500 plus CD's to Apple Lossless for my music server. Nice to know I'm not completely wasting my time.

 

[c-Row]

I can't believe that, nearly four years after its introduction (and well after its reverse-engineering by audio codec hackers), people still think that Apple Lossless is not, in fact, lossless. 🙄

Sometimes people want to see it with their own eyes or hear it with their ears. 😉

and just to make sure did you rip the song from the original cd as wav?? or was is just some mp3 of it u had ???just wondering

I don't remember whether it was an already ripped WAV on my drive or a constant re-ripping from the original CD, but the source file was uncompressed for sure.


[edit] Still need to do the md5 comparison, although I guess the embedded tags might lead to different results...? Unless you'd burn the Lossless file to CDR and do a re-rip.

 

[Slickgonzalez]

Wow

This was truly eye-opening.

Within the past year I have switched to ripping everything in ALAC, but before that I was a V0 man.

Lossless is obviously the way to go. I always knew mp3's were lossy, but it's amazing when you actually HEAR what you're LOSING.

Anyone who cares about their music collection should use a lossless codec. And stop using the ITMS!

 

[ChrisA]

...Pictures show the visual difference between the original WAV and the compressed file - what you see is what you don't hear in your AAC/MP3. The sample is what gets lost during encoding.

That is not true. That you see is literally the difference. Difference could be the result of something that is added or lost. Your test can't tell which it is.

The way MP3 encoding works is really not to "throw away" some data. What it does is "substitute" the actual data with a mathematical function that creates data like the audio data. What is recorded to the MP3 file are sets or parameters that are given to this function. So in effect ALL of the data are thrown away and new data takes its place.

What you have shown us is the difference between the output of a mathematical approximation and the true audio data. If you ask what data are "lost" in lossy compression, the answer is technically "all of it"

The function is designed to not reproduce data that the ear does not listen to. In music we pay a lot of attention to something the "attack" of a note but don't care as much about timbre. The idea of lossless is to "toss out" parts of the sound that will not be missed as much. The the size of difference does not tell you as much as we might think. That matters is what's in there.

Would be interesting to listen to it.

.JPG works the same way.

All that said. when I use my good headphones I can hear the difference from 320K mp3 and lossless in about 1% of the music I have. (not 1% of the songs, but 1% of the time) it was anoyying so I re-ripped everything to lossless. I have about 12,600 tracks in my iTunes library all but about 600 ripped from CD.

 

[VirtualRain]

Thanks for this!!!

What are the relative file sizes of all the formats compared?

 

[ChrisA]

so in other words apple loseless is compressed file or lower in size but still contains the same frequencies as the wav uncompressed version???

and just to make sure did you rip the song from the original cd as wav?? or was is just some mp3 of it u had ???just wondering

Yes, "lossless" is as the name says. It is about the same as if you "zipped" the .wav file. Here is how it works (simplified)

WAV might have these numbers in it 12, 45, 46, 36 Then FLAC or Apple Lossless might have this 12, 33, 1, 10. The second string takes less space to write but can be used to reconstruct the first string. (2nd string is the difference between the values.) Thay use other more powerful tricks, but same idea

Yes, I have seen that. Someone re-encodes a downloaded MP3 to FLAC and thinks the sound is better.

 

[Luap]

Thanks for this!!!

What are the relative file sizes of all the formats compared?

This is an old(ish) thread which was brought back to life the other day. Anyway, relative file sizes are easy to determine yourself. Just rip the same track into a few different formats/bit rats to see the differences in file sizes.
But given that the thread is about lossless codecs, expect a roughly 50% reduction in file size from the original uncompressed audio file.

 

[c-Row]

The idea of lossless is to "toss out" parts of the sound that will not be missed as much.

I don't think so, since you can completely reconstruct the original file. "Toss out" might be a misleading term here.

.JPG works the same way.

I disagree, for the same reason as above. JPG is the equivalent to MP3 or AAC, since you can't get the original file back in its full complexity (saving to JPG at full quality might be an exception here, but I don't think so). If anything, it's PNG which would be to pictures what ALAC is to audio.

 

[Teej guy]

I don't think so, since you can completely reconstruct the original file. "Toss out" might be a misleading term here.

Absolutely. The I believe a more correct way of looking at it would be "substitute with a more efficient representation of the data."

"Toss out" is strictly lossy.

 

[twistedH3L1X]

How about "normalizing" that file?

I took one of the files and phase inverted it.

... nothing. Pure silence. Not a single peak anywhere, just a perfectly flat line and absolutely no sound. Both files had perfectly cancelled out each other.

I'm not trying to troll or disrespect c-Row. Obviously much thought and time was offered here for free. Thank you for all that you've done here.

But I was wondering if the WAV vs. Inverted ALAC result (the "silent" file) was "normalized" to full volume afterwards before mentioning the result. I can see that you know your stuff, so you probably did. Silence at a low level may not be silence at all. And high frequencies are always at a much lower level than the lower frequencies. And sometimes low level dithering can fudge results. I guess I should go do the work myself.

Cheers to all. 🙂

 

[ChrisA]

Absolutely. The I believe a more correct way of looking at it would be "substitute with a more efficient representation of the data."

"Toss out" is strictly lossy.

I'm re-reading my own post. It was a typo. Of course :lossless" would not "toss out" anything. Replace "lossless" with "lossy". what a difference three letters make, like forgetting to include the word "not" in a sentence.

So yes. lossless encoding replaces the data with a more efficient encoding.

 

[c-Row]

I'm not trying to troll or disrespect c-Row. Obviously much thought and time was offered here for free. Thank you for all that you've done here.

But I was wondering if the WAV vs. Inverted ALAC result (the "silent" file) was "normalized" to full volume afterwards before mentioning the result. I can see that you know your stuff, so you probably did. Silence at a low level may not be silence at all. And high frequencies are always at a much lower level than the lower frequencies. And sometimes low level dithering can fudge results. I guess I should go do the work myself.

Cheers to all. 🙂

Actually I don't remember since it's been a few days since. 😉 Unless somebody else wants to try I could do another test with a normalised mixdown.

 

[50548]

Interestingly, this is what the Amarra crew say about ALAC ripping:

"1) Use AIFF file format for bit-perfect rip.
AIFF is the native uncompressed audio file format for the Mac environment. AIFF files are perfect for iTunes and can be played on many Windows PCs too.
Ripping to compressed formats such as MP3, ALAC, FLAC or AAC may save space, but ripping your files to these formats is not bit perfect! These formats actually remove data from the music stream and resulting file type is different from its uncompressed format; so, this cannot be considered a bit-perfect rip.
2) Apple's iTunes has a perfectly fine CD ripping utility that provides convenient bit-perfect conversion from PCM - just make sure to select the AIFF encoder. We recommend that 'Error Correction' be enabled too."

I wonder whether the advice above REALLY makes sense in the light of this thread's conclusions...by the way, I use Audirvana Plus, not Amarra.

 

[Arran]

It's a pity this thread is so old and the audio samples no longer available. I thought the OP's experiment was fascinating.

The idea of inverting one waveform and then combining two to get just the differences is brilliant!

 

[Jolly Jimmy]

I wonder whether the advice above REALLY makes sense in the light of this thread's conclusions...

It doesn't, it's utter bollocks. As are so many of their claims. I especially like the ones about music sounding "smoother" with an SSD than a HDD, and that network drives sound "grainy".

 

[stchman]

I personally encode all my music in the MP3 format.

If one uses VBR in encoding their CD audio to MP3, you will be VERY hard pressed to tell the difference.

People complain about MP3, but it is still the only music format that pretty much ALL music devices will read.

 

[Irishman]

I personally encode all my music in the MP3 format.

If one uses VBR in encoding their CD audio to MP3, you will be VERY hard pressed to tell the difference.

People complain about MP3, but it is still the only music format that pretty much ALL music devices will read.

If ultimate compatibility is your goal, then yes, MP3 is the most effective format. With the right DAC and speakers or headphones, the differences between MP3 and FLAC or ALAC are pronounced. You can get into it for less than $500 (DAC and headphones). But, keep in mind, this is not a solution for an iPod, but for a computer.

 

[Julien]

...If one uses VBR in encoding their CD audio to MP3, you will be VERY hard pressed to tell the difference.

People complain about MP3, but it is still the only music format that pretty much ALL music devices will read.

....but if you can tell the difference then it WILL be different (inferior). So why settle for less?

If ultimate compatibility is your goal, then yes, MP3 is the most effective format...

I'll argue the other side of the coin. Once converted to MP3 you are "stuck". With ALAC (open source since this thread was started) you can easily convert (using many free programs) to LPCM, FLAC, MP3 or ACC. So I say ALAC (or other lossless) is the ultimate compatibility.

 

[Irishman]

....but if you can tell the difference then it WILL be different (inferior). So why settle for less?



I'll argue the other side of the coin. Once converted to MP3 you are "stuck". With ALAC (open source since this thread was started) you can easily convert (using many free programs) to LPCM, FLAC, MP3 or ACC. So I say ALAC (or other lossless) is the ultimate compatibility.

I side with you on the quality side. If the information is in the original master, I want to preserve it in whatever file I use. Once it's lossy, it's lost forever.

 

[Sackvillenb]

If one uses VBR in encoding their CD audio to MP3, you will be VERY hard pressed to tell the difference.

This is very true. They are some interesting listening tests as well as more technical and objective analyses that have demonstrated this.

I think the biggest thing people forget to really think about in these discussions about mp3 and bitrate and lossless is the equipment being used to reproduce the sound.

It's ALL about the equipment. A high bitrate mp3 will sound no different than lossless on most standard equipment (e.g. apple earbuds, most speakers you get from futureshop or bestbuy, etc.). But, run that audio through a good DAC and amp and a set of "audiophile" grade headphones or speakers... and things might be different.