Are you an audiophile?
 

Just a simple polling guys... I wonder if there are lot people here are audiophiles. I'm not one, my ears hardly could differ the quality of 160 kbps with 320 kbps mp3. Honestly I don't want to be an audiophile since it will be troublesome for me If I demand all my songs are lossless.

Double Post:
damn, I want to make this a public poll. Moderator, is there any way to solve this?

Over the past few years, and after originally stumbling upon Gamingforce Audio way back when, I have slowly developped into a audiophile.

I have some friends that look at me weird when i show them the file sizes of the songs i have. But it always makes them go "It's no different" that urks me.. loseless sounds way different then lower encoded songs.

Can I claim to be halfway there? While like you I probably couldn't tell the difference between 160 and 320, I can definitely tell when I'm listening to a 120 that someone apparently recorded in their basement.

Maybe it's just that all the music I've been finding/ripping (I try to rip at highest level possible) has been high, which has gotten me used to that standard. Back when I was grateful to get music off Napster on my dial-up (a sign of how long ago that was), I would be happy with 96 kbps music as long as it worked, haha.

I can't stand 128kbps MP3's for instance. I'm not one of those "OH I CAN HEAR THE CRISP HIGHS AND THE BROODING LOWS WITH A 5.3 METRE SOUNDSTAGE AND I CAN HEAR THE SOUND OF THE DRUMMER'S EYELIDS CLOSING" type audiophiles, but if someone took my AKG K26s and I had to go back to using crappy sony in ear headphones, that would suck.

And VBR is your best friend.

Without a doubt, yes. Many years of performing music have developed my hearing extensively, and I can tell a distinct difference between low-end and high-end sound. For the moment, my Hi-Fi setup is limited merely to headphones, although I may finally make the jump this summer and pick up a decent speaker rig (Likely a Pair of B&W DM601S3 or 602S3, haven't decided on a proper Amp/Receiver yet).

Definitely not. I'm a wannabe audiophile - what with my plans to purchase some $300 US retail earbuds and my obsession with having high quality VBR mp3s for everything (you can't really tell much difference between this and lossless). I'm also obssessed with retagging and renaming everything that I download, except for #gamemp3s releases.

questions for non-audiophiles: are you actually wishing to become an audiophile? Why's that? Well, I'm afraid to become one actually, if that happens that would mean I must start collecting lossless then!

Yeah I used to be sorta like that as well... except now I can tell the diff. between below 128 and 128 and above. I can also detect between 320 and 128, but not minor things like 190 vs 160... I guess I'm just not that much of an wannabe audiophile.

For me though, VBR and 192 has become the defacto standard. I also am going to try and get FLAC for what I want to 'archive' to CD. Like Mucknuggle, I'm only a wannabe :p

That's stupid.

That's like being ashamed of wanting the best of something.

I'm not sure. I voted no because 192 kbps CBR is quite good enough for me, and I wouldn't want anything better than that. I see being an audiophile as a frustrating pursuit, because your hearing is going to get worse no matter what you do. Mine's worse now than it was at age 20.

I'm definitely not. I hate music encoded in less than 192kbs, since its not really that great to listen to, but aside from that, I don't mind. Having everything encoded in high bitrates would just mess with my iPod battery/disk space anyway!

I would say I'm more of an audio enthusiast than an audiophile. If it sounds good to me, it sounds good. I'm not going to ramble on about soundstage, palpability (?), speed, and all those other non-technical terms I hear a lot of audiophiles (90% of whom are probably average joes) spewing out.

"Oh yes, there's too much mid-bass, the midtones are muddy, and the highs are a bit too rolled off." Ugh. Some of the people on the Head-fi forums are especially bad about this. One of them just made a post stating that he had spent $5000 on headphones and amps since finding that forum. Five-thousand dollars? What a waste. Nobody needs a pair of AKG K-1000 headphones. (Headspeakers?)

I have been for quite a while. I fact the only person I truely trust to make perfect CD rips, is (surprise) myself. I think everyone else does something wrong to fudge up the rip. I only use mp3 because its so well supported. If I had a digital music player (with a large hard drive), I'd just rip everything to Monkey's Audio and never worry about having to hear mp3s anymore from my own rips.
Of course I'm too poor to get audio equipment good enough to hear the difference between -V 2 mp3s and lossless (best example of that: my headphones cost $12).

Actually I am not an audiophile. The reason is that some of my favorite recordings were made in the 20s and of course the sound was horrible, but they're still great recordings. As long as you can make out the nuances, I don't see what the big deal is. It's like people complaining that Citizen Kane is not as good a movie if it's not seen on HDTV.

Being an audiophile doesn't mean that you hate low-quality recordings, Minion. My personal favorite CD was recorded in 1977. Is it as full and rich as some modern recordings I have of the songs? No. But the precision and style are still there.

I'm definitely the same way. I just want what I have to sound good with what I've got. I'm fine with 128k MP3's on my speakers (although I prefer higher rates and VBR.) I don't care if my home audio system is not up to theatre standards. As long as what I'm listening to has a nice, full, rich sound, I'm more than happy.

In that case, I'm not even close to an audiophille, I shall take the monkier "Enthusiast", or maybe "Appreciator" or something like that :laugh:

Need. There's an interesting term. Do any of us NEED Headphones or Speakers or any sort? They're certainly not essential to my survival.

No, I suppose we don't. Although I must say I would be very sad indeed without my music. Sometimes I feel that it is the only thing maintaining my sanity.

I have tin ears, so being an audiophile is out of the question.

While I can sometimes detect some muddiness in the high or low ranges of a 128 kbps MP3, more often than not I don't. Only by comparing a 128 and, say, a 192 side by side can I detect any difference.

This is actually a benefit, as 192 VBR MP3's are widely available--almost the "standard" these days--and very portable.

Frankly, people who insist on lossless-only rips or spend thousands of dollars on expensive stereo systems frighten me. Kind of like people who consider themselves gourmands or artistes, actually--there can be a level of snobbishness about audiophilery.

No, in fact if we all were all hardcore, we'd all use our PCs without a monitor.
I'd say just settle for what tests the limits of your soundcard and your ears. Anything that goes higher than that (for example if it can output sound above 22000Hz, beyond what any human can hear) is a waste of money.

There are practical uses for lossless audio. If you want an archival copy of your CDs, lossless is the best way to go if you want a "perfect" copy in case you damage the original disc (but so are disc images.)

Insisting solely on lossless rips though, is just plain impractical on your hard drives.

I'd almost say half of being a "hardcore" audiophile is bragging about your setup and how it's better than everyone else's.

That's another thing. My classical collection alone is far too large to be loseless audio. I would need like, the Pentagon to fit it all.

I'm an audiophile, but I'm not so much into the digital music realm -- Vinyl is where it's at, baby. I swear, if you listen to classical recordings on a good sound system, with a good needle (and the vinyl is in decent shape, of course) you will know what I'm talking about. A full, rich sound that, no matter how high-bit they make CDs, it doesn't sound nearly the same.

As for MP3s, it depends on the music. For pop/rock and stuff I don't care about, I can *handle* 128. I don't like to, but unfortunately unless I actually want to pay for some of the music I have (heaven forbid!), I have to take what I can find. With my classical music I usually rip in .ogg format, just because I think it sounds better. Very little of my collection is lossless, simply because I don't have that kind of space on my computer. But it sounds vastly better than any of my 256 MP3s.

Double Post:
Exactly.

No, I'm not an audiophile. I don't have a single lossless music file in my comp, and i probably will never have one since it's such a waste.
I like my music 192CBR or over 200VBR, I can stand 128, but if a song is in 128 I'd look for a higher bitrate version unless it's not possible.