How good are your ears?

[Marco Raaphorst]

Ever did this listening test:
https://www.npr.org/sections/therecord/ ... io-quality

It compares uncompressed files to 128 and 320 kbps MP3 versions.

I am 50 now. Everything above 15.5 kHz doesn't exists for me. I used to have great hearing, better than most people I worked with. Today I already am the loser compared to my 16 year old daughter. Of course

Must say I am able to pick out the 128 kbps version in the above test. But I got the 320 versus uncompressed versions mixed up a couple of times.

Please do this test. Tell me what you're hearing and feeling.

Great to get old, you cut the bullshit...

[TritoneAddiction]

Ah shit. I guessed two of each alternative. I'm pretty dissapointed with myself.

I still think it's way easier when you compare your own music that you've worked and know inside and out. You render out a wav file, upload it to Soundcloud and all of a sudden it sounds a lot crappier.

[audiojoe07]

That was an awesome article. I missed two of the answers. Some were very easy. The first instinct is to listen for the high-end frequencies, more obvious is to try to hear any undesirable sound artifacts. The easiest was by far Mozart's Piano Concerto, the 1 second of differences in white noise at the beginning is the most revealing.

It's not easy to hear the subtle differences, takes a lot of experience. There's an article here that has a training video that is supposed to help you recognize different frequencies more accurately: https://www.audiogearz.com/improve-mixi ... -training/

[MarkTarlton]

you might find this interesting

[Marco Raaphorst]

you might find this interesting

yeah nice one!

I agree. And I do feel like a mix should have a low pass at 16 kHz. Never like these high frequencies. Annoyed me. Even that tv 15 kHz tone dove me nuts for many years. Now it's finally gone

[demt]

mine are trained to appreciate loud volumes due to large jets on heathrows flight path

[aeox]

128kbps actually sounds better (to me)