Why are people still using MP3?

[MasJ]

MP3s are what are easily available everywhere. It's a chicken and egg problem. Rippers will favor other formats if people demand it. People will favor other formats if they are widely available.

[Sprung]

Did someone say eggs? Now I need my toast question answered.

[Gypsy]

Buy cds, rip them, sell them. Or just buy them digitally. Or download mp3s here for free. Your choice.

[Aeolus Aeneas]

Because not all of us are audiophiles who think we can hear stuff that is physically impossible.

[Elmdor Rizer]

I just wanted to point and laugh at you guys for seemingly caring about the sound quality of your music. It'd only make it easier to tell that the guitars are out of tune, ya pop-strings!

So Nick, what I don't quite understand: you hatred of MP3s, is it because you really think that AAC sounds so much better or is it more of an academical thing here? Because if it's about whining for the sake of whining I'll totally hop aboard with you. I still won't give a shit about this here question, mind you, but I'll totally nod my head, go "good man" etc etc.

Also, you guys are needlessly mean. I can totally dig it.

[deadlegion]

I'm too lazy to iron all my clothes but those little marks clothes pegs leave really bother me

[Inferno.]

I'm too lazy to iron all my clothes but those little marks clothes pegs leave really bother me

But you must iron everything. Ever.

Including your Y fronts, Mr deadlegion.

[Nick Naim]

So Nick, what I don't quite understand: you hatred of MP3s, is it because you really think that AAC sounds so much better or is it more of an academical thing here? Because if it's about whining for the sake of whining I'll totally hop aboard with you. I still won't give a shit about this here question, mind you, but I'll totally nod my head, go "good man" etc etc.

I'm not going to lie and say that the regressiveness and people's unwillingness to change that mp3 represents have nothing to do with it, but another issue is wastefulness. It is a comparatively inefficient audio codec. If people are unwilling to do the easiest thing, with added benefits in favor of less waste, that leaves us with poor prospects as a society. I'm not saying an audio codec is particularly important compared to other issues like global warming, but it is what it is.

So if you wanted a deeper answer, there you have it. But the important bit is that mp3 is not a good codec to be using in 2015.

And I never said I prefer aac, only that it's better than mp3. Pretty much any modern, lossy audio codec is better than mp3. Vorbis and AAC just happen to be mainstream enough to be viable choices. Opus is on the horizon and beats them both.

That Apple audio originally had DRM iirc. Look, it's all shit just accept it and move on.

DRM can be placed on a lot of things. AAC just happened to support it as a feature. I'm the farthest thing from an apple fanboy, in fact I hate apple's practices. Either way, DRM audio files seem to be a thing of the past.

[psysfaction]

To be honest for years I have been using 320kbs MP3s and I was totally fine with it.
But since a few weeks I got a pair of high end speakers and build myself a Volumio network audio player with a Raspberry Pi and a hifiberry DAC+.

When I listen to Flac or 24bit content I can hear a clear difference in acoustical music like Jazz, Flamenco and so on.
But when I listen to normal pop music I can not hear a real difference due to how theses songs are mastered in the Studio with hardly any dynamic.
Even with most of my Tech-House and Minimal-Techno I can not hear a big difference.

A great song for testing my audio gear and the quality of different codecs for me has been Privat Investigation by Dire Straits.

So in the end it all comes down to your audio equipment and the style of music that you listen to.

[gezegond]

mp3 works on my phone, PC, mp3 player, PSP, and NDS. AAC is arguably a better codec, but everything comes in mp3 anyway. I'm used to mp3, and there really isn't a big difference. I think your argument about being lazy as a society (and comparing it to global warming etc.) is deeply flawed, as the priority of what codec I listen my music in is different on something large scale like global warming or war. I do hate the fact that so little people care about (or even know about) those subjects, but I don't really care what format people listen their music in. If you really care so much then by all means get your music lossless and then encode into your codec of choice. I'd totally do so if I cared enough.

[deadlegion]

So in the end it all comes down to your audio equipment and the style of music that you listen to.

Indeed. But arguing about aac (or whatever lossy audio) being "better" than mp3 is rather pointless.

[psysfaction]

Indeed. But arguing about aac (or whatever lossy audio) being "better" than mp3 is rather pointless.

I absolutely agree.. Really the biggest issue is that people are so used to listening to music on bad sound systems and bad quality that record studios are mastering the music very different nowadays trying to compensate the fact that people do not own good sound systems or good headphones.
Most is master with a Loudness attitude so that people can even listen to it though the speakers of an Ipad.
If you compare this with real dynamic that music has in a studio when played live then it is just sad.

[Nick Naim]

When I listen to Flac or 24bit content I can hear a clear difference in acoustical music like Jazz, Flamenco and so on.
But when I listen to normal pop music I can not hear a real difference due to how theses songs are mastered in the Studio with hardly any dynamic.
Even with most of my Tech-House and Minimal-Techno I can not hear a big difference.

If you are comparing the exact audio samples in those different codecs, that is more likely to be a psychological effect than any real perception of quality. FLAC doesn't magically make music sound better. You wouldn't be able to tell the difference between FLAC and a high quality, lossy encoding in true VBR averaging out at just below 200 kbps.
24-bit audio might make lossless audio more convenient to store and work with (under some circumstances), but it will not make music playback any better than properly sampled 16-bit audio. The human ears have a limit, and 16-bit audio can encompass those limits.
That's why the opus codec doesn't support higher than 16-bit.

Regardless of that, the listening tests that can most objectively measure the relative quality among lossy audio codecs are double-blind tests, such as the tests done to produce this graph:



Any other type of listening test has been all but proven, if not proven to produce biased results.

[deadlegion]

If I'm listening to music in the car then it doesn't make any difference if it's a CD or mp3, because of other noise it isn't a proper environment.
I've never been a huge fan of headphones no matter what their quality. The only time I ever use them now is like mowing the grass and crap like that, I would never use them out in public like most young people do as they inhibit your awareness and it's just obnoxious imo. But then so is walking around using smartphones etc unaware of people around you and expecting them to get out of your way.

At home I can tell the difference between CD and mp3. Any lossy audio just doesn't seem to have any "feel" in the low end bass especially.
Ever been to a live rock concert? You feel just as much as you hear. Lossy audio just doesn't feel right, but if all you do is use headphones then it wouldn't really matter. Especially if they're cheap ones, which might be another indication of why mp3 is still everywhere; your gear is very average so it doesn't matter what kind of lossy audio you're listening to.

[Nick Naim]

At home I can tell the difference between CD and mp3. Any lossy audio just doesn't seem to have any "feel" in the low end bass especially.

That is not a scientific test, as I stated above. So unless your mp3s are encoded in low bitrate and/or bad quality, you are not really noticing any difference, but instead it's all in your head.