Sony Says Upsampled 248K Transparent to High Resolution

[Ken Newton]

...It's a plasma so I'm probably a candidate for OLED, though it does seem the LCD types have gotten better.

I've owned an 50" Panasonic plasma TV for a number of years, but was shocked at how hyper realistic the top 4K HDTV's looked when I recently sauntered in to my local BestBuy store. Blown away, fairly describes my reaction. The top Sony dynamically backlit LED models are ridiculously outstanding, but the top LG OLED models are even more ridiculously outstanding, IMHO. Unlike with audio, video dynamic range expansion seems to make a very big subjective improvement. My plasma suddenly looks obsolete.

 

[watchnerd]

What does Hi Res sound like?

It sounds like Redbook.

So we get:

Redbook lossless -> lossy 256k -> extra special soundshaping -> Redbook lossless

 

[watchnerd]

I've owned an 50" Panasonic plasma TV for a number of years, but was shocked at how hyper realistic the top 4K HDTV's looked when I recently sauntered in to my local BestBuy store. Blown away, fairly describes my reaction. The top Sony dynamically backlit LED models are rediculously outstanding, but the top LG OLED models are even more ridiculously outstanding, IMHO. Unlike with audio, video dynamic range expansion seems to make a very big subjective improvement. My plasma suddenly looks obsolete.

My LG plasma died last year so I went to a 4K TCL OLED. I'm no videophile, but even to me the differences are obvious. Plus the savings in weight / energy. And it has Roku built in.

 

[Sal1950]

What does Hi Res sound like?

Tastes like chicken.

 

[Don Hills]

What does Hi Res sound like?

For fun and education, you can:
- Load a 24/96 track into a tool (I use Audacity).
- Make a copy (Edit --> Duplicate)
- High pass filter one copy at 20 KHz, leaving only the ultrasonic sounds. (Effect --> High Pass Filter --> 20 KHz - 48 dB/oct)
- Boost the gain (Effect --> Amplify) or normalise (Effect --> Normalise) to make it loud enough to hear.
- Set both tracks to play back about 1/4 speed. (Click on each track title. Select Rate --> 22.05 KHz.)
- Press Play, and use the Solo buttons to switch between tracks.

On good "Hi Res" material, the ultrasonics are quite definitely "musical". On poor or upsampled material, they are various forms of noise.

 

[Saidera]

248 kbps MP3 does exist at least, for LAME encoders? But 256 kbps is normal.

From this we know some high-res files offer little benefit over the compressed low-res equivalent.

And the history regarding SBR is intriguing. For non-engineers this thread is the only place to understand the history of DSEE HX. Although there are many algorithms to upscale audio to CD (early 2000s), to HiRes (since 2013), and now using AI to increase accuracy for different types of audio (2018), I would say DSEE HX is the most famous and the best algorithm to upscale MP3s for the mass market to embrace HiRes products. Its problems include harsh high frequency sounds for highly compressed audio and certain vocals. It can lead to muddy sound and its stereo enhancing effect is experienced differently depending on whether you use IEMs or headphones, and its make/model. And differences can only be noted in very highly compressed (96 kbps) MP3s which have lots of instruments in them, or in the way harsh sounds turn less 'jagged' - smoothed out in a way. When it comes to 64 kbps it is not so good. Since 2018 DSEE HX AI (now DSEE Ultimate) introduced extra tweaks to increase soundstage 'height' - the beating of drums and audience/ambience of live concerts' clapping, so long as the source file still has some of that left over as a hint. It is well known that different Sony products had different DSEE HX sound effects. Some make no difference at all, some give piano sounds extra depth. Even DSEE Ultimate still makes mistakes with vocals. So it is at best a comforting function to enable MP3 users to save eMMC space and still listen to HiRes.