Apple lossless official announcement

[mononoaware]

I hope it becomes the standard in music production because even proper stereo mixes were little and far this millennia.

Try changing where you get your digital downloads?
Maybe it depends on the artists too. . .
I don’t update the Audio archive very often, but recent downloads from Bandcamp have been very good (double checked on spectrogram and wave-form).

In my experience on Bandcamp it seems extra effort is being put into the final master, even contemporary modern artists I have purchased recently were well mastered.

 

[Blaspheme]

I think some of you are quite close to the truth. I downloaded one of the Atmos files with Music, and checked out the files. It contains .data file with some interesting content:

#EXT-X-MEDIA:TYPE=AUDIO,GROUP-ID="audio-stereo-256-binaural",AUTOSELECT=YES,CHANNELS="2/-/BINAURAL",NAME="songEnhanced"
#EXT-X-MEDIA:TYPE=AUDIO,GROUP-ID="audio-stereo-256",AUTOSELECT=YES,CHANNELS="2",NAME="songEnhanced"
#EXT-X-MEDIA:TYPE=AUDIO,GROUP-ID="audio-stereo-256-downmix",AUTOSELECT=YES,CHANNELS="2/-/DOWNMIX",NAME="songEnhanced"
#EXT-X-MEDIA:TYPE=AUDIO,GROUP-ID="audio-HE-stereo-64",AUTOSELECT=YES,CHANNELS="2",NAME="songEnhanced"
#EXT-X-MEDIA:TYPE=AUDIO,GROUP-ID="audio-HE-stereo-64-binaural",AUTOSELECT=YES,CHANNELS="2/-/BINAURAL",NAME="songEnhanced"
#EXT-X-MEDIA:TYPE=AUDIO,GROUP-ID="audio-HE-stereo-64-downmix",AUTOSELECT=YES,CHANNELS="2/-/DOWNMIX",NAME="songEnhanced"
#EXT-X-MEDIA:TYPE=AUDIO,GROUP-ID="audio-stereo-128",AUTOSELECT=YES,CHANNELS="2",NAME="songEnhanced"
#EXT-X-MEDIA:TYPE=AUDIO,GROUP-ID="audio-stereo-128-binaural",AUTOSELECT=YES,CHANNELS="2/-/BINAURAL",NAME="songEnhanced"
#EXT-X-MEDIA:TYPE=AUDIO,GROUP-ID="audio-stereo-128-downmix",AUTOSELECT=YES,CHANNELS="2/-/DOWNMIX",NAME="songEnhanced"
#EXT-X-MEDIA:TYPE=AUDIO,GROUP-ID="audio-alac-stereo-48000-24",AUTOSELECT=YES,CHANNELS="2",NAME="songEnhanced",SAMPLE-RATE=48000,BIT-DEPTH=24
#EXT-X-MEDIA:TYPE=AUDIO,GROUP-ID="audio-atmos-2448",AUTOSELECT=YES,CHANNELS="16/JOC",NAME="songEnhanced"
#EXT-X-MEDIA:TYPE=AUDIO,GROUP-ID="audio-atmos-2768",AUTOSELECT=YES,CHANNELS="16/JOC",NAME="songEnhanced"

#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:AVERAGE-BANDWIDTH=259489,_AVG-BANDWIDTH=259489,BANDWIDTH=271395,CODECS="mp4a.40.2",STABLE-VARIANT-ID="6bea21024b2c5ef023a011b8c89327ca4a179734930d4d46ccee4f6a93ee5985",AUDIO="audio-stereo-256-binaural"
P287454153_A1570942456_audio_en_gr256_bm.m3u8
#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:AVERAGE-BANDWIDTH=259482,_AVG-BANDWIDTH=259482,BANDWIDTH=271385,CODECS="mp4a.40.2",STABLE-VARIANT-ID="9a64d1cb7c6038da3b411cf301ffc62a745f37309bfb5e89654549879c9f84ed",AUDIO="audio-stereo-256"
P287454153_A1570942456_audio_en_gr256.m3u8
#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:AVERAGE-BANDWIDTH=256235,_AVG-BANDWIDTH=256235,BANDWIDTH=274153,CODECS="mp4a.40.2",STABLE-VARIANT-ID="9927f02da9bea411e7ab5300af73239b496722644f6d118c1ae7f6e429821738",AUDIO="audio-stereo-256-downmix"
P287454153_A1570942456_audio_en_gr256_dm.m3u8
#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:AVERAGE-BANDWIDTH=72117,_AVG-BANDWIDTH=72117,BANDWIDTH=78896,CODECS="mp4a.40.5",STABLE-VARIANT-ID="0bc4ff85790e67e8667a94c8a500ba368005e4522fb93222ebcb62cad7f39a0c",AUDIO="audio-HE-stereo-64"
P287454153_A1570942456_audio_en_gr64.m3u8
#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:AVERAGE-BANDWIDTH=72121,_AVG-BANDWIDTH=72121,BANDWIDTH=78893,CODECS="mp4a.40.5",STABLE-VARIANT-ID="52b5caa6e7cee827e21a6867dc9e4d51579b079bf6b7e78aa41edb806b4ade48",AUDIO="audio-HE-stereo-64-binaural"
P287454153_A1570942456_audio_en_gr64_bm.m3u8
#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:AVERAGE-BANDWIDTH=69460,_AVG-BANDWIDTH=69460,BANDWIDTH=78148,CODECS="mp4a.40.5",STABLE-VARIANT-ID="85e37d804fa722593362b08e1122210a3d5e98a34d9e794f8622f4bb934b19ba",AUDIO="audio-HE-stereo-64-downmix"
P287454153_A1570942456_audio_en_gr64_dm.m3u8
#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:AVERAGE-BANDWIDTH=132214,_AVG-BANDWIDTH=132214,BANDWIDTH=136994,CODECS="mp4a.40.2",STABLE-VARIANT-ID="6afa87a7009e98cd0fe369e929266222586a08b7b0f6480784299832ced51aad",AUDIO="audio-stereo-128"
P287454153_A1570942456_audio_en_gr128.m3u8
#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:AVERAGE-BANDWIDTH=132214,_AVG-BANDWIDTH=132214,BANDWIDTH=136995,CODECS="mp4a.40.2",STABLE-VARIANT-ID="16742cb6f863702075c3d5d9795162c2c013b8f6375eb1cf02c10ad08e413723",AUDIO="audio-stereo-128-binaural"
P287454153_A1570942456_audio_en_gr128_bm.m3u8
#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:AVERAGE-BANDWIDTH=128067,_AVG-BANDWIDTH=128067,BANDWIDTH=137419,CODECS="mp4a.40.2",STABLE-VARIANT-ID="194f6b2d6e4ea9a5a1150adcf138797ab0e49a3fe54c4e7939e8a1dfee52a471",AUDIO="audio-stereo-128-downmix"
P287454153_A1570942456_audio_en_gr128_dm.m3u8
#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:AVERAGE-BANDWIDTH=1596147,_AVG-BANDWIDTH=1596147,BANDWIDTH=1689895,CODECS="alac",STABLE-VARIANT-ID="aa55a5776885b1a10448a61394b2ef2d5c01e42f882f749ac9bc63a6a8727dbc",AUDIO="audio-alac-stereo-48000-24"
P287454153_A1570942456_audio_en_gr2304.m3u8
#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:AVERAGE-BANDWIDTH=450245,_AVG-BANDWIDTH=450245,BANDWIDTH=450234,CODECS="ec-3",STABLE-VARIANT-ID="4e221db58ae8c570a6588c128dad3b1f822b0501338497580e9e0a5032854926",AUDIO="audio-atmos-2448"
P287454153_A1570942456_audio_en_gr2448.m3u8
#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:AVERAGE-BANDWIDTH=770243,_AVG-BANDWIDTH=770243,BANDWIDTH=770218,CODECS="ec-3",STABLE-VARIANT-ID="11fa62ecc94d154f1579a62153d637ced5c62cb947cc82af4322739bfaef52e9",AUDIO="audio-atmos-2768"
P287454153_A1570942456_audio_en_gr2768.m3u8

So it looks like there are all kinds of various versions available, including a binaural, downmix, alac as well as the actual Atmos tracks, in this case showing 16 channels.

The version that got downloaded looks to be the audio-atmos-2768 as well as the audio-stereo-256 version.

That is interesting. Checking the larger lossless package I discussed above (with Atmos download in Music.app disabled) reveals a .data file with the same 12 media types (but some detail differences, like bitrate/bandwidth which appears to be variable). I reckon this is an index, but each package contains a different set of audio data. That's for folklore which has all the merit badges. Checking a download for Donker Mag—which is lossless and master but no Atmos—there are only four media types in the index: 64/128/256 and 24/44.1 (it'll take a lot of downloading and metadata digging to find those elusive 24/192 gems, so I'm not bothering). Again I'd reckon the Atmos package can deliver the binaural and other lower derivatives, say, which is as it should be. But I don't think it contains the lossless ALAC, because that's bigger. And I don't think disabling "download Atmos" would result in you downloading Atmos either (although stranger things have happened).

 

[Blaspheme]

Maybe this dismissive attitude has to do with lack of faith in human beings.
But I really see this “Dolby Atmos” claim by Apple to be a short-lived investment just to add on this extra “feature” to their product line-up so they can market to a bigger audience.

Maybe, but they've also announced adding Atmos mixing to Logic Pro, so that suggests a deeper interest, on the creative/production side.

 

[mononoaware]

Maybe, but they've also announced adding Atmos mixing to Logic Pro, so that suggests a deeper interest.

Or just too enthusiastic? I’m sure big tech companies are capable of investing in such ways. . .

 

[voodooless]

A LOT of iconic tracks over several eras received an Atmos touch up, i find it difficult that you have no interest in ANY of them.

Like what? I've seen Abbey Road, some Coldplay a bit of R.E.M. and Pearl Jam a bit of Jazz stuff. The majority is some new-fangled stuff that is okay when on the radio, but not my cup of tea. I've mostly looked at the albums though. There might be separate tracks done as well that I have not found yet.

 

[abdo123]

Like what? I've seen Abbey Road, some Coldplay a bit of R.E.M. and Pearl Jam a bit of Jazz stuff. The majority is some new-fangled stuff that is okay when on the radio, but not my cup of tea. I've mostly looked at the albums though. There might be separate tracks done as well that I have not found yet.

There is an entire playlist in Apple music called 'Hits in Spatial Audio'

https://beta.music.apple.com/be/playlist/hits-in-spatial-audio/pl.ba2404fbc4464b8ba2d60399189cf24e

 

[voodooless]

But I really see this “Dolby Atmos” claim by Apple to be a short-lived investment just to add on this extra “feature” to their product line-up so they can market to a bigger audience.

You might be right there, still, that doesn't mean the technology is not interesting .

There is an entire playlist in Apple music called 'Hits in Spatial Audio'

https://beta.music.apple.com/be/playlist/hits-in-spatial-audio/pl.ba2404fbc4464b8ba2d60399189cf24e

Yes, that's just a selection of the same songs from those albums mostly with a few exceptions.

 

[Blaspheme]

There is an entire playlist in Apple music called 'Hits in Spatial Audio'

https://beta.music.apple.com/be/playlist/hits-in-spatial-audio/pl.ba2404fbc4464b8ba2d60399189cf24e

Haha, unlike voodooless perhaps, I really like new-fangled stuff. Otoh I didn't need the fingers on my other hand counting the songs I could listen to all the way through on that list. And I did try earlier.

 

[mononoaware]

I appreciate the responses here, even though I have been quite critical.

I will leave the experts to discuss their data and analysis, as I’m sure that’s what most visitors are here to see.

 

[voodooless]

I appreciate the responses here, even though I have been quite critical.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with that! I'm still critical as well, but I can also acknowledge the technological achievement that Atmos brings. And the criticism is on many levels:

- Apple Music desktop app experience sucks big-time up to the point that it won't even play some songs anymore (still need to reboot to see if that fixes it)
- The available Atmos albums do not interest me for the most part
- It's very unclear what the customer gets served because there seem to be many more versions of a track than is apparent
- Without any further dissection of the files, there is no way of knowing what kind of Atmos mix it is. There is a compatibility option that maps to x.1 channels + some effects channels, rather than having real in space defined channels. I can imagine that the latter will give the best experience
- It's to be seen how good the mixes actually are. If the latest remasters of certain albums are any indication, I bet I won't be smiling when I find an Atmos album of something I actually like (The bastardization of the latest Delicate Sound of Thunder remaster comes to mind ). But there is some hope that people more familiar with movie soundtracks and mixing will be behind the buttons. They might bring some much-needed change..

 

[mkt]

Interesting that no one is saying that lossless (the word in the thread title) is an audible improvement (probably right), but anyone listening to Atmos and stereo can reliably tell the difference and have a preference (depending on mix and setup).

 

[Honken]

I definitely do not prefer the Atmos versions of songs with my "supported" AirPods, they sound dull and unengaging. I'm definitely curious what it'd sound like with 16 channels though!

As for lossy vs. lossless, I've tested myself a few times both with the aforementioned pods and with the setup in my signature. What I've done is to simply guess whether the song I'm listening to is lossless or not, and then I look at my phone to see the result. It is a crapshoot and I'm probably wrong more often than I'm right.

Maybe I'd be able to differentiate better with my headphones (HD600 with EQ) but they are stuck with lossy playback as they are connected to a Windows machine.

 

[chelgrian]

Maybe, but they've also announced adding Atmos mixing to Logic Pro, so that suggests a deeper interest, on the creative/production side.

What they really mean is they are integrating the ability to create a ADM file which is a broadcast WAV file with the Atmos metadata in it. Suitable for upload to AVID Play for distribution in to streaming services.

You can do Atmos in Logic now if you like pain and also have the Dolby Atmos Production Suite. Monitoring is the problem though most people give up and just use ProTools with an MTRX or MTRX studio interface.

 

[chelgrian]

There is one kind of Atmos

It's not that simple.

Theatrical Atmos is delivered as a 128 channel BWAV file plus metadata.

Theatrical Atmos mixes can be fit in to the 15 channels available in Home Atmos by grouping objects at the cost of spatial resolution and object separation.

Home Atmos can then be delivered losslessly encoded using TrueHD (only used for UHD bluray) or lossy compressed using E-AC-3 (used by video streaming services and Tidal and Apple for music) or AC-4 (used for ATSC3 broadcasts).

In particular AC4 in the configuration used for ATSC does not provide full bandwidth height channels and has severe issues if you try and hard pan object in to the heights. This means you need different mixes when targeting this if your 'normal' mixes are not to be compromised.

There is a lot more complication with it you have stem mixes and objects or object only mixes (again depends on what you are targeting)

So there are many forms of Atmos not just one.

 

[txbdan]

I appreciate the responses here, even though I have been quite critical.

I will leave the experts to discuss their data and analysis, as I’m sure that’s what most visitors are here to see.

You're clearly suspect of this, but I encourage you to take a deep breath and read up on it more. You're not showing an understanding of how it works at all. It's not surround, its not stereo, its not anything in particular. Think of it as a bunch of audio objects along with a few sets of directions on how to position them over time. Your processor picks the appropriate set of directions for your hardware (for headphones, AVR, MacBook Pro, etc) and decodes the audio object positioning as best it can given all the speakers you have and their positions. You can have headphones, four surround speakers, or a hundred surround speakers, the processor will make the bullets or the train or the bass guitar sound move around you in the same 3D space as best it can in all scenarios.

 

[DavidMcRoy]

And the consumer has no idea what it's is getting... if I see the Atmos logo on the screen, what does that mean? Is it a real local render, a downmixed version, a binaural version? The only way to really be sure currently is through Apple TV 4K and an AV receiver.

This goes back to my contention in other threads that Dolby Labs should revise its branding. Perhaps “Dolby Atmos Immersive” vs. “Dolby Atmos Binaural” would be appropriate.

 

[SKBubba]

All this confusion about what will play in what resolution on what devices with what settings, and even more confusion about the future of music which is apparently spacial, whatever that is.

Whatever. Seems like a half-assed rollout, at best.

Neither Amazon nor Apple seem all that serious. Both seem to just be checking off boxes. Mix in a lot of BS marketing, and Bob's your uncle.

Let's see what Spotify does.

 

[mononoaware]

You can have headphones, four surround speakers, or a hundred surround speakers, the processor will make the bullets or the train or the bass guitar sound move around you in the same 3D space as best it can in all scenarios.

Thanks for explaining it this way. It helps to define the actual final user experience.

In the beginning I thought Atmos was just 7.1.2 surround and higher, and that whatever signal AirPods/Mac’s got was a virtual simulated version of that which is created from converting a stereo PCM signal (I thought Atmos was a switch you could flick on anything Apple Music).

But from responses here I have now learned that (at least currently) Atmos signal is a 128-channel audio data stream + associated meta data (this is the object placement part) which can be applied universally to speakers/headphones off all shapes and sizes (as well as multi-channel surround speaker setups).
And Dolby reserves the right to decode it on the receiving end and also reserves the right to how it all works exactly.

My thoughts now have just been whether all of this actually results in a better audio experience for the end user on headphones/compromised speakers.
Since on these particular devices it really is a virtual digitally-processed experience (here is where I think headphones/smartphones/Mac’s differ from listening on a multi-channel speaker setup).

 

[mononoaware]

This goes back to my contention in other threads that Dolby Labs should revise its branding. Perhaps “Dolby Atmos Immersive” vs. “Dolby Atmos Binaural” would be appropriate.

I agree sub-categories would help clear things up and also make Dolby seem more transparent.
But how I understand it all works now, I get kind of get how Dolby are marketing Atmos as this “universal” standardised experience.

I guess the only way to judge if all Atmos versions can be blanketed as “Atmos” is by testing out every version side by side when they are available.
(subjectively since I have a strong belief that the data between versions will be different)

 

[eas]

I've done a little more digging.

The package for the Atmos download on MacOS makes use of the venerable M3U8 streaming playlist format to define the available streams and the fragments for those streams. The .movpkg is itself associated with the Apple TV+ app. Presumably it was first used for their subscription streaming video service.

• The top-level m38u*.data file, like the one posted above by @voodooless, includes a parameter for each stream called "STABLE-VARIANT-ID", this corresponds to the "UniqueTag" attribute on each <stream> element in the top-level boot.xml file.
• Each stream defined in the boot.xml file also includes a "PATH" attribute which corresponds to one of the data directories.

By joining these up I can see that the two directories containing data on my computer correspond to:

• #EXT-X-STREAM-INF:AVERAGE-BANDWIDTH=256080,_AVG-BANDWIDTH=256080,BANDWIDTH=263643,CODECS="mp4a.40.2",STABLE-VARIANT-ID="a1857814bd2e314ae109c7b2033e005bb0855ea55548e346cdfa70b09e74b442",AUDIO="audio-stereo-256"
• #EXT-X-STREAM-INF:AVERAGE-BANDWIDTH=770161,_AVG-BANDWIDTH=770161,BANDWIDTH=770191,CODECS="ec-3",STABLE-VARIANT-ID="61f8e1c857966212743277fc0c592144955795c70dd45a554431f70f713601f8",AUDIO="audio-atmos-2768"

The specified codecs may be of interest.

Elsewhere there is more information on these (and other) streams "audio-atoms-2768" stream:

• #EXT-X-MEDIA:TYPE=AUDIO,GROUP-ID="audio-stereo-256",AUTOSELECT=YES,CHANNELS="2",NAME="songEnhanced"
• #EXT-X-MEDIA:TYPE=AUDIO,GROUP-ID="audio-atmos-2768",AUTOSELECT=YES,CHANNELS="16/JOC",NAME="songEnhanced"

The channel definitions for the Atmos version may be of interest.

Note that all my playback tests were done while disconnected from the network so in this case the streams referenced above were on disk, rather than over the network.

During playback with the Atmos option selected the Music.app access files in the directory associated with the "audio-atmos-2768" stream. During stereo playback it access files in the directory associated with the "audio-stereo-256" stream.

It seems clear that binaural Atmos playback is derived from the multichannel audio-atmos-2768 data. Neither the "audio-stereo-256-binaural" nor the "audio-stereo-256-downmix" referenced in the top-level m3u8 file are necessary for binaural playback, at least not on a Mac. They could be used on an iOS device.

This casts further doubt, in my mind, on the idea that there are pre-rendered, device-specific files for playback on the internal speakers of supported devices.