How come I can hear the difference between a 128kbps MP3 and a 1411kbps WAV?
There are a number of reasons, some of which people really don’t like to hear. Since I find the difference painfully obvious on a lot of music, here’s a list of possibilities: 1. You don’t know how to listen to music or what to listen for. Very few people actually sit down and seriously listen to music. Most have something playing in the background when they are doing something else. Listening takes concentration and practice, just with any other skill. It’s worth the effort. 2. Your equipment is inferior. The quality of much home audio equipment has deteriorated over the past decade. This is partly due to the ‘Wal-Mart’ effect, as I call it: products reduced to the lowest cost commodities. A $100 audio system does not sound remotely as good as a $500 system did ten years ago. To lower the price to that extent, a lot is taken out. (That said, a modern $500 amplifier probably sounds better than its $500 counterpart did ten years ago.) Boomboxes, computer audio, and ‘Wal-Mart’ systems ar
