MP3: The Definitive Guide

Equalization and Sound Quality

While true audiophiles may never accept lossy compression formats as a home standard just for the convenience factor, most of us do place a very high priority on the many conveniences offered by the MP3 format. So we’re left with a question: How do we make sure we’re getting the most from our MP3 collections?

Can Quality Be Measured?

Before even thinking about evaluating standards of quality, it’s critical to understand that “this way lies madness.” Audiophiles have wrestled for decades to achieve “objective” measurements that would fairly represent the quality of a recording. And while there are many objective measurements that can be made for any given signal, it’s important to understand that the mathematics of audio measurement and the subjective experience of quality are two different animals. Furthermore, the mechanics of lossy compression (discussed in Chapter 2) more or less nullify the validity of just about any objective criteria. In other words, the only tests that matter for MP3 audio are subjective tests, i.e., real-world listening tests. Your ears don’t lie. Even so, it’s possible that the file you encode to your own standards today could end up being played on much better equipment tomorrow, so it pays to shoot for quality a little above your own thresholds.

The most important thing to keep in mind when testing for MP3 quality is that your computer probably isn’t the best place to do it. How’s that? Unless you’ve invested a fair sum in ...