Many people seem to be unaware of high definition audio – and the qualities that hifi earbuds possess. While for casual listeners, the distinction may not be immediately evident, for audiophiles, it is like night and day. As a result, here is a breakdown of just what high-resolution audio is.
Basically, there are two main factors that determine the quality of digitally recorded sound. This is the bit depth and the sampling frequency. Bit depth is the details found in each sample of the audio. It essentially measures the amount of information that each frequency carries along with it. The sample rate is the rate of frequencies being transmitted every second.
To explain it simply, the bit depth measures the amount of information being delivered to the listener. On the other hand, the frequency determines the speed at which this information arrives. To newcomers, these terms may seem complicated, but audiophiles are undoubtedly quite familiar with them. MP3s are the format of media files that people use to listen to songs and similar audio nowadays. They are compressed to anything from 64 kbps to 320 kbps. At often times, music files can go to nearly 8000-9000 kbps in size, and thus such a reduced amount cannot come without a loss in detail.
This difference that is present as a measure of reducing file size also results in the loss of high-resolution audio. Thus, the difference between compressed MP3 files and high-resolution audio more or less stems from the difference in bitrate and quality. But, that isn’t all of it.
This is because a few techniques are present that allow MP3 files to sound higher quality than they really are. This is done by removing particular characteristics that do not affect the listening experience that much. The goal is to remove only the details of the track that were overshadowed by another instrument, or generally are not noticeable. Thus, the audio becomes ‘lossy’. Despite the reduced size and removed details, the sound is still somewhat high-quality, and the listening experience feels the same.
But with the growing demand for hi-fi audio experiences, earbuds that are capable of listening to it are rising in popularity. And as higher storage devices are becoming easily accessible, people are finally getting the high-resolution audio they’ve always wanted. Without any compromised details, these tracks are able to offer an experience of their own. This is because they have all their details attached and do not lose out on even the tiniest intricacy.