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True HD Digital Music?

post #1 of 16
2/12/07 at 7:34pm
Thread Starter 
Is there a place that ACTUALLY produces and sells true HD digital music?

I checked out MusicGiants which seems to be largest "High Definition Music Download" service, but according to them their HD Digital Downloads are equivalent to a CD (which I didn't think was hi-def). It's basically an uncompressed digital copy of the CD tracks from what I can tell.
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post #2 of 16
2/12/07 at 8:42pm
not sure but would like to know but the hd-dvd of
u2 is it in dolby true hd.
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post #3 of 16
2/13/07 at 12:28am
What exactly do you mean by "HD"? The most common term for "better-than-CD" is "advanced resolution" - a logo you'll see on DVD-Audio discs.

I doubt you'll see anything better than CD on most download services - where would they get the data from? Not that many people are releasing on DVD-Audio and SACD. Plus there's compatibility problems - how many media players correctly handle multi-channel file formats? Not many.

If you want high-res music, the easiest thing to do is buy some proper DVD-Audio or Super Audio CDs.

http://www.sa-cd.net/ has a database of all(?) SACD releases, and http://www.quadraphonicquad.com/ has a list of selected DVD-Audio releases. Both have reviews too.
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post #4 of 16
2/13/07 at 7:05am
The new Nine Inch Nails HD DVD, Beside You in Time, has a TrueHD soundtrack. It releases on Feb 27 and is available for pre-order on Amazon for $17.45. Can't beat that!
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post #5 of 16
2/13/07 at 8:33am
Never forget that a TrueHD soundtrack isn't necessarily "better than CD". It could just be CD resolution, but multichannel. Not that that's particularly bad, of course - at least it's better than Dolby Digital.
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post #6 of 16
2/13/07 at 9:06pm
The MusicGiants site explains that by "high definition music downloads", they mean exactly CD quality, with lossless compression (packing) in the WMA format. (I checked a reference - actually there are several variants of WMA, including the lossless codec used by this site.)

"What is a High Definition Music Download?
High definition music downloads are the highest quality download available for your home theater. The sound quality of this download is equal to a CD. It is an uncompressed digital file, unlike the MP3 which is compressed 7 times. The High Definition download is encoded in the Lossless WMA (Windows Media Audio) format."
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post #7 of 16
2/14/07 at 12:12am
What sort of world have we come to where a site feels justified in using the term "high-definition" for CD-quality? That would be, what, the level achieved over 25 years ago?

Sigh...
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post #8 of 16
2/14/07 at 4:43am
Thread Starter 
That's why I'm not excited about MusicGiants and was looking for a place that could deliver better than CD quality (which I would consider HD).

What's weird is that the CEA's definition for HD Audio is better than Red Book or greater that 44.1/16 bit" but they advertised for MusicGiants at CES.

If CD quality is "HD", I'd purchase physical media and rip losslessy (is that even a word?) myself... I was really looking to see if there are any online delivery vendors selling better than CD quality audio. Still looking...
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post #9 of 16
2/14/07 at 6:56am
Thread Starter 
Looks like there will be a new site opening soon delivering true HD Audio called http://www.itrax.com/ . All the music being sold will come from artists on that label (AIX Records ) running that music store.

Quote:
"Compact Discs have been around for over 20 years and can sound pretty good, but they can never break out of the fidelity limitations defined by the CD format itself... audio digitized at 44.1kHz and 16-bits. With the arrival of new high-resolution formats at 96 kHz.24-bits AND 5.1 surround sound... a recorded music experience can eclipse these former boundaries and become TRUE High-Resolution listening. All of the tracks available on this site are NEW high-resolution recordings... take a test listen and experience the difference. Audio fidelity better than reality (TM)"

That's the only true HD Audio online delivery store I've run across so far... and they aren't open yet.
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post #10 of 16
2/14/07 at 7:36am
Quote:
Originally Posted by KMO View Post

Never forget that a TrueHD soundtrack isn't necessarily "better than CD". It could just be CD resolution, but multichannel. Not that that's particularly bad, of course - at least it's better than Dolby Digital.

Wrong! Try reading up about TrueHD before you bash it at every opportunity.

http://www.dolby.com/consumer/technology/trueHD.html

To the OP, you might want to reconsider using the term "true" when referring to HD audio, since you're obviously not referring to the trademarked term TrueHD.
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post #11 of 16
2/14/07 at 8:10am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Odys View Post

Wrong! Try reading up about TrueHD before you bash it at every opportunity.

http://www.dolby.com/consumer/technology/trueHD.html

To the OP, you might want to reconsider using the term "true" when referring to HD audio, since you're obviously not referring to the trademarked term TrueHD.

He wasn't bashing. While TrueHD can support 8 channels of 96/24, it doesn't have to do so. If the master soundtrack for a film is only at 44.1/16, for example (and that can easily be the case) then his statement is true. TrueHD can potentially be hi-res, but it is not necessarily so.
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post #12 of 16
2/14/07 at 8:43am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Odys View Post

To the OP, you might want to reconsider using the term "true" when referring to HD audio, since you're obviously not referring to the trademarked term TrueHD.

Serves them right for inventing such a crummy trademark name, to be honest. They should have left it as MLP.

I feel the same way about "DVD-Audio". Hard thing to search for when there are so many people also talking about "DVD audio"...
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post #13 of 16
2/14/07 at 8:44am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Odys View Post

Wrong! Try reading up about TrueHD before you bash it at every opportunity.

http://www.dolby.com/consumer/technology/trueHD.html

Did you even read the link you posted? Dolby TrueHD is lossless compression, with no guarantee of audio resolution nor number of channels. There's no reason it can't be one channel at 44.1 resolution. All TrueHD does is pack audio data more efficiently (like zipping a file).

Sanjay
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post #14 of 16
2/27/07 at 3:06pm
Just bought the new Nine Inch Nails Blu Ray, Beside You in Time.
It looks stellar, (1080p)
it also has on the blu ray copy a DolbyTruHD track which is being decoded by my PS3 and is being sent out optical to my reciever (96kHz/24bit).

its pretty sweet.
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post #15 of 16
2/27/07 at 9:58pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by KMO View Post

What sort of world have we come to where a site feels justified in using the term "high-definition" for CD-quality? That would be, what, the level achieved over 25 years ago?

Sigh...

Just like "HD radio".
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post #16 of 16
3/3/07 at 7:22am
Quote:
Originally Posted by sdurani View Post


Quote:
Originally Posted by Odys View Post

Wrong! Try reading up about TrueHD before you bash it at every opportunity.

http://www.dolby.com/consumer/technology/trueHD.html

Did you even read the link you posted? Dolby TrueHD is lossless compression, with no guarantee of audio resolution nor number of channels. There's no reason it can't be one channel at 44.1 resolution. All TrueHD does is pack audio data more efficiently (like zipping a file).


Another big marketing hype/scam so then Bestbuy salesmen can ambush unsuspecting public... On top of this, lossless compression has been around for a while (FLAC, MONKEY, WAVEPACK) so why the h*ll did they brand their own incarnation as TrueHD?
It's all BestBuy conspiracy

By the way, I use lossless (WMA-L) in my audio server setup for quite a while.
All this time I did not know I had TrueHD at home
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