Microsoft to launch iPod killer. - Page 6

Centurion · 09-19-2006, 07:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Osnabrueck

Well, that's one more thing Lu. $10 for a full album is also expensive when you consider iTunes' lackluster 128k bitrate for purchased music. When an album is released that I really want, I'm apt to go buy the CD and get a high quality recording, instead of a medium-quality recording.

Low bitrates are ok for material where the sound quality was never steller to begin with, but for new releases the quality leaves me cold. Hopefully Zune will also pressure iTunes to improve the quality of downloaded files.

I couple of months ago i read about a download service which even send you the songs you downloaded on a CD. Quite nice if you ask me. I don't understand why the songs on itunes aren't tripped in high bit rates and such.

Osnabrueck · 09-19-2006, 07:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Luwalira

I don't understand why the songs on itunes aren't tripped in high bit rates and such.

Either 1: Apple is really stingy with their bandwidth, or 2: It was part of the deal they struck with the record companies that iTunes bitrates would be of interior quality so that CDs would remain the ultimate medium for audiophiles and "serious" music lovers.

An alternate theory would be that the 128k figure is a marketing ploy, so that Apple can say "this iPod can hold 4,000 songs." If they increased the quality of their iTunes catalogue they'd have to adjust that to say "...can hold 3,000 songs" which would look bad in the eyes of the general public.

Really, it wouldn't take much for Apple to make their downloads sound good. 128k is at the threshold of good, just bump to, say, 198k and we're doing just fine. The fact that they have yet to improve their quality prevents me from buying more stuff on iTunes.

Centurion · 09-19-2006, 08:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Osnabrueck

Either 1: Apple is really stingy with their bandwidth, or 2: It was part of the deal they struck with the record companies that iTunes bitrates would be of interior quality so that CDs would remain the ultimate medium for audiophiles and "serious" music lovers.

An alternate theory would be that the 128k figure is a marketing ploy, so that Apple can say "this iPod can hold 4,000 songs." If they increased the quality of their iTunes catalogue they'd have to adjust that to say "...can hold 3,000 songs" which would look bad in the eyes of the general public.

Really, it wouldn't take much for Apple to make their downloads sound good. 128k is at the threshold of good, just bump to, say, 198k and we're doing just fine. The fact that they have yet to improve their quality prevents me from buying more stuff on iTunes.

Good points made.

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