Is it me or does Mastered for iTunes sound really good?

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by Murphy13, Oct 21, 2014.

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  1. Murphy13

    Murphy13 Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    Portland
    I just downloaded the new Neil Diamond album and I have to say I am quite impressed. I've downloaded lots of iTunes tracks for songs/albums I'm not particularly interested in a higher resolution and really have no complaints. I do have quite an extensive HI rez collection for my favorite classic albums plus over 5,000 CD's ripped in lossless.

    Although the resolution plays a key role, I think its more about the recording and production. I've heard crappy productions still sound crappy in Hi-Rez. don Was did a nice job with the new Neil Diamond album.
     
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  2. Driver 8

    Driver 8 Senior Member

    It can sound good if the source material is good, with the recent Zeppelin remasters being a case in point.
     
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  3. Murphy13

    Murphy13 Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    Portland
    Do I wish iTunes offered 16/44? Yes. However, to be honest, unless you have trained, golden Ears, I bet most could not hear the difference a/b the same material. Plus many of the golden Ears would never admit it anyway if they could not hear the difference
     
  4. cdash99

    cdash99 Senior Member

    Location:
    Mass
    AAC 320, played through a non-iTunes program (Pure Music in my case), works perfectly well for me.
     
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  5. Nostaljack

    Nostaljack Resident R&B enthusiast

    Location:
    Washington, DC
    There nothing wrong with iTunes as a jukebox/music management system. The only issue is their codec of choice and even then, most don't notice what's lost. I can hear the degraded MP3'ness in the decay/fade out and I hate it. "Mastered for iTunes" is acceptable but I'd rather have ALAC. Maybe someday...

    Ed
     
  6. couchdave

    couchdave Founding member of Mystik Spiral

    Location:
    Boston, MA, USA
    The iTunes store sells files in AAC, not MP3.
     
  7. 4stringking73

    4stringking73 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Ohio
    If you go by your ears they sound really good! The trick is getting people to do that. Vinyl is still my preferred medium though.
     
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  8. coffeetime

    coffeetime Senior Member

    Location:
    Lancs, UK
    Frequent contributor to the 'Mastered for iTunes' thread here. Been impressed with the MFiT files I've bought here. Everything from Abba to Zeppelin, Beatles to Nicola Benedetti, Queens of the Stone Age to Melody Gardot.

    Whilst not a cast iron guarantee of sound quality, I'm happy that there are standards and expectations of the master and the subsequent encoding process that as much of the sound quality of the master is preserved given 256Kb/s AAC is the specific target (as opposed to further encoding step of the redbook CD master).

    I think the advance release of the new Zeppelin remasters on iTunes relative to the CD & vinyl version surprised many of those here who chose to listen (if not subsequently buy).

    As a product aimed at the mass market, as opposed to 24/96 hires, it's much, much better than the MP3 files offered by Amazon, Google etc.
     
  9. Gaslight

    Gaslight ⎧⚍⎫⚑

    Location:
    Northeast USA
    I like the idea of what it's about, which is essentially removing the CD as the source versus a 24/96 digital file. But of course the final product depends on the quality of the source. Garbage in / garbage out.

    Sooner or later they'll offer those original source files for purchase, I think. Maybe with this Pono launch it's something Apple themselves are working on and it would be nice to see.
     
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  10. onlyconnect

    onlyconnect The prose and the passion

    Location:
    Winchester, UK
    If you look up the detail on MfIT it is sensible mastering advice (ISTM) so you can expect it to sound good.

    Tim
     
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  11. hishou

    hishou Forum Resident

    Location:
    Berlin, Germany
    I'm late to the party, but very impressed by the quality of Mastered for iTunes tracks! No more clipping on my CD-ripped tracks, everything sounds so much more musical. Very clever and sensible move by Apple.
     
  12. PanaPlasma

    PanaPlasma Forum Resident

    Location:
    Belgium, Europe
    What? How can your cd-rips be mastered for iTunes? Do you mean the soundcheck/replaygain function?
     
  13. msobetzko

    msobetzko Member

    Location:
    California, USA
    Are you getting MFiT files via iTunes Match?
     
  14. hishou

    hishou Forum Resident

    Location:
    Berlin, Germany
    Sorry, I didn't express myself correctly. I meant compared to CD ripped tracks, there's way less clipping (tried a track from MIA's Matangi et Muse's latest album), at least i didn't hear any.
     
  15. motownboy

    motownboy Senior Member

    Location:
    Washington State
    I have done something I have never done before and purchased a Mastered for iTunes version of an album that I have on CD and vinyl because it sounds really good. I bought Diana Ross' "Diana" from 1980....the one produced by Nile Rodgers & Bernard Edwards of Chic. As far as I know, it is not available on hi-res yet. The MFIT version sounds really good compared to the redbook CD and original vinyl.. I have the Nautilus half-speed mastered LP, but haven't compared the two. To me it's like a layer of distortion and bad eq have been removed with better defined transients... By no means is this an audiophile recording to begin with, but the MFIT process seems to have produced surprisingly good results. This is my "go-to" version until the album becomes available in hi-res...

    Has anyone bought an MFIT download of an album that they have on CD and/or vinyl because it sounds really good and have it be there "go to" version??

    [​IMG]
     
  16. alexpop

    alexpop Power pop + other bad habits....

    Accessibility factor is always appealing for the odd song. But give me a long player and 12" of sonic satisfaction and a beautiful open out album cover anyday.
     
  17. AppleCorp3

    AppleCorp3 Forum Resident

    Every time I start to think my MP3 or AAC starts to sound good, I put on a CD or record and am reminded just how much I'm missing.
     
  18. Endymion

    Endymion Forum Resident

    Location:
    Germany
    Then you have to get a good DAC.
     
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  19. Chooke

    Chooke Forum Resident

    Location:
    Perth, Australia
    There is an existing thread on this, including updates as new releases come out. Many of the remasters released as hi res on HDTracks and the like are also released as MFiT the next day or so. They are the same remasters but obviously in lossy AAC rather than hi res. However, I doubt anyone can hear a difference unless they are listening really close and only on certain passages. Try it, and compare them on Foobar's DBX software, it may surprise...
     
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  20. Dave S

    Dave S Forum Resident

    It be worthwhile specifying the CD. There are different masterings out there.
     
  21. Bobby Morrow

    Bobby Morrow Senior Member

    Didn't realise 'diana' had been Mastered By iTunes.. I've got so many copies of this album.:D Did they manage to get rid of the distortion on 'Have Fun'?

    I've just bought Abba's 'The Album' and 'Arrival' albums. Both sound great. Must better than any of the remastered CDs I have. They were cheap too.
     
  22. Yost

    Yost “It’s only impossible until it’s not”

    As a big fan of Diana I just compared the iTunes masters with the AAC rips of 2 early CD's of the album. Although the early CD's sound not as warm as the iTunes masters, I still prefer them. The bass of the iTunes masters is too pumped up for my ears.

    But the iTunes masters sound much better than the remastered CD's!
     
  23. coffeetime

    coffeetime Senior Member

    Location:
    Lancs, UK
    The rest of the MFiT Abba studio catalogue are all worth your time. Night and day improvement over the 2005 Complete Studio Recordings box and I've been entirely satisfied with them since buying the lot when the MFiT albums were first made available.
     
  24. Bobby Morrow

    Bobby Morrow Senior Member

    Yes, I was going for 'Abba', 'Super Trouper' and 'The Visitors' next. I'm in the unfortunate position of owning only the blue box and early 2000s remasters of most of Abba's albums. So anything is an improvement.:D
     
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  25. driverdrummer

    driverdrummer Forum Resident

    Location:
    Irmo, SC
    I plan on getting MFiT Abba-Voulez Vous and Gentle Giant-Octopus over the weekend.
     
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