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MP3's over 128k?


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Old 14-11-2008, 21:14
grocerjack
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Where can you get these legally. iTunes seems to provide only at 128k and on the 'volume limited' Classic this is rubbish, barely loud enough to hear any song let alone the intricacies of the music.

So, are there any download sites which legally sell MP3's or other iPOD suited formats at a decent sampling rate greater than 128, preferably 320?
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Old 14-11-2008, 21:27
Matt-08
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Play.com have 320kbps downloads, over 3 million in fact!

http://www.play.com/Music/MP3-Downlo...gitalHome.html

Don't forget that iTunes songs are AAC, and iTunes Plus songs are at the bit rate of 256kbps.
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Old 14-11-2008, 22:07
frailfury
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7digital.com has the largest selection of high quality music available. Most tracks are 89p.
Play.com are good aswell.
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Old 15-11-2008, 00:25
grocerjack
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Cheers peeps. great advice - I may have been wrong about iTunes, but the last few have been 128k and on a decent system you might get way with it, say at a party, but on an iPod Classic the volume limitation is so piss poor that you can barely hear the music. Apple need to sort out the volume issue or they'll never get me as a customer again. Surely they could give people a choice on mandatory volume limitation?
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Old 15-11-2008, 00:36
grocerjack
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Oh and I've just downloaded Stargazer by Rainbow at 320 and put it on the iPod.

Awesome.
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Old 15-11-2008, 05:08
Slipstreem
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There is no logical reason for a 128Kbps MP3 to be any quieter than a 320Kbps MP3. Bitrate and volume are totally unrelated in any digital audio format.

Cheers, Slipstreem.
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Old 16-11-2008, 08:32
kyussmondo
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All EU iPods have volume restrictions due to EU regulations. There are various applications you can use to remove it. I think the best and most simple to use is GoPod http://gopod.free-go.net/ . Connect your iPod, open GoPod, click to uncap and you will now have an iPod as loud as an iPod in the US. I got my first iPhone from the US and when I got my iPhone 3G from the UK the decrease in volume was definitely noticeable. You can also use GoPod to put the cap back if you ever need to send it back for repair because I think it may void your warranty if you send it back uncapped.

Regarding iTunes...128kbps is a bit poor, however an AAC file is better to a comparable MP3 file and also the song from the store is likely to be encoded from the original masters whereas an MP3 from the computer is already encoded from a compressed CD. As others have mentions, iTunes Plus songs indicated by the ones with the Plus symbol next to them are in 256kbps and are non-DRM as well.
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Old 16-11-2008, 10:00
kyussmondo
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EDIT: GoPod doesn't work with the Classic...looks like it only works with the older iPods...
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Old 16-11-2008, 12:54
Matt-08
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Just got Insomnia by Craig David on Play Digital and it was 256kbps.
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Old 16-11-2008, 17:53
ShaunIOW
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Buy the CD and rip yourself at the quality you want and have a copy hard backup - plus a lot of back catalogue titles are cheaper on CD than downloading.
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Old 16-11-2008, 20:50
stevieboy378
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Oh and I've just downloaded Stargazer by Rainbow at 320 and put it on the iPod.

Awesome.
Agreed - the track is a total mindf*ck . . .

"HIGH NOON, OOH I'D SELL MY SOUL FOR WATER . . . . "
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Old 18-11-2008, 17:57
JohnD2000
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Regarding iTunes...128kbps is a bit poor, however an AAC file is better to a comparable MP3 file and also the song from the store is likely to be encoded from the original masters whereas an MP3 from the computer is already encoded from a compressed CD. As others have mentions, iTunes Plus songs indicated by the ones with the Plus symbol next to them are in 256kbps and are non-DRM as well.
CD's are not compressed.
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Old 18-11-2008, 18:12
steve..b
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much better quality by ripping your own cd's ...............................

I wish I had never downloaded all the albums that I did, most of them are ok on my ipod with a set of earbuds, but when I use the ipod line out dock into a headphone amp and a pair of senn hd 600s ripped cd's sound much better, and not only that since I have gone back to buying cd's again, I find a lot of them are cheaper to buy from amazon etc than it is to download them.
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