CD Import NEWB

[thats_so_thall]

Hey, y'all!
Super sorry if this isn't allowed or tolerated, but I definitely need help with some logistics with this song quality anxiety I'm dealing with!
I've been getting super into burning CD's to AIFF, because I love the idea of having lossless music files in my library! I got bored one day, and decided to download a spectrum program to really test if the songs that I'm burning onto my harddrive we're actually "CD quality." I read somewhere that it solely depends on how the person mixes/masters said album; so from my knowledge, SOME albums that are distributed via CD could very well be NOT "CD quality."
So below, I've attached THREE images of a single song by a band called "ERRA" from their album Impulse; the song is called Render the Void. The "2.m4a" picture is from the CD source (yes I know it is in ALAC format, but my question still stands.) The LLS.M4a attachment is from Qobuz and the "tragic hero" attachment is from bandcamp. As you can see, these all have similar outcomes, and from my knowledge and a little bit of research; if a song is reading/cutting off at 16kHz that means the quality is at a bitrate of 128kbps. I'm not entirely sure what the light blue marks above the cut off mean, so any clarification on that would be wonderful as well!
So my question is; am I wasting my time and hard drive space when importing this CD at an AIFF format? Should I just import it as 128kbps since all tests point to that quality? Is it essentially upsampling when I DO import this particular CD to AIFF; since I've read that is useless to do?
Sorry for the lengthy post, I am just super curious! Thank you much for taking the time to read my post; any feedback or advice is much appreciated!

[Spoon]

Re: CD Import NEWB

128kbps is a bit rate, although it could be that mp3s will have a 16khz cut off to maximize audio at a lower bit rate.

That CD looks like it was once an mp3 file perhaps, but that is just 1 CD, the rest will not be like that. Rip CDs to AIFF or Apple Lossless and not over think it.

[garym]

Re: CD Import NEWB

Rip to lossless. That's the best you can do with any CD no matter what. Unless you have the ability to track down the band, force them to find the master tapes and remaster the album in the manner you desire and then re-release this on CD or create high-res downloads. In other words, of the 1,000 things in life you have to worry about, this issue is number 1,001.

And by the way, if you want to worry, also worry about all the hi-res, 24/192 files being sold to consumers that are really just upsampled 16/44.1 CD quality, or even worse mp3 files that are upsampled to 24/192. And this upsampling doesn't improve quality, it simply makes the exact same audio reside in a larger file.

[thats_so_thall]

Re: CD Import NEWB

128kbps is a bit rate, although it could be that mp3s will have a 16khz cut off to maximize audio at a lower bit rate.

That CD looks like it was once an mp3 file perhaps, but that is just 1 CD, the rest will not be like that. Rip CDs to AIFF or Apple Lossless and not over think it.

I just notice that these masters are at the same cut off throughout the distributions; bandcamp, Qobuz, and the actual CD from the label. i guess my question would be, is there any point to rip them at lossless if the tests point to that cutoff? I feel like it would essentially be upsampling the quality that isn't even there :O

[thats_so_thall]

Re: CD Import NEWB

Rip to lossless. That's the best you can do with any CD no matter what. Unless you have the ability to track down the band, force them to find the master tapes and remaster the album in the manner you desire and then re-release this on CD or create high-res downloads. In other words, of the 1,000 things in life you have to worry about, this issue is number 1,001.

And by the way, if you want to worry, also worry about all the hi-res, 24/192 files being sold to consumers that are really just upsampled 16/44.1 CD quality, or even worse mp3 files that are upsampled to 24/192. And this upsampling doesn't improve quality, it simply makes the exact same audio reside in a larger file.

Hmmmmm, I see what you're saying! I know it's a worry that I shouldn't have, but I also would like to rip the CD where the cutoff of the tests show. The bandcamp and qobuz downloads (At lossless quality) show the same exact cutoff as the CD from the label does. So that's why I am curious to know if what I am doing is essentially upsampling by ripping the CD's to "lossless", and not at the appropriate quality of the tracks. Like to me, seeing this test made me think that I'm wasting hard drive space by ripping these into lossless when not needed. Maybe I just am not understanding LOL

[garym]

Re: CD Import NEWB

Hmmmmm, I see what you're saying! I know it's a worry that I shouldn't have, but I also would like to rip the CD where the cutoff of the tests show. The bandcamp and qobuz downloads (At lossless quality) show the same exact cutoff as the CD from the label does. So that's why I am curious to know if what I am doing is essentially upsampling by ripping the CD's to "lossless", and not at the appropriate quality of the tracks. Like to me, seeing this test made me think that I'm wasting hard drive space by ripping these into lossless when not needed. Maybe I just am not understanding LOL

Yes, with respect, you are not understanding. There is way, way more to lossless vs lossy than cutoffs. That's one of many modifications lossy codecs make to audio. Lossy codecs use psychoacoustic modeling to determine what to "keep" vs "throwout" (and it's way more than just not encoding information above or below certain cutoffs). If you rip these as lossy, you'll be throwing out lots more information than just the cutoff. And keep in mind, that if someone has, say, an AAC file that their player can't handle, instead of converting it to mp3, they would use FLAC or some other lossless codec to preserve the audio. Because taking a lossy file (AAC) and converting it to another lossy format (mp3) throws out EVEN MORE audio information. And Harrdrive space is dirt cheap. Whether you can detect the lost information in multiple lossy to lossy conversions is uncertain (you might, and you might not...you'd have to do an ABX blind listening test). But why even risk this. Rip to lossless (FLAC) and be sure you've captured ALL the audio content, whatever it is.