Listening to the 麻豆社 Radio 2 Electric Proms in HD Sound
Tim Davie, 麻豆社 Director of Audio & Music, announced on 18th October that the 麻豆社 would make some of the 麻豆社's online radio output available in an extra high quality format that we're calling 'HD Sound'. Listeners in the UK can enjoy the 麻豆社 Radio 2 Electric Proms in HD Sound during the concerts broadcast from the 28th to 30th October.
To listen in HD Sound you will need to follow the link from the Electric Proms web page. There you'll also find a link to a survey for you to tell us what you think of the sound and how well it performs. Please do complete the survey - this is the first Radio 2 concert using HD Sound and we need to know how well it works for you.
HD Sound is a very high quality audio feed delivered over the internet. It uses a higher bit rate to deliver the sound, 320kb/s compared with the normal 128kb/s for Radio 2, giving much more detail in the audio. HD Sound also has a much wider dynamic range; that is, the change in loudness between the quiet and loud parts of a concert will be much greater than we normally broadcast. The wider dynamic range will give you an experience much more like the one you would hear if you were at the concert. The greater change in loudness may require listeners in noisy places or those who want the music on "in the background" to turn the volume up to hear the quiet parts and then turn it down again for the louder parts of the music, if you don't want to do this you may prefer the normal sound available through iPlayer, radio and TV.
The Electric Proms will only be available in HD Sound through the special web page, and only within the United Kingdom. We will move HD Sound into the iPlayer as soon as we are sure it will work reliably for everyone, in the meantime anyone having trouble with the HD Sound player can use the iPlayer to receive the usual high quality sound. We will make the Electric Proms concerts available on-demand (for 'listen again') in HD Sound too, so you can listen to the first of the concerts, featuring Elton John, on the Electric Proms web site now. The live concerts will only be available in HD Sound through the special Electric Proms web pages, not in the iPlayer.
If you would like to know more about the technology behind HD Sound, you can read my description in an earlier post here on the 麻豆社 Internet Blog and this more technical post on the 麻豆社 R&D blog.
Rupert Brun is Head of Technology for 麻豆社 Audio and Music
- The 麻豆社 Radio 2 Electric Proms started last night, with Elton John's concert. Listen again or listen live to the next two concerts in HD Sound on the Electric Proms web site.
- The picture shows Elton John during last night's concert. There are more pictures plus a gallery of memorabilia from the 麻豆社 archives and from listeners on the Electric Proms web site.
Comment number 1.
At 1st Nov 2010, badunn wrote:I think the 麻豆社 are seriously stretching the use of HD term for the audio. I wouldn't class 0.320 Mbps bitrate as High Definition. In comparison:
CD = 1.4 Mbps bitrate
SACD / DVD audio = 5.6 Mbps
Bluray = 20 Mbps
麻豆社 HD = 0.320 Mbp
I know sound quality is not just down to bitrate but it is the foundation
Now for everybody else to make their mind up
Complain about this comment (Comment number 1)
Comment number 2.
At 1st Nov 2010, Coup Attempt wrote:So something offering worse sound quality than FM and CD (let alone the real HD sound formats of SACD /DVDA or FLAC-HD) constitutes, in 麻豆社 speak, "HD"?
Right.
Complain about this comment (Comment number 2)
Comment number 3.
At 1st Nov 2010, Nick Reynolds wrote:Hi - see Rupert's comment on his previous blog post. The other names were already taken!
Thanks
Complain about this comment (Comment number 3)
Comment number 4.
At 1st Nov 2010, badunn wrote:Come on - the issue hear (sic) isn't if the term 'sound' or 'audio' has been used - it's the term HD. 320 Kbps is not High Definition Quality (unless the 麻豆社 have another word for 'quality')
Can the 麻豆社 really label 320Kbps bitrate as High Definition delivery of music or voice (hmm.. what would OFCOM say?)
Everybody is jumping on the HD bandwagon. My old digital camera takes 1.3 Megapixel photos... hang on - that's 1280脳1024 definition - well what do you know - I have a HD camera (not).
Apologies for the sarcasm but read paragraph 3 - first sentance again.
Complain about this comment (Comment number 4)
Comment number 5.
At 1st Nov 2010, Nick Reynolds wrote:My apologies. I misread the comment. However you may find Rupert's latest comment on his previous post interesting.
Complain about this comment (Comment number 5)
Comment number 6.
At 1st Nov 2010, badunn wrote:Nick - I appreciate your quick responses and I am enjoying the debate...but I have a real sense of frustration in the watering down of how the HD brand is being used.
320Kbps is not high defintion - it could only ever be labelled as something like 'improved standard definition' (even that's very dodgy it as I would have classified CD sound quality @ 1.4Mbps as SD). 320Kbps is not even recongnised as Hi Fidelity (in the HiFi world) - yet it would be more accurate to use the terms 'HiFi' or 'Higher-Fi' rather than HD.
However I am cynical enough to know that if the 麻豆社 had branded this as ''HiFi Sound'' - no-one would have given it a second look. This really is misuse of the HD tag.
I really do applaud the fact that 320Kbps streaming is occuring - and genuinely recognise the improvement that this yields, as 128Kbps as a typical is just not acceptable - but it still isn't HD. If you think this debate needs to move to the other blog then please do so
Regards
Barry
Complain about this comment (Comment number 6)
Comment number 7.
At 1st Nov 2010, HD wrote:@post 1 - lossless compressed audio on a normal film Blu-ray is normally only up to around 4 Mbps, not 20 Mbps.
Complain about this comment (Comment number 7)
Comment number 8.
At 1st Nov 2010, badunn wrote:DTS-HD Master Audio is a lossless audio codec with bitrates up to 24.5Mbps
Lossless data compression is a class of data compression algorithms that allows the exact original data to be reconstructed from the compressed data. (assuming Wiki is correct)
But this isn't the comparison - 0.320MBps cannot deliver HD sound quality in the way that the HD term has been employed - and that is my beef.
Complain about this comment (Comment number 8)
Comment number 9.
At 1st Nov 2010, HD wrote:I agree with you that that the 麻豆社 broadcasting with 320kbps audio shouldn't be called HD audio, but no film/concert Blu-ray using lossless compressed audio will get any where near 24.5 Mbps. Just because it is part of the spec doesn't mean it ever gets used - so it isn't a valid comparison to compare the bitrate the 麻豆社 uses to a lossless compressed bitrate capability on Blu-ray almost 5x higher than is actually used for lossless compressed audio on Blu-ray.
Complain about this comment (Comment number 9)
Comment number 10.
At 1st Nov 2010, HD wrote:Also, the maximum bitrate on Blu-ray needs to be high enough for all the audio tracks (eg. different languages, commentary) even though only one audio track can be played at any one time. But I doubt you will find any Blu-ray title with any lossless compressed audio track anywhere near 24.5, since most are up to around 4.7 Mbps for a losless compressed 5.1 track - with some 7.1 tracks a bit over 5 Mbps.
Complain about this comment (Comment number 10)
Comment number 11.
At 1st Nov 2010, badunn wrote:Agree with the observations on blu-ray - although my version 'The Matrix' (which I believe to be an ordinary version) from memory is between 14 and 19 Mbps. I would suggest that bitrates at Mbps of 4.5'ish and above are what could be classed as geting into HD territory. I doubt very much whether a straight answer will be forthcoming with the explanation of why the term HD is being applied.
Complain about this comment (Comment number 11)
Comment number 12.
At 2nd Nov 2010, HD wrote:Talking of bitrate (comparing how 麻豆社's 320 kbps bitrate is compared to Blu-ray), "The Matrix" Blu-ray, if you look at the specs thread at AVSforum, the main audio bitrate (Dolby TrueHD Audio, English) is 1646 kbps, there are other audio tracks eg. for different languages which are less (eg. 640 kbps or 192 kbps). The video track is the one that's 16439 kbps.
Complain about this comment (Comment number 12)
Comment number 13.
At 2nd Nov 2010, softdinamic wrote:This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the house rules. Explain.
Complain about this comment (Comment number 13)
Comment number 14.
At 2nd Nov 2010, badunn wrote:HD1080 - looks like I've still got loads to learn!
Complain about this comment (Comment number 14)
Comment number 15.
At 8th Nov 2010, 2Bdecided wrote:How sad - arguing about the name, rather than applauding the seismic shift in audio quality caused by removing the usual OTT Radio 2 processing, and (to a far far lesser extent) increasing the bitrate.
Of course some people are scared that their "golden ears" might be revealed to be "cloth ears" if they were to comment on what things actually _sound_ like. Far easier to hide behind the stubborn belief that several Mbps of lossless 5.1 must sound better than 320kbps stereo - whereas, 5.1 vs stereo aside, 320kbps AAC really is enough to let you hear everything that's put into the encoder. Moving a microphone an inch would make more audible change to the signal than moving from 320kbps AAC to lossless 24/96.
Rupert - anything you can do to make available an (optional) 320kbps unprocessed/less-processed on-demand version of content from other stations would be very much appreciated.
I think Radio 2's less "pop" output would benefit the most (compared with what's available now) - but for some of us, pretty much _any_ music and drama would sound better if we could hear it as it sounded leaving the studio, rather than after having been dynamically compressed and EQ'd for normal broadcast.
So, here's hoping!
Cheers,
David.
Complain about this comment (Comment number 15)
Comment number 16.
At 9th Nov 2010, Rupert Brun wrote:Thanks to everyone for the comments and debate. To answer David's specific point, I would very much like to extend HD Sound to other output. At present I'm working on turning it into a properly supported offering with iPlayer integration, rather than something that has to be manually stitched together every time we do it. Once that's achieved it will be easier to extend the coverage.
I've addressed the "HD Sound" name issue in some detail here.
/blogs/radio/2010/10/hd_sound_for_the_electric_proms.html
To summarise, it has to be seen in a broadcast context. HD TV is a term which is generally understood as being 鈥渂etter quality TV鈥, despite using lossy codecs for final distribution. HD Sound is the radio equivalent - yes, it uses a lossy codec, but it's better quality than the sound we've previously been able to broadcast. I chose the name because I think the majority of people will understand that it鈥檚 鈥渂etter quality sound鈥 without further explanation. The view of the Radio 3 listeners who fed back on the Proms XHQ experiment (and over a thousand did) was that it sounded great; it was their call for the experiment to be made permanent that led to the creation of HD Sound. The important thing for me is that we are going to provide significantly better sound quality for some of the live music and major events we broadcast, surely that鈥檚 good news.
Rupert Brun
Head of Technology for 麻豆社 Audio & Music.
Complain about this comment (Comment number 16)