[sparkymarky]

So having no idrive, no 6fl usb, just professional headunit, i have been using cd's in the main for quality, assuming the aux to be rubbish as i listened to a couple of tracks ages ago and it sounded pants.

However. A while back i installed a parrot mki9000 for bluetooth telephone calls (which works great). It also has inputs for usb, line in and dedicated ipod cable (and BT audio which works fine but lacks some midrange bass and soundfield width compared to CD)

NOTE: all these inputs go into the parrot little box of tricks which is then connected the car's aux port in the armrest, so still using the standard bmw aux in.

So i chucked a sony usb stick in the parrot usb today, unsure what was on it and what bitrate.

Michael jackson stuff. Which actually is great for testing quality due to great mids, lows and highs in his tracks. I also in my cd wallet had the same songs burned in mp3 @ 320kbps (which sound great through the hifi coded headunit, jl audio amp etc).

Started playing and remembered how convenient it is to use the parrots remote (i've got it where an idrive controller would be) to control track volume, skip etc.

So it started playing and i thought, wow, do you know what this sounds pretty damn good...way better than what the aux without the parrot used to sound like i'm sure. So on the road trip to work i start playing the cd (320kbps remember) and flicking the head unit to aux to play the exact same song from the usb stick via the aux. Hand on heart, i really struggled to tell the difference. I spent about 3/4 hours pausing, rewinding listening for the lows, mids and highs. They sounded 99% the same. I may detect a *slightly* wider soundfield with the cd (and i mean slightly, like the clicking of fingers on 'beat it') but in all honesty i cant be certain there was any difference.

Ps i have my hearing tested every 12 months professionally for work and it always comes back as excellent!

So, i get home a minute ago, with usb stick in hand thinking i wonder what bitrate the usb stick tracks were ripped at.

128kbps. This has been a real eye opener for me. Now i am into home cinema etc and a bit of an ear for when something sounds flat, thin and lower bitrate. What i would say though is that some other tracks @ 128kbps on the stick DID sound narrow, flat and thin. But I cannot deny that the m.j tracks and some other tracks i have since found out are 256kbps are not poor quality.

I have a mobridge on the way which i have literally bought this week but now i honestly don't think i need the direct usb connection for a better audio quality whilst i'm going through the parrrot into aux- Although i will get tracks displayed on the head unit with the mobridge- i dont get that through aux obviously. I may go to the hassle of installing the mobridge just to get track info on the headunit as it does make for a better experience, undoubtedly.


Tried googling to see what DAC the parrot uses but to no avail.

Ps the parrots own 20w amp is NOT connected (well it is but only to one speaker in the logic 7 centre speaker position for telephone calls only).


I await everyone telling me I should clearly hear the difference between 128kbps and a 320kbps cd...as i would say exactly the same thing But, at least as far as the M.J tracks were concerned (again not for all tracks on the stick) 128kbps was rocking.

[tc535i]

try this...

http://www.npr.org/sections/therecor...-audio-quality

[sparkymarky]

...and i guess i will be able to use the steering wheel controls for music and phone calls with the mobridge...so actually it will be of benefit to still go ahead and install it.....maybe......

[sparkymarky]

Originally Posted by tc535i

try this...

http://www.npr.org/sections/therecor...-audio-quality

Interesting.
First two i got wrong. Could not tell the difference whatsoever.
3rd and 4th i got right. i could tell a distinct difference in quality. the uncompressed wav sounded a lot 'nearer' more enveloping, the 128kbps speech sounded a lot more clipped off.
5th i got right. Could only just tell a difference though.
6th i also got right. But again this may have been more luck than judgement.

evaluation: 4 out of 6 right. But i really had to listen over and over for the latter two.


Thanks for that. Very interesting. Ps i was listening via a pair of decent sennheiser earbuds but plugged into a standard v.cheap laptop. Whether the source makes a difference or not in this test, i am unsure.

Just to add i can clearly hear some tracks which sound awful on 128kbos - but maybe thats because they are 70s/80/s stuff which altough ripped at 128kbps by me, the original encoding on the net was not great to begin with.

[sparkymarky]

Originally Posted by tc535i

try this...

http://www.npr.org/sections/therecor...-audio-quality

Out of interest, what is your view on the difference in bitrates. Much real world difference in it to you or not.

Also, how did you fair on the tests out of interest?

[ctuna]

FYI see entry 80 in the following thread then read the rest.
http://www.e90post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1002984

It takes about 256 bit per sec mp3 or greater to reach cd quality.
There are a lot of other places for it to go downhill to.
IF your system can do no better than a AM radio then that is the limiting
factor.

[sparkymarky]

Originally Posted by ctuna

FYI see entry 80 in the following thread then read the rest.
http://www.e90post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1002984

It takes about 256 bit per sec mp3 or greater to reach cd quality.
There are a lot of other places for it to go downhill to.
IF your system can do no better than a AM radio then that is the limiting
factor.

Just read post 80, actually i have read the whole thread the other night.
Not sure what you're trying to say though re: the am radio bit. Other than whatever is the weakest part of your system will affect everything else and yep I get that. Would you do the mobridge to get some direct usb access? Or would you stick with the aux via the parrot.

I am assuming the parrot actually does some sort of DAC otherwise how does the signal get down the aux cable to the headunit from the usb stick....

[tc535i]

I don't really have any quality audio anymore, I was just guessing at answers when I listed to it on my shit desktop speakers and built-in audio card

[sparkymarky]

I should probably add i've just remembered that I have the eq settings on teh headunit different for cd and aux input. Must be different eq curves in the car.

i.e CD is -1 on treble (or it gets too harsh for me with hifi tweeters)
& +1 on bass (oem hifi underseats amped with jl audio)

Aux is +2 on head unit treble
0 on bass with 'superbass' enabled on the parrot. As much as i am no fan of superbass type things and indeed with head unit at +1 the whole thing sounds muddy and truly awful, i can tell no difference between the cd and aux usb stick mid bass with these setings.

This weekend i reinstall my boot sub so will be interesting to make further sub bass comparisons between sources.

[ctuna]

Other auxes are better than the BMW one but
getting things in digitaly via USB or some other
uncompressed digital form is best.
Don't know about the other auxes but the BMW one is
extra bad.

[AW335TT]

Not hearing the difference between 128 and 320 doesn't mean there is no difference. It usually means, your system isn't able to play the differences.

[AW335TT]

Originally Posted by tc535i

try this...

http://www.npr.org/sections/therecor...-audio-quality

This tests your system more than your ears. Any hifi system will clearly reveal the difference, if you are having a hard time distinguishing between different qualities, it is a direct reflection of your play back system.

The difference from 320 to flac/wav in my car is huge, anyone with decent hearing can tell the difference.

[sparkymarky]

Originally Posted by AW335TT

This tests your system more than your ears. Any hifi system will clearly reveal the difference, if you are having a hard time distinguishing between different qualities, it is a direct reflection of your play back system.

The difference from 320 to flac/wav in my car is huge, anyone with decent hearing can tell the difference.

Point taken. Although I am jl audio amped (which made a massive difference in audio quality) I am still on OEM HiFi doors and tweeters. I have upgrades ready to go in though.

I might retry the internet hearing comparison again tonight but using laptop HDMI digital audio out into my pioneer home cinema amp which does audio at 192khz/24 bit d/a. I think the amp should see a raw digital signal and use its own DAC rather than the laptops.

[w2830]

I've been wanting to add 6FL to my 08 Non-Idrive L7 Professional HU with BT for ages...never had to nerve to pull the trigger. I just did some research on mObridge after reading your post. Please keep us updated on how is goes once you have it installed. I was pretty set on 6FL since that's all I needed, now I'm trying to find out what the better option there is....Maybe someone can make direct me in the right direction? Thanks for reading!

[sparkymarky]

Originally Posted by w2830

I've been wanting to add 6FL to my 08 Non-Idrive L7 Professional HU with BT for ages...never had to nerve to pull the trigger. I just did some research on mObridge after reading your post. Please keep us updated on how is goes once you have it installed. I was pretty set on 6FL since that's all I needed, now I'm trying to find out what the better option there is....Maybe someone can make direct me in the right direction? Thanks for reading!

Sorry to say wont be doing this for a while - the M0bridge box turned up (for which i paid a bargain £29 for) but it was coded to porsche and it was going to cost £150 plus vat just to recode to BMW (plus i had to source cables etc so it became unviable rather than buying one new).

On the other hand....I have this morning bought an f20 sat nav screen (6.5 inch) and will be attempting to fit it with a nexus 7 or similar, space dependant, and install the unit into the dash centre speaker grill housing to keep the dash as oem as possible.....)

[w2830]

Originally Posted by sparkymarky

Sorry to say wont be doing this for a while - the M0bridge box turned up (for which i paid a bargain £29 for) but it was coded to porsche and it was going to cost £150 plus vat just to recode to BMW (plus i had to source cables etc so it became unviable rather than buying one new).

On the other hand....I have this morning bought an f20 sat nav screen (6.5 inch) and will be attempting to fit it with a nexus 7 or similar, space dependant, and install the unit into the dash centre speaker grill housing to keep the dash as oem as possible.....)

No problem. Sorry to hear about your bad luck with the M0bridge. Sounds like tons of work on your next project. I'm all about keeping oem look as well. Keep us posted please. I'd love to see how it turns out and wish you all the luck!