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> I've heard 192kb files and they sound like complete garbage.

I'm curious, did you blind test yourself? I blind tested a friend of mine who kept saying so, and he did barely better than random.

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It really does depend on the file. However, if we're talking about most 192KB music files, they tend to sound "tinny" or shallow. There's not a lot of depth to the sound as compared to quality you would get from a CD.

It's very easy to tell the difference between 192kbps and FLAC if you have a decent subwoofer and the song ever goes below 30hz. On run-of-the-mill speakers and earbuds, probably not.

It's extremely rare for music to contain anything below 30Hz. Even below 40Hz is rare. The only place you're likely to find such low frequencies is sound effects in movie soundtracks.

I'm sorry, I pulled that number out of my ass.

I should have said 'if the frequency goes sufficiently low'.

Unless you are into Bassnectar and the like... ;)

Interestingly, a lot of "bass heavy" music focuses on frequencies around 50Hz, not the really deep sub-bass. This makes sense when you consider human hearing. Those higher frequencies sound much louder to us, and they're still low enough to get the tactile feeling.

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