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As Monty Montgomery pointed out in his essential white paper, 192khz can cause audible distortion, most likely the differences being heard by a very few testers. Not a goid thing, quite the opposite, in fact. The flaws in this latest analysis is being robustly pointed out over on hydrogenaudio, where highly knowledgeable audio engineers hang out.

https://xiph.org/~xiphmont/demo/neil-young.html
https://hydrogenaud.io/index.php/topic,112204/topicseen.html

Exactly. The key to the analysis is the use of "differences in perceived fidelity" not "improvement in perceived fidelity". Although I didn't read the whole thing (didn't need to), I noticed right away that they only considered the ability to perceive differences, not the ability to pick out the supposed superior hires files. As chicks said, this is fully explainable by Monty's intermodulation distortion introduced in the audible spectrum of the playback gear due to stresses from trying to reproduce the ultra-sonics.

Reading further on the hydrogenaudio site, it seems there is more than a bit of cherry picking and biases going into the meta-analysis. Also some pointed out the author of the paper and AES in general have a passing interest in (you guessed it!) Meridien Audio, and this analysis was published not long after an "award-winning" paper and subsequent follow-up release of new technology by Meridian.

I am shocked! Shocked, I say!! 😃 Anyway, good read. Especially this part:

Audio purists and industry should welcome these findings -- our study finds high resolution audio has a small but important advantage in its quality of reproduction over standard audio content.

The analysis showed something small, but it is by no means shown to be "important" or an "advantage". Could he be any more transparent?

Archimago is usually good reading for a down-to-earth take on such matters. See http://archimago.blogspot.co.uk/2016/07/musings-digital-interpolation-filters.html and scroll down to the post-scripts at the bottom.

But... but... HiRez downloads cost way more. They MUST be better, right!? Lol.

Archimago is usually good reading for a down-to-earth take on such matters. See http://archimago.blogspot.co.uk/2016/07/musings-digital-interpolation-filters.html and scroll down to the post-scripts at the bottom.

I like his comments regarding the markup of hi-res recordings, for example:

. The question for me in considering the purchase is not whether they may sound different, but rather does this difference justify a 250% markup!? In this context, does a 52.3% accuracy rate in a research setting sound like a valuable proposition to grab the high-resolution version?

And if you want a err "different" take on the study http://www.audiostream.com/content/its-official-people-can-hear-high-res#RIB7KfugAj3bo3cz.97

Anyone else find it ironic that Audiostream, along with the rest of the "high end" press, who routinely condemn ABX testing, are hailing this meta study of ABX testing as the official, debate-ending, truth? Lol

Anyone else find it ironic that Audiostream, along with the rest of the "high end" press, who routinely condemn ABX testing, are hailing this meta study of ABX testing as the official, debate-ending, truth? Lol

I noticed that too. Hypocrisy at its finest. 😃

A meta study is jargon for third hand information, correct?

Why resort to that when the proof of the pudding will always be just one's own ears, in one's home? If one can be honest with oneself, it isn't that difficult to check if any claimed improvement can be heard over the ambient noise level in even a supposedly silent room, with ears that have lost varying levels of hearing capability with age and abuse. And with a brain that is more adept at filling in any gaps in sound quality, compared to any other audiophile tweak? Especially so when it is commanded to listen to the music and not to what is missing in it.

For those who don't believe in this approach, there is enough on the net to sustain the pursuit of ever growing frequency and sample size numbers, and I don't see that changing. I don't think these people are in the Sonos market of interest though and even less so now with the stated markets being those interested in streaming services and voice control. I would not be surprised if the "purists" were even aghast at these developments and would prefer to instead see better casework, heavier kit, and bouncing needles in backlit dials to make up for the absence of glowing tubes. Nothing wrong in itself with that, they just aren't the market for Sonos.

Isn't also the fact that these higher numbers need new jargon ridden equipment at home with the capability to convert these to signals a speaker understands, speaker that are of much the same basic technology for decades now, suggestive of something? All this would be understandable if the end objective was to sit gazing at signal traces on oscilloscopes with better resolution that show a more perfect outcome.

On the subject - I notice that there are a handful of streaming service offering lossless CD rips, for a higher monthly fee. Which in itself seems like a rip off, given what to me sounds like perfectly adequate sound quality from Apple Music, but my question isn't about these, but about streaming of Hi res music. Is this available anywhere today?