Been told alot of different things by alot of different people about bit rates in live sets. Half the people i spin with use strictly 320's for every song in any set. But I also know alot of headliners who will spin 256's and up.

Just curious if there's a big difference from 256kbps and 320's for an average club soundsystem?

there is a big difference, but let me be the first to say that mp3=over compressed garbage.


wav life.

I used to play 320's myself. But that switched about mid way through this year and went over to wavs only. So I don't have the exact reasons why one is better than the other (pretty sure the wav has a larger spectrum)...but as mister Bleep Bloopington said....wavlyfe.

Sounds about right thanks guys. Perfection just gets more and more expensive...

yeah, I second the .wav thing. Or download it FLAC and convert it to .wav (cheaper on Addictech, etc.). I am no expert on the subject, but compressing .wav to mp3 removes some of the very high (like above 10khz) information, as well as some of the low lows. Playing a lossless format like .wav on a high quality big system will have more of that shimmer and sparkle to it.

^ Yeah definitely more of a sparkle. Did a little experiment with the same song with various qualities from youtube rip to 320 to wav and the difference is like night and day.

One more question on the subject though, when constructing a set if you drop a wav after a 320 would the eq'ing sound off? since i'm now assuming bringing a wav in would introduce new frequencies should you just stick to one filetype or bring the next track in with reduced hi's/low's?

Really appreciating the input guys, big gig coming up in the new year

i don't think 320 vs. wav on a club system much of a difference at all. massive modal nodes, crowd noise, house compression/saturation/limiting/eq/ etc will account for so much variance that it would be hard notice the difference, even for "platinum ears," lol. it makes a well-audible difference if you are monitoring in a well-treated room (as said before, most of the information is taken out of the highs).

i will play 320s if that is all that is available. for my tracks i play 24bit 48000 cuz i'm a snob and i can (i know for a fact that i wouldn't notice the difference between that and a 16bit 44100 on a club system).

i wouldn't stress too much on this kind of stuff. on a loud system i think the difference is negligible. i would love to run some a/b tests to see if they really notice or its just audio placebo. obviously always strive for the best, but i wouldn't alter track choice based on that fact alone.

Im with iONiK... Unless your playing on some 100k ^ system in a perfect setting, 320 and up is the go. Can't say id go any lower in mp3 (256 etc)
So much limiting and usually poor mixers etc in clubs that by the time your audio reaches the systems speakers something is gonna be messing with the original audio anyway... As long as you get you gains right, go for it.
I also keep all my own tracks in high quality wavs, but that cuz they're mine, i know them down to the last bit of silence and need them to have EVERYTHING... Most people don't hear what i do in my tracks...