I don't know how often this website comes-up on these forums. But, readers may want to check-out Noise Addicts just for grins and giggles.

The site will let you test your ears to see if you can "hear like a teenager" and give back to back comparisons of 128kbs and 320kbs MP3 recordings. Choice of headphones or speakers is critical. I could hear 15kHz with Audio Technica ATH ES55 headphones but not with iGrado headphones.

Have Fun!

Listen here. If you still can. Nobody who is serious about movies and home theatre and has powerful subs and Outlaw amps can hear like a teenager. If they did their new-found hobby killed all that. When we discuss the term "reference level" then excellent hearing is out the window.

Thanks for the site.

When I really think about it there is no way my hesring is good enough to distinguish between the various kbps rates available to us. Again if you crank it up loud enough to sound real you are likely beyond recovery as far as SQ goes.

I found a nice link to such undertakings (evaluation of perceived audio quality as a function of encoding) on the Audio Engineering Society (AES) website:

http://www.aes.org/e-lib/browse.cfm?elib=15074

It's a listening test based on various mp3 encoding rates vs. uncompressed material from which the compressed files were derived.

I've yet to download it, but I probably should as Member price is only $5.

I'm familiar with the methodology that they probably used (at least I think that I am as we use this sort of approach in product sound quality when we do structured juried tests), but I am curious to read it.