[FM] Internet Radio and Archived Music

[John R Pierce]

> With all the discussion of Internet Radio, I've seen no discussion of the
> sound quality. Unless it has improved dramatically since the last time I
> tried, the Real Audio type streaming is no where near FM or CD quality.
>
> I would love to listen to the stations mentioned here but the quality is
> just not there for my tastes.
>
> Rich Hanson
>
> [Alan sez: For dialup users that may be true. I'm not impressed with
shockwave or quicktime, but the MP3 stuff or the 56k stream that comes out
of the grassy hill is way beyond that in terms of fidelity, and very
listenable.

Its all about data rate.   I was messing with a 48k feed using MP3 and
'shoutcast' in 44k sample/second mono mode, it sounded great.  I've heard
36k 'Microsoft Active Streaming Format' stereo streams that sounded very
good.  The new experimental 128k MP3 stream from KPIP (also
shoutcast/icecast) is better than the best possible FM sound, but you need a
DSL or cable modem or better link to hear it, and it does occasionally
'hiccup' when net congestion gets the better of it.

-jrp