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Main Area and Open Discussion => General Software Discussion => Topic started by: Curt on October 06, 2009, 07:18 AM
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MP3 was a revolution when it entered the audiophile world. Not entirely a good revolution, in my opinion, but nevertheless something that changed the world of sound. Because of MP3's obvious lack of quality, other formats have been developed, but... well..., apart from WMA, not with too much commercial success. This has left the vast majority of consumers in a dark corner: Either settle with low quality, or purchase the original recording (if you can find it). Now this may change!
MP3HD is a lossless compression of an ingenious kind. It consists of two layers. The top layer is a normal lossy MP3 layer, and the bottom layer contains all the missing details. Meaning that MP3HD can be played on all MP3 players, but only the lossless details will come forth via a new MP3HD player. That is SMART! :-)
Average bit-rate will typical be between 475 and 875 kbit/s
mp3HD Overview
* mp3HD is a lossless audio codec (100% bit-exact replica of CD tracks)
* Backward Compatible to mp3
* File extension .mp3
* Bitrates for music approximately 500 to 900 kbps rates (similar to other lossless codecs), depending on genre
* Embedded mp3 track and the mp3HD file share the same id3 metadata
* Encoding parameters (e.g. bit rate), ancillary data and meta data of embedded mp3 track are under control
You can get the de- & encoder, and 'toolkit' via http://www.all4mp3.com/Learn_mp3_hd_1.aspx at http://www.all4mp3.com/SoftwareHD.aspx
For 32-bits Mac, Linux, and Windows,
- but 64 bits and Windows 7 (Seven) are not listed!
[ You are not allowed to view attachments ]
The following tools are available immediately for your tests:
* Encoding
o Command-line encoder
* Decoding (to wav)
o Command-line decoder
* Playing
o Plug-in for Winamp (for Winamp 5.5 and above)
* Platforms
o Win32 (Microsoft Windows XP, 2000, NT 4, Me/98), Vista
o Linux32
o Mac OS X
* Support
o CD audio (PCM): 44.1, 48 kHz sampling rate, 16 bit/sample
This page (http://www.all4mp3.com/FeaturedTracks.aspx) also has a few audio files with the new encoding
- average download speed: 370 KB/s
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You're right, that is very smart. Wonder what the audiophiles will have to say.
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I don't care much for the format - players have starting adopting FLAC... and for low-capacity players, probably not supporting FLAC, something like 370kbps is too big :)
The idea is smart though, I guess.
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Sounds something like an Encapsulated PostScript or EPS** file.
It's a great idea if you only want to support a single file format for your music files. :Thmbsup:
But it's still a bit of a kludge. I would have liked it more if it were able to retain the old MP3 file sizes and still be lossless. Now that would have been the absolute killer format.
Thanks for the heads up Curt! I'm definitely going to be keeping an eye on this one.
(But in the mean time, I'm still gonna stick with FLAC for hi-def.)
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** (EPS basically embedded a low resolution "preview" graphic image in a regular PS file. Since most machines didn't have the memory or power to render a PS file directly, EPS allowed you to see what your file looked like before you sent it to a laser imaging device. Before most of the printing industry switched over to using PDFs for 'direct to plate' pre-press, EPS ruled the world. Quark Xpress and the Adobe product family were the driving forces behind the EPS format.)
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I think 40hz is right: it's useful if you want only one version of the music files. However, the idea of having extra space on my cell phone/mp3 player taken by sound that I can't hear isn't that great.
I think I'll keep my regular mp3, I don't have earphones or sound card good enough to notice any difference anyways :P
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Oh, you are all such a bunch of square minded wankers, afraid of any improvements not coming from your favourites! Your arguments are soo...., welll, I better shut up.
:P
Sorry!
Of course this format is not perfect, but neither are any other formats! MP3HD is of course technical superior to FLAC (which is not a common format) because the compression makes the MP3HD file at least 30 percent smaller than a FLAC file, while the quality of the MP3HD sound fully will match the FLAC. The download links also offer a converter, so if you think the MP3HD file still is too large for your sister's portable player or your kitchen speakers, you may convert it into a normally sized MP3 file. But you still have the lossless file for your hi-fi set-up.
FYI: the new format is displayed the normal way: MP3 (not 'MP3HD').
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Of course this format is not perfect, but neither are any other formats! MP3HD is of course technical superior to FLAC (which is not a common format) because the compression makes the MP3HD file at least 30 percent smaller than a FLAC file, while the quality of the MP3HD sound fully will match the FLAC.
-Curt
11-Pink Floyd-High Hopes.flac - 46.1MB
11-Pink Floyd-High Hopes.mp3 - 48.6MB
And that's sticking to 192kbps MP3 quality for the non-lossless format :-\
...I think I'll keep my FLACs. It also kinda feels nice to be using an open format and all, and the encode time is faster.
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11-Pink Floyd-High Hopes.flac - 46.1MB
11-Pink Floyd-High Hopes.mp3 - 48.6MB-f0dder
- quite a surprise, and not in line with what I've read.
But as I said, I'll shut up.
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11-Pink Floyd-High Hopes.flac - 46.1MB
11-Pink Floyd-High Hopes.mp3 - 48.6MB-f0dder
- quite a surprise, and not in line with what I've read.-Curt
It's going to depend on the type of the music - perhaps FLAC is just better at encoding stuff that has high dynamic range than mp3hd? Only tried that one track, and can't be bothered with some evil range-compressed industrial right now :) (gotta head off for work in ~30min).
But as I said, I'll shut up.-Curt
Please don't, it's always interesting to hear about new stuff, even if I'm not going to be a fan of it :)
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- okay, at least I will talk long enough to tell that there are 38 more HD music files to get, one at a time, from http://www.all4mp3.com/Listenmp3HD.aspx
Also I should say that half of the files listed at the previous link (http://www.all4mp3.com/FeaturedTracks.aspx), are surround files!
Finally, if some of you didn't follow any of the links, I should tell that there is a plugin (http://www.all4mp3.com/SoftwareHD.aspx) for WinAmp (Windows only).
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11-Pink Floyd-High Hopes.mp3 - 48.6MB
And that's sticking to 192kbps MP3 quality for the non-lossless format :-\
...-f0dder
I wonder if increasing the bitrate of the traditional MP3 portion of the file will produce a larger or smaller MP3HD file. It would be interesting to see a 32 vs. 320 kbps comparison.
I'm still on the fence about this idea. I guess to me it probably boils down to how well they work with tagging programs. Encoding/decoding time will also probably play a large part in whether it's adopted or not.
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I'm still on the fence about this idea. I guess to me it probably boils down to how well they work with tagging programs. Encoding/decoding time will also probably play a large part in whether it's adopted or not.-Hirudin
Get this...the lossless part of this new format is stored in ID3v2 tags. Can you believe that? So, the short answer is that current tag editors are not going to be able to handle this new format very well. The problem is that, by spec, an ID3v2 tag can be up to 256 megs. Yes, megabytes. In other words, the tag editor will have to rewrite all the lossless data on tag changes since ID3v2 tags are stored at the start of a file (yes, I know about padding). Crazy design decision, methinks.
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skwire: that's (a few steps beyond) borderline insanity O_o
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Yeah, no kidding. Can you imagine the potential memory usage of a tag editor at that point? I could be mistaken, however, but that's how I interpreted all the specs I could find on this format.
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The format is still beta'ish; one would expect the tagging-thing to be dealt with at some point in time.
About the size of the outcome; yes it surely relates to the music:
| Genre | HD Bit-rate | File-Size |
| Pop,Rock,Folk | 876 kbits/s | 26 MB |
| Jazz | 786 kbits/s | 23.5 MB |
| Classical | 605 kbits/s | 18 MB |
| Audio-Books | 474 kbits/s | 14 MB |
So my guess is that MP3HD will excel with Classical music, as an example, but not with Rock.
Other than that, the example is plain stupid; any classical concert contains tons more dynamic tunes than any rock music concert ever, and should therefore also take up much more bits, I would imagine.
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The format is still beta'ish; one would expect the tagging-thing to be dealt with at some point in time.-Curt
This wouldn't solve the fundamental problem (if skwire understood the specs properly), though - that a lot of existing programs would possibly have to be updated in order to not crash / eat up memory like crazy when dealing with mp3hd files.
So my guess is that MP3HD will excel with Classical music, as an example, but not with Rock.-Curt
All variable-bitrate compression formats depend on the input in one way or another - either by having a constant output filesize (and trying to "spend less bits on less active passages") or achieving different output filesize depending on the input.
Other than that, the example is plain stupid; any classical concert contains tons more dynamic tunes than any rock music concert ever, and should therefore also take up much more bits, I would imagine.-Curt
Don't know about that, but I expect it to depend very much on the compression algorithm. As I understand it, MP3 works by doing frequency analysis, and discarding frequencies we don't pay as much attention to, in order to achieve better bitrate for the more interesting frequencies... lossless codecs obviously cannot do this, so they work differently :) - I would expect classical music to achieve relatively small filesizes because there's silent passages and slow progressions, whereas rock, industrial, etc is often full-volume-all-the-time and has a lot of "harsh" sounds (shredding guitars, noise, whatever) that I would guess results in a larger bitrate requirement.
But I'm pretty much a layman when it comes to audio and audio compression, so I could be totally wrong :)
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- you're of course right, f0dder - I was thinking 'dynamic range' rather than 'dynamic average'. Classical music concerts have an extreme dynamic range, but a low dynamic average, so to speak.
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This concept isnt entirely new... check out WavPack (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WavPack). They use two files to store the data. Notice I'm not saying one method is better or worse, just giving another example!
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But as I said, I'll shut up.-Curt
Please don't, it's always interesting to hear about new stuff, even if I'm not going to be a fan of it :)
-f0dder
@Curt - Yeah, seriously. Don't.
I've read many of your other posts.
You always find neat stuff I'd never know about if you didn't bring it to our attention. :Thmbsup:
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Also I should say that half of the files listed at the previous link (http://www.all4mp3.com/FeaturedTracks.aspx), are surround files!-Curt
MP3 Surround isn't really new, it's been around since 2004 as a standard, see here (http://www.betanews.com/article/MP3-Goes-51-Channel/1102131014).
And I used to use the Aud-X MP3 Surround (http://www.aud-x.com/) VirtualDubMod 1.6.0.0 and codec 2 or 3 years ago.
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You always find neat stuff I'd never know about if you didn't bring it to our attention.
-40hz
- that has been my excuse for a couple years! :mrgreen:
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FYI: the new format is displayed the normal way: MP3 (not 'MP3HD').
-Curt
This is bound to be awfully confusing for a while. Until now, there was a clear distinction: mp3 small and lossy, fast to download and good for portables. FLAC - lossless and big, so schedule your downloads for the night, and double-check your player can play it.
Without this distinction, everyone will always have to explain: download as mp3 here (old-style, small, lossy), or download as mp3 there (new lossless format, size XXL). I think it's a bad call. The difference is substantial enough to have warranted a dedicated file extension.
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but still, it is not certain that anyone but Thomson will ever use the (MP3)HD format...
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I made the GUI that you download for windows :)
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Am I the only one who thinks MP3 should've died a slow death by now?
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Am I the only one who thinks MP3 should've died a slow death by now?-scancode
It's still an OK format when you can accept quality loss...
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Am I the only one who thinks MP3 should've died a slow death by now?-scancode
The sound quality is fine, but the way the tagging standard for the MP3 format stands today it's as if it were strategized by a drunken monkey.
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Am I the only one who thinks MP3 should've died a slow death by now?
-scancode
as someone who hasnt a clue I ask:
are there alternatives that dont involve huge filesizes - or should we just get used to large filesizes ?
(I know, there's loads of space on current hard-drives...)
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as someone who hasnt a clue I ask:
are there alternatives that dont involve huge filesizes - or should we just get used to large filesizes ?
(I know, there's loads of space on current hard-drives...)
-tomos
Sure, there is Vorbis and AAC (short for Advanced Audio Coding) if you like lossy codecs. Both have open implementations for encoding and decoding, and are well supported. Plus they're not involved in the patent hell that the algorithms used in MP3 are, so you can use them freely without any of the concerns, especially Vorbis, which was an open format from the start.
In any case, MP3 is still a very viable option, even more if you use a good encoder like LAME, which has continued to improve its encoding quality over the last years.
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I made the GUI that you download for windows :)
-defiant91
- welcome to DC, defiant91 :up:
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- welcome to DC, defiant91 :up:
-Curt
Thanks. Do you guys like the GUI? I worked hard on it and would like some opinions on it.
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Am I the only one who thinks MP3 should've died a slow death by now?
-scancode
It still is dying a slow death.
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Thanks. Do you guys like the GUI? I worked hard on it and would like some opinions on it. -defiant91
- you did it in vain, I think, as far as DC goes. No-one seems to be using it. Me neither.
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I made the GUI that you download for windows :)
-defiant91
What GUI?
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GUI = Graphical User Interface
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I think Deo meant his statement for defiant91 who had asked for opinions on the GUI he designed for this MP3HD product but didn't provide a screenshot. I couldn't find one on the Thomson website, either. defiant91, if you want some opinions, perhaps you can post a screenshot or two here? Or, if anybody has installed it (I have no plans to), maybe they can post some screenies.
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OMG, MP3 lossless. There is WavPack, there is FLAC :-* and there is Monkey's Audio. MP3 is for instant, mobile playing, not for archiving. (And the MP3 codec is still not license-free.)
I wonder when there will be "Ogg Vorbis HD" ...
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This sounds like what mp3PRO (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mp3PRO) failed to do.
Keeping fingers crossed there.
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This sounds like what mp3PRO (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mp3PRO) failed to do.
-Xenonym
While on the surface it may seem like they are similar in their goals they really aren't. MP3Pro was all about providing better sounding audio at lower bit-rates, but it was always still lossy. MP3HD is trying to implement lossless as part of the MP3 standard while the core MP3 technology is the same as it always has been.
They've got a tough row to hoe if they are going to overtake FLAC as the lossless standard.
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FLAC is an open, license-free format, MP3 is not. Unless they'll change that, they'll fail.
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Am I the only one who thinks MP3 should've died a slow death by now?
-scancode
MP3 is ubiquitous so it is unlikely to die out any time soon. Whether MP3HD will make any headway is debatable but give than lossy MP3 is prrety standard on all mobile players it seems very unlikely that manufacturers will stop supporting the format.
Also there are millions of people who have purchased in MP3 format - its pretty unlikely that people will convert MP3 to something else and lose even more fiddelity (assuming most people are even capable of figuring out conversion processes).
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Am I the only one who thinks MP3 should've died a slow death by now?
-scancode
as someone who hasnt a clue I ask:
are there alternatives that dont involve huge filesizes - or should we just get used to large filesizes ?
(I know, there's loads of space on current hard-drives...)
-tomos
I think tomos hit on something with the observation about storage space.
Huge disk space has become so inexpensive that, for archival purposes, file compression has almost become a non-issue.
Nowadays, it's only if you're dealing with streaming media that file compression is still an important consideration.
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I know people like to hate MP3, in favor of OGG, FLAC, etc. But since I've upgraded to the latest LAME, I don't think it's worth worrying about at decent bitrates.
According to the LAME site (like this page: http://lame.sourceforge.net/gpsycho.php), the standard implementation that most encoders use is poor, and buggy on top of that. My personal experience when encoding my preferred genres (prog metal and power metal) is that the accuracy of top-rate VBR is actually superior to my audio equipment. Then nifty display of the encoder seems to bear this out: it's not showing much if any "overflow" data outside what fits inside the allocated frames.
I'm thinking that this is an example of something becoming ubiquitous because it's "good enough". Just like HTML has plenty of quirks, but gets the job done, and is now so entrenched that I can't imagine it going away, MP3 at a decent bitrate with a good encoder is just fine, and there's so much out there for it (both infrastructure and the music itself) that it's not going anywhere for some time.
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MP3 at a decent bitrate with a good encoder is just fine
-CWuestefeld
Agreed...and anybody that disputes this must prove it with an ABX test. :P
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MP3 at a decent bitrate with a good encoder is just fine, and there's so much out there for it (both infrastructure and the music itself) that it's not going anywhere for some time.-CWuestefeld
I don't think the point in using something like FLAC implies that MP3s are inherently bad. The point in using a lossless codec is for archival purposes. When MP3's lossy codec replacement comes along, and believe me sooner or later it will as progress is inevitable, those who have their music ripped to a lossless codec like FLAC can just transcode their music to the New Great Thing without having to spend all the time re-ripping their CDs. Transcoding is a lot faster than ripping. Transcoding an MP3 to a different lossy format is less than ideal as you will have the information in the music you lost while ripping to MP3 and then you'll have additional loss as you transcode to the new lossy codec.
Now if you want to leave lossless codecs out of the conversation & just talk about lossy codecs available now I think that someone who chooses Ogg Vorbis over MP3s may not even do it because of the sound quality, either. This person may choose Ogg Vorbis because they like to support the open source effort & maybe because the Ogg Vorbis tagging standard is more versatile than ID3 v2.3/v2.4/v.ad-nauseum.
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[... When MP3's lossy codec replacement comes along, and believe me sooner or later it will as progress is inevitable, ...-Innuendo
I haven't got the slightest idea what progress you are talking about! Is it the "progress" from 1411 kbps, to 320 kbps, to 64 kbps, to 22 kbps, or what??? In case you didn't notice, the quality has been constantly FALLING every year for twenty five years; there has been absolutely NO "progress"! Each and every manufactory is working at heir hardest to get lower quality, not higher.
:-[
In case you cannot tell, I am not happy with the audiophile situation. ;)
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Each and every manufactory is working at heir hardest to get lower quality, not higher.-Curt
... which is multiplied with a constant factor every time something gets "remastered", see the latest Beatles remasters with the cut-off peaks...
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I haven't got the slightest idea what progress you are talking about! Is it the "progress" from 1411 kbps, to 320 kbps, to 64 kbps, to 22 kbps, or what??? In case you didn't notice, the quality has been constantly FALLING every year for twenty five years; there has been absolutely NO "progress"!
-Curt
But that's bitrate, not quality. Quality has been improving over the years, that is, bigger quality at smaller bitrates. If music sounds worse, it's not because of lossy codecs (at least not directly), but the music industry, full of dumbasses who don't know any better about sound quality, or music for that matter <_<
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... which is multiplied with a constant factor every time something gets "remastered", see the latest Beatles remasters with the cut-off peaks...-Tuxman
Yep....Loudness war (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loudness_war).
Stupid music industry...
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I haven't got the slightest idea what progress you are talking about! Is it the "progress" from 1411 kbps, to 320 kbps, to 64 kbps, to 22 kbps, or what??? In case you didn't notice, the quality has been constantly FALLING every year for twenty five years; there has been absolutely NO "progress"! Each and every manufactory is working at heir hardest to get lower quality, not higher.-Curt
Not sure what you mean...there are even some online music you can buy in FLAC form so I'm not sure where you are getting that quality is falling. Please elaborate as I must be misunderstanding/missing your point, Curt.
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yeah, I know, I didn't say it right. The idea of explaining it in English, was a bit overwhelming at the time. Sorry.
When I was younger there was no Internet. If I wanted to hear a new CD, I would go into a shop in an actual building and put on a giant pair of headphones, or take a seat in their "listening room", and listen to that music in high fidelity sound. At high volumes! Today I will have to go to a page on the Internet and listen to some tiny 22 kbps LOW fidelity sound stream. The same goes for the replacement of the BIG stereo gear in my living-room; the two four feet cabinets on the floor have been replaced by a couple of tiny speakers next to my monitor on the table. Quality has been sacrificed for comfort. No progress, in real life.
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If I wanted to hear a new CD, I would go into a shop in an actual building and put on a giant pair of headphones, or take a seat in their "listening room", and listen to that music in high fidelity sound. At high volumes!
That reminded me of the distinctly unpleasant experiences of going to preview a cd, like you, but so very often, some heavy-techno-metallic-crap would be blaring from speakers in the store so the sound permeated the earphones. So trying to listen to sensitive, subtle piano solos would be hideously interfered with by "musicians" substituting enthusiastic frenzy for skill. I am GLAD those days are past and my music can be a private affair. I'll settle for being able to hear a low quality sample with no background noise.
On another note, one of the positives of my descent into old age is that I have no need to pay a premium to buy frequencies I can't hear anymore. Nature has now blessed me with mp3 ears.
(Profuse apologies to all the techno-metallic-??? fans I've offended. ;D)
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On another note, one of the positives of my descent into old age is that I have no need to pay a premium to buy frequencies I can't hear anymore. Nature has now blessed me with mp3 ears.
-tsaint
;D That really resonates with me, as well. I like that, mp3 ears 8)
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On another note, one of the positives of my descent into old age is that I have no need to pay a premium to buy frequencies I can't hear anymore. Nature has now blessed me with mp3 ears.
-tsaint
;D That really resonates with me, as well. I like that, mp3 ears 8)
-Darwin
Save me a seat on that bus also ... 30 years if open piped Harleys has had an impact on my hearing.
I am wondering if the Loudness War fiasco that Innuendo mentioned is why many tracks sound like the vocals are/have been washed out (barely audible) to me.
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On another note, one of the positives of my descent into old age is that I have no need to pay a premium to buy frequencies I can't hear anymore. Nature has now blessed me with mp3 ears.
-tsaint
;D That really resonates with me, as well. I like that, mp3 ears 8)
-Darwin
Save me a seat on that bus also ... 30 years if open piped Harleys has had an impact on my hearing.
I am wondering if the Loudness War fiasco that Innuendo mentioned is why many tracks sound like the vocals are/have been washed out (barely audible) to me.
-Stoic Joker
Ditto - my problem is I like to know the frequencies are there even if I can't hear them.
Seriously though I still buy CDs mostly. I hate paying the same price for audio downloads (or even more quite often) when I can have a shiny disk plus a booklet full of pictures and text, or in the case of classical music background info on the artists, performance and historical notes.
Maybe I am old fashioned but I do like to have the physical product. When I do download stuff more often than not I burn a CD anyway to listen on a HiFi system or in the car.
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my problem is I like to know the frequencies are there even if I can't hear them.
:P :P :P :P :P
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my problem is I like to know the frequencies are there even if I can't hear them.
If you are a discerning listener, you will readily notice the difference if they are missing, even if you don't actually hear them, because the lack of harmonic resonances in the higher frequencies dulls the tone of the sound in the range you do hear. That's why music mastered at a higher resolution (96Khz, 24 bit) sounds better when reproduced on a CD (44Khz, 16 bit resolution). It's also why violinists can continue to play beautifully long after they are no longer able to hear directly the highest tones they produce.
While this is true of acoustic music, I don't know if it applies to tones generated electronically, but then I don't listen to much electric music anyway.
That said, high bit rate MP3 (256-320 kbs, VBR) should be nearly indistinguishable from CD sound if properly encoded, and I listen to a lot of music that way, but I usually rip it or convert it from lossless myself. In-ear headphones also help make up for some of the upper frequency hearing loss.
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yeah, I know, I didn't say it right. The idea of explaining it in English, was a bit overwhelming at the time. Sorry.-Curt
Don't worry about it, Curt. I'm a native English speaker & sometimes even I struggle for the right way to say something.
When I was younger there was no Internet. If I wanted to hear a new CD, I would go into a shop in an actual building and put on a giant pair of headphones, or take a seat in their "listening room", and listen to that music in high fidelity sound. At high volumes!
Lucky you. When I was younger there was no internet, either, but the shops around here didn't even have listening rooms. One just had to either hope that during the time you were shopping one of the clerks would play it on the in-store sound system or you could try your luck begging one of those clerks to put on the album you were were interested in. If the clerk didn't have anywhere near your musical tastes then you were out of luck.
Today I will have to go to a page on the Internet and listen to some tiny 22 kbps LOW fidelity sound stream.
Yes, which is why when I am interested in hearing what something REALLY sounds like I don't even bother with those crummy sound streams & I secure a more high-fidelity sample elsewhere.
The same goes for the replacement of the BIG stereo gear in my living-room; the two four feet cabinets on the floor have been replaced by a couple of tiny speakers next to my monitor on the table. Quality has been sacrificed for comfort. No progress, in real life.
Technology used to listen to has changed, but you don't have to give up quality if you do not want to. There are stereo components that integrate with that BIG stereo gear in your living room that allows you to stream high quality music streams (FLAC, APE, TAK, etc.) across your network & play them through your high end stereo like any other sound source with amazing results.
And as for the computer itself, sacrifices do not have to be made there, either, if you are willing to part with a little cash. Myself, I have a stand-alone sound card (Creative Audigy 2 ZS - needs upgrading, I know, but still sounds good) connected to a set of Klipsch ProMedia 5.1 Ultra speakers. With this setup on my PC I can tell you that music can fill the house, the yard, the neighbors' yards, etc. and sound excellent with any sounds emanating from my PC. Once I found the music player with the plugins of my choice a little tweaking yielded me a heavenly music experience.
I guess what I'm saying is just like it's always been, good sounding audio is possible, but today you just have to spend your money on slightly different directions in order to achieve your goal.
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While this is true of acoustic music, I don't know if it applies to tones generated electronically, but then I don't listen to much electric music anyway.-xtabber
There have been studies done on this and yes, it's even a factor when the music is generated electronically. One study found that people who listened to the music via a lossless were affected mentally and emotionally more than when they listened to the same music via a lossy source.
Something else I found interesting was that the test subjects exhibited more mental fatique when listening to the lossy music as their brains were trying to find the parts of the music that "wasn't there" even if there was no audible difference between the lossy & lossless source to the human ear.
That said, high bit rate MP3 (256-320 kbs, VBR) should be nearly indistinguishable from CD sound if properly encoded...
I find that to be 99% true, but during some complex musical segments even the best MP3 encoding cannot get rid of some artifacts that just aren't there when listening to a lossless version of the song. Again, it's very rare that it ever happens, but it irritates me no less.
In-ear headphones also help make up for some of the upper frequency hearing loss.
In-ear headphones also contribute to hearing loss. :)
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The announcement of the first MP3HD player is more about touch-screen etcetetera than about MP3HD. I guess they realize that nobody except a few DC-members will know what MP3HD is.
Dear all4mp3.com subscribers,
first things first: we wish you all a happy 2010, full of love and mp3.
For us, the year starts with this great news: Samsung just announced the first ever mp3HD player during last week's CES show in Las Vegas .
We were lucky to have a hands-on demo of the IceTouch (YP-H1) during the show, and this innovation-rich player is very promising:
Beside mp3HD playback, the Icetouch features the world’s first 2-inch, full color, transparent Active Matrix Organic Light Emitting Diode (AMOLED) touch-screen display. It functions as a DVD-quality video player, studio quality audio player, an ultra-portable photo album, an FM radio and even a portable storage device (up to 16GB onboard memory)
According to Samsung, it will be available for purchase in the first half of ....
Link to the full Samsung press release here (http://www.samsung.com/us/news/newsRead.do?news_seq=16487&page=1&gltype=localnews)
all4mp3 team
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Maybe a bit off topic but I'd like to share this with you all : I recently had a go at Jetaudio Plus because it was on sale and I wanted to get it since a long time ago. I was interested in the mp3 sound management by Cowon, which I find outstanding, something called BBE. See http://www.bbesound.com/technologies/BBE_MP/BBE_MP_WhitePaper.pdf for those who are interested.
But actually I was favorably surprised by another point, the mp3 encoder. I used to rely on EasyCDDA, encoding my CD @ 192 kbps ABR. With Jetaudio Plus I chose 192 kbps VBR and I was astonished by the difference (on the same Sony Walkman, a NWZ-S738F). The music seems "clearer", "richer" than with EasyCDDA with a similar compression level.
I don't know if the basic version of JetAudio (free) has the same mp3 encoding capabilities, but I can now highly recommend it if it's there.
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- the way you describe your experience, I must say that I don't think the improvement necessarily was due to JetAudio's converter as much as to ABR versus VBR. 192 kbps ABR is mostly something like 110~180 kbps, while 192 kbps VBR always is 192 kbps. Edited: wrong! the "V" in VBR is for "variable". "CBR" is constant.
But I do think JetAudio Plus is really fine.
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ut actually I was favorably surprised by another point, the mp3 encoder. I used to rely on EasyCDDA, encoding my CD @ 192 kbps ABR. With Jetaudio Plus I chose 192 kbps VBR and I was astonished by the difference (on the same Sony Walkman, a NWZ-S738F). The music seems "clearer", "richer" than with EasyCDDA with a similar compression level.
-MerleOne
Hm, couldn't find mention of which MP3 encoding engine EasyCDDA uses; the closest "official" info I found in any obvious place was a link to mp3dev.org, which seems to be an old site for LAME? - some review does say it uses LAME, though. And afaik, LAME is pretty much the highest-quality encoder on the market?
JetAudio doesn't mention it's codec either, but a 2007 thread on their forum implies Fraunhofer... I hope that they've either changed codec since, or that Fraunhofer has improved their codec, since it used to have worse quality (except for very low bitrates, but who use 96kbps for their audio? :))
But hey, some blind-listening studies have been made where people actually prefered MP3 over FLAC... probably because they've been listening to MP3s so long that they've gotten used to the lossy sound >_<
192 kbps ABR is mostly something like 110~180 kbps, while 192 kbps VBR always is 192 kbps.-Curt
Hm, don't you mean that CBR will always have constant rate? ABR is still variable bitrate, and don't give 100% predictable output size... but more so than VBR. See this (http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?title=ABR) :)
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You can use all stupid archivers for lossless audio compression. We don´t need hundrets of redundant lossless formats.
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..., while 192 kbps VBR always is 192 kbps.-Curt
Hm, don't you mean that CBR will always have constant rate?
-f0dder
- you're of course right, f0dder. I confused VBR with CBR. :-[
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You can use all stupid archivers for lossless audio compression. We don´t need hundrets of redundant lossless formats.-Crush
Archivers? Generic compression tools don't tend to work very well with audio data compared to a specialized codec... besides, not all media players are going to support, say, playback of .wav from a .rar file :)
I agree that we don't need Yet Another FormatTM, though, if it doesn't bring anything really valuable into the mix... and imho MP3HD doesn't. In fact, because of the way it works (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=20185.msg180278#msg180278), I even think it's a downright bad idea :)
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Try 7zip or rar. The main difference of the lossless compressors is sometimes a small function before compression similar to this one:
for (t_audiosize x=0; x<wavlen-1; x++) { wav- = wav[x+1]-wav
- ; if (wav
- <0) wav
- =0-wav
- ; }
... That´s all
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Yes, yes, I had that crazy idea years ago, when I found I could save a few megabytes by ZIP compressing my MP3s, since both foobar2000 and XMPlay can play compressed files with ease. Then I realized I could not edit any MP3 directly from fb2k if I did that...
The WAV format doesn't have a metadata system, and a PMP doesn't handle 7ZIP or RAR compressed WAV files too well. Heck, my own computer takes several seconds just to process a single compressed audio file (a fairly big one, though). The fact that general compression algorithms are pretty efficient compared to FLAC doesn't make them a suitable option for audio compression.
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ut actually I was favorably surprised by another point, the mp3 encoder. I used to rely on EasyCDDA, encoding my CD @ 192 kbps ABR. With Jetaudio Plus I chose 192 kbps VBR and I was astonished by the difference (on the same Sony Walkman, a NWZ-S738F). The music seems "clearer", "richer" than with EasyCDDA with a similar compression level.
-MerleOne
Hm, couldn't find mention of which MP3 encoding engine EasyCDDA uses; the closest "official" info I found in any obvious place was a link to mp3dev.org, which seems to be an old site for LAME? - some review does say it uses LAME, though. And afaik, LAME is pretty much the highest-quality encoder on the market?
JetAudio doesn't mention it's codec either, but a 2007 thread on their forum implies Fraunhofer... I hope that they've either changed codec since, or that Fraunhofer has improved their codec, since it used to have worse quality (except for very low bitrates, but who use 96kbps for their audio? :))
-f0dder
Easy-CDDA uses LAME. Don't know about JetAudio, but since the free version does not include MP3 encoding, they probably pay for their MP3 codecs, and since they bundle MP3 and MP3pro together, I'd guess they license them from Thomson.
Setting VBR rates is a lot more complicated than just picking a bitrate. You need to set maximum and minimum filters and various options. LAME provides a number of optimized presets which you can use as is or tweak yourself. These are available only in the registered version of Easy-CDDA, IIRC. ABR is VBR with averaging between frames to achieve a consistent file size, so the final quality may depend on how much compression is actually needed for a given source.
Here's a reasonably comprehensible description of VBR vs ABR: http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?title=ABR
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So,
can anyone recommend the least damaging way to rip CD's to mp3 (with preferably a reasonably priced or free app) ?? ...seeing as it looks like the MP3HD sounds (har har :p) like a bit of a dead dog
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So,
can anyone recommend the least damaging way to rip CD's to mp3 (with preferably a reasonably priced or free app) ?? ...seeing as it looks like the MP3HD sounds (har har :p) like a bit of a dead dog
-tomos
Presumably, you mean the least lossy way, no? I don't think it is possible to physically harm the media itself when ripping CD's.
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So,
can anyone recommend the least damaging way to rip CD's to mp3 (with preferably a reasonably priced or free app) ?? ...seeing as it looks like the MP3HD sounds (har har :p) like a bit of a dead dog
-tomos
Presumably, you mean the least lossy way, no? I don't think it is possible to physically harm the media itself when ripping CD's.
-Darwin
ehh, the least lossy way for the MP3's :D (I meant)
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Many years ago I used EasyLAME which was a pre-configured RazorLAME-- alt-preset-standard (VBR).
Though I haven't encoded mp3s in many years, I would probably try Pazera's freeware LAME Front-End (http://www.pazera-software.com/products/lame-front-end/) if I were to get started on a mp3 collection today.
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tomos: for free ripping, go with EAC and also use the AccurateRip plugin... and choose a decent MP3 rate (or do the sane thing and go FLAC if you aren't super-constrained by disk space). If you're willing to pay a bit, go for dBpoweramp - faster ripping than EAC (especially if your drive supports C2 error reporting), but still does it securely.
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Yep, EAC is the best ripper-- especially if you have a scratched CD. Other free tools like CDex and Audiograbber reportedly get the job done as well.
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FWIW BonkEnc (http://www.bonkenc.org/) (new to me) is a free audio converter and CD ripper which is currently well-regarded. Could be worth a look. 8)
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Try 7zip or rar. The main difference of the lossless compressors is sometimes a small function before compression similar to this one:
for (t_audiosize x=0; x<wavlen-1; x++) { wav- = wav[x+1]-wav
- ; if (wav
- <0) wav
- =0-wav
- ; }
... That´s all
-Crush
Um... really? (http://flac.sourceforge.net/format.html)
Also, Exact Audio Copy (EAC) is lovely indeed, it interfaces neatly with both LAME for MP3 encoding and FLAC for lossless.
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Yep, EAC is the best ripper-- especially if you have a scratched CD. Other free tools like CDex and Audiograbber reportedly get the job done as well. -sajman99
...as long as the CDs aren't scratched or copy-protected, in which case I don't think you should use anything besides EAC or dBpoweramp.
AudioGrabber freeware? Last time I used it, it was commercial... and used the sucky XING engine. Or am I thinking about something else with a similar name?
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f0dder:
Looks like AudioGrabber (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audiograbber) has been free for a while (Feb '04), but I didn't realize it is now abandonware. AG's website is gone, but it can still be found at CNET and other download sites.
Personally, I never had any reason to use anything other than EAC with its superior secure ripping mode. I'll take a look at dBpoweramp as well. :)
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Personally, I never had any reason to use anything other than EAC with its superior secure ripping mode. I'll take a look at dBpoweramp as well. :)-sajman99
EAC's ripping is secure, but I dunno if I'd call it superior - it works by re-ripping each sector multiple times, which strains your drive and can be slow. dBpoweramp utilizes C2 error pointer information, which means it only has to re-rip sectors the drive tells it were ripped problematically - and it does this in a second pass, so the first pass can go full speed (re-ripping a sector means searching back, which is a pretty slow operation). Unfortunately, not all drives support C2, and some that do don't support it reliably :/