mp3 tracks with no silence between Options

[gix_65]

i've this question today...is possible to listen some tracks in mp3 format without little silence between one track and other ?
for example if i'm listening an audio live cd i don't hear the silence between the tracks...but when i hear the same tracks ripped in mp3 format i hear a little gap...
my question is if there a mode to don't listen the small pause in mp3 mode or in mp3 player

[audioflex]

--nogap switch in lame, and the rio karma i heard has gapless playback.

[Jud]

i've this question today...is possible to listen some tracks in mp3 format without little silence between one track and other ?
for example if i'm listening an audio live cd i don't hear the silence between the tracks...but when i hear the same tracks ripped in mp3 format i hear a little gap...
my question is if there a mode to don't listen the small pause in mp3 mode or in mp3 player

Hey, a lot of software players have a gapless playback feature. If you're using Winamp 5, go to Options, Preferences, Plug-ins/Output, and choose one there, or configure DirectSound Output to fade out, which works for me.

The other choice is to rip the CD as one file and use a CUE sheet that marks where each track starts. Foobar2k recognizes CUE sheets and there are Winamp plugins for it.

[be020261]

[...]
"Gapless playback" consists of two parts:

1) Gapless decoding - lossy formats like MP3 store audio data in frames, which can't store entire audio CD track without either truncating last samples or adding extra null samples (total length must be a multiply of frame size, being fixed at 1152 samples for MPEG-1 layer 3); MP3 also suffers from encoder/decoder delay causing the decoder to produce additional null samples at the beginning of decoded stream. In order to correct this problem, lossy-encoded file needs to store two additional numbers - amount of samples to remove at the beginning of stream, and amount of samples to remove at the end of stream, then the decoder needs to take these nubmers into account. That's what this thread is about. LAME 3.90 and newer can store gapless playback info in LAME headers, and some players (like foobar2000) can play those files without encoder-added null samples at the beginning/end of file.
Another way to workaround gapless decoding is to write a DSP that tries to guess amount of samples that needs to be removed, but that method is simply unreliable and generally useless since players reading LAME header info exist (as well as tools to manually add gapless playback info to MP3 files that don't contain it).

2) Gapless output - many (mostly old) players have a design flaw requiring them to reopen wave output device between tracks, producing audible pauses. Modern players such as Winamp3 and foobar2000 don't have this problem; Winamp2/5 has "gapless output plugins" that avoid reopening output at cost of other minor glitches (displayed playback position being ahead of actual sound, etc; they trick the player to start decoding next track while previous one is still being played).

If you're lucky, your MP3 have been encoded with a recent vestion of LAME. If it's the case, then point #1 is almost resolved. (You will need a player that decodes those 2 number ZzZzZzZ was talking about.)

Next, you'll have to find a player or a gapless (NOT A CROSS-FADER) output plugins (if using WinAmp - I don't know if WA5 has a gapless output...) You'll find this on the WA web site, search for 'gapless'.


P.S. I have some MP3 files encoded with LAME 3.92, -APS and the playback isn't gapless even using Foobar... I even tried using the 'fix MP3 header' feature without any luck. Any idea?!

--
be020261

This post has been edited by be020261: Sep 14 2004, 13:03

[ChangFest]

--nogap switch in lame, and the rio karma i heard has gapless playback.

Don't use the --nogap switch. LAME allows native gapless playback through players that can decode it using it's gapless tag information. Foobar2000 (software player) supports this. The only hardware player that supports this is the Rio Karma as audioflex mentioned.

[Twinky]

Does Lame 3.90.3 write these 'gapless' headers?

[dev0]

Does Lame 3.90.3 write these 'gapless' headers?

Yes, of course.
Every version since 3.90 does.

[gix_65]

Next, you'll have to find a player or a gapless (NOT A CROSS-FADER) output plugins (if using WinAmp - I don't know if WA5 has a gapless output...) You'll find this on the WA web site, search for 'gapless'.
--
be020261

thanks to all for the answers...
i found on the WA web site gapless output but seems it doesn't work...
i listen my mp3 live maded to me with EAC + lame 3.90.3...and i hear gap between tracks

[Omion]

thanks to all for the answers...
i found on the WA web site gapless output but seems it doesn't work...
i listen my mp3 live maded to me with EAC + lame 3.90.3...and i hear gap between tracks

I haven't used Winamp for a long time, so this could be copletely outdated, but...

I remember trying to get gapless playback in Winamp with my Vorbis files, and I remember increasing the value for "buffer ahead on track change"

Go to preferences > plugins > output > DirectSound > Buffering, and increase the slider that says "Buffer-ahead on track change".

If that doesn't help, then use Foobar

[Madrigal]

Try mp3splice, available here.

Regards,
Madrigal

[be020261]

If you're still interested in gapless playback tru WA5:

This quote is refering to a gapless decoder (ie point 1 in my first post):

Continued (sort of) from http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/show.php/showtopic/17724

1. What It Is
It's the twisted-by-Otachan () version of the tweaked-by-YunaSoft-and-moka version of the written-by-Shibata, mpg123-based, Winamp5 MP3 decoding plugin.

2. Changes Since 1.18y pl-08

• Supports Winamp5 (Thanks to T-Matsuo)
  
  
  
• Supports MP1, MP2
  
  
  
• Supports ID3v2 and APE tags
  
  
  
• Can display ID3v2/APE tag specific data in titles (%a ~ %e)
  
  
  
• Takes care of multibyte encodings in title display
  
  
  
• Tag editing functions are disabled; T-Matsuo's mp3infp is called externally instead. You need to install mp3infp to edit tags.
  
  
  
• Int 24bit, Int 32bit, Float 32bit, Float 64bit output possible
  
  
  
• Sample-exact output for LAME encoded MP3 files (Gapless decoding)
  
  
• Supports ReplayGain
  
  
  
• Improved streaming playback support
  
  
  
• mpg123 library ugraded to pre0.59s
  
  
  
• Fixed the mpg123 library's limitation of not being able to play MPEG-2.5/8kHz data (Thanks to Northern Verse)

3. Download
in_mpg123_118ot72.zip Ver. 1.18y ot72 (764KB) (20040815)

If the previous link doesn't work, try this one: in_mpg123_118ot72a.zip

after copying the plug-in in your WA dir, be sure to remove the 'MP3' extention in the default 'Nullsoft MPEG audio decoder' (so that in_mpg123 will do mp3 decoding)

And here's the gapless output I use (was using err, when i used to use WA5 ) (ie point #2 in my first post)

Matthew Lloyd - Gapless output for WA

That's it

I've tested these plug-ins using my own rips using EAC secure mode, with LAME 3.90.3 and with MPC (natively gapless) and the results was perfect.

EDIT: P.S.: Of course, you could use foobar2000 to play all your mp3/mpc/ogg/flac/etc. without having to figure out what input/output plug-ins you actualy need... It is gapless right out of the box.

This post has been edited by be020261: Sep 16 2004, 13:43

[Madrigal]

And here's the gapless output I use (was using err, when i used to use WA5   ) (ie point #2 in my first post)
Matthew Lloyd - Gapless output for WA

The following is a user's review of Matthew Lloyd's plugin, taken directly from the above link (emphasis mine):

"User Review:
by Mike Mason
Feb. 9, 2003
Works a bit, but still leaves audible gaps (mp3s have silence at the start of them due to the way they're encoded). Mp3splice works much better, leaving no gaps, and is also available in the plugins section."

Download Mp3splice here.

Regards,
Madrigal

This post has been edited by Madrigal: Sep 16 2004, 17:09

[Never_Again]

For portable use, I found the following to work well:

1) Rip the CD with EAC using the Copy Image & Create CUE Sheet function.
2) Encode the resulting image (WAV) if you haven't already.
3) Split the MP3 with MusiCutter.

Once in MusiCutter, you will need to point it to the CUE sheet created in step #1. The splitting step is lossless: you can join the resulting individual MP3 tracks back into one big MP3 that will be the exact copy of the original big MP3 (created in step #2).

Works great with iRiver players and LAME CBR. I've had weird issues with --alt-preset standard though. The first track will loop infinitely and the player never advances to the next. That's using v3.96.1; the same problem with a downloaded nonstop mix encoded with v3.93.

Not an --alt-preset standard issue, to be sure; more like a peculiar iRiver bug.

[be020261]

And here's the gapless output I use (was using err, when i used to use WA5   ) (ie point #2 in my first post)
Matthew Lloyd - Gapless output for WA

The following is a user's review of Matthew Lloyd's plugin, taken directly from the above link (emphasis mine):

"User Review:
by Mike Mason
Feb. 9, 2003
Works a bit, but still leaves audible gaps (mp3s have silence at the start of them due to the way they're encoded). Mp3splice works much better, leaving no gaps, and is also available in the plugins section."

Download Mp3splice here.

Regards,
Madrigal

Ok you're right. I tried it and it works fine. I didn't test it much though, my external hdd is crashed () so i dont have much mp3 / files to test with it.

[Madrigal]

... my external hdd is crashed () so i dont have much mp3 / files to test with it.

Sorry to hear about your hdd ... I hope you have backup and can recover quickly.

Regards,
Madrigal

[be020261]

The problem is that Windoze doesn't recognize my drive anymore... Using R-Studio NTFS, I can recover everything (the 'FAT' (ie NTFS-FAT) is still intact... so as the data contained... ) Now, I need another 160gb drive for backup.

Did I say it's the second time that things happens to me?! (Maxtor DV5000 = ) The first time, I had the drive for 1 week!

This post has been edited by be020261: Sep 17 2004, 17:38

[gix_65]

If that doesn't help, then use Foobar

foobar is gapeless for default or which option I must set?

[Omion]

If that doesn't help, then use Foobar

foobar is gapeless for default or which option I must set?

It's gapless by default (actually I don't think there's an option to turn it off) as long as you encoded it with LAME 3.90 or greater.

Foobar reads the two delay numbers that recent LAMEs store in the MP3. If those numbers are not stored, then it's not gapless.

[gix_65]

And here's the gapless output I use (was using err, when i used to use WA5   ) (ie point #2 in my first post)
Matthew Lloyd - Gapless output for WA

Mp3splice works much better, leaving no gaps, and is also available in the plugins section."

Download Mp3splice here.

Regards,
Madrigal

I have tried the files of which over but I always listen considerable gap
between the tracks... then I have tried this plug-in and seems to work very better

winamp.com plug-in _._Gapless Audio Output by Christian Volmer

Christian Volmer's Comments:

This plug-in is capable of completely removing the gap between consecutive tracks in Winamp. "Completely" means: You won't hear the gap at all in 95% of all cases, in 4% of all cases you'll only realize the gap if you listen very carefully. And yes, this works with Pink Floyd!

[Madrigal]

Just to confirm that Volmer's plugin appears to work just as well as Mp3splice, and may in fact be a bit more manageable and non-intrusive than Mp3splice, when it comes to de-selecting or de-activating it.

Regards,
Madrigal

[burnett_s]

Well, I always rip a live or mix cd with the option 'Copy image and create cue sheet' in EAC Action options. Then I use foobar2000 to play the cue file and everything went just fine, until today.
Today, reading this post, I realized that foobar2000 is gapless by default as long as you rip the cd using EAC with LAME 3.90 or greater. So you can rip the cd with the usual method, song by song.
What a great news !!! So, the playback is gapless but if I want to burn this ripped album to a cd...and listen to it, are the silences between tracks still there or not? I mean, will I listen the silence between tracks or not?


EDIT: I forgot to tell you that I have correctly configured the Offsets correction of my drivers.

This post has been edited by burnett_s: Sep 20 2004, 04:53

[damagician]

I hear everyone saying that Foobar is gapless by default but I have just downloaded and installed and there are still gaps between tracks. They are no where near as bad as the gaps I was hearing in Winamp but they are still there.

Is there a setting I can change in order to correct this problem? Except for this little hickup Foobar seems to be a great music player.

[Omion]

I hear everyone saying that Foobar is gapless by default but I have just downloaded and installed and there are still gaps between tracks.  They are no where near as bad as the gaps I was hearing in Winamp but they are still there. 

Is there a setting I can change in order to correct this problem?  Except for this little hickup Foobar seems to be a great music player.

Well, as stated earlier in this thread, you need to encode the MP3s with the proper settings in order to play them back correctly. Re-encode the MP3s with a new version of LAME (or use Vorbis or MPC or pretty much any other codec) and Foobar will be able to play them without gaps.

Basically, it's probably a problem with the MP3s that you have, not something that Foobar's doing.

[edit: fixed link]

This post has been edited by Omion: Nov 23 2004, 11:34

[Synthetic Soul]

Not that it really needs confirming, but... :

I'd never really paid much attention to talk of gapless MP3s, but after reading this thread today I thought I'd give it a try this evening.

Dark Side of the Moon sprang immediately to mind as a source for my test...

I just listened to the LAME 3.96.1 MP3s in Foobar and it was a real joy to listen to. Considering that you don't need to do anything but encode with a newer version of LAME and playback with Foobar (tough choices all round) I think this is such a nice touch. If you need any persuasion to switch to LAME from another MP3 encoder, or Foobar from another player, I think this has got to be near the top of the list.

[damagician]

I was using a OGG files.

As I mentioned the gaps are miniscule but they do still exist. Sounds like a crunch when it moves onto the next song in a dj mix.

Don't want to sound like I'm moaning as I already prefer Foobar to any other media players as it simply just straight up plays music and doesn't seem to use up any of my system resources either which is a big plus.

This post has been edited by damagician: Nov 24 2004, 06:15