new Open Source mp3 Encoder from Helix Community Options

[DigitalDictator]

when (if) the quality of the encoder has been checked out, would it be possible to "borrow" some ideas and implement them into LAME? Or maybe vice versa? If, as Gabriel states, the code is much more simple to understand?

[Enig123]

I have the same kind of question. Can this encoder be improved based on that wierd license.

For LAME, I'm sure 4.x series will be much readable than current branch.

[Enig123]

I'm trying to compile it with ASM, but they don't even mention what assembler you should be using! Hopefully it's MASM...

All but "pow34.asm" can be compiled with MASM. The last binary I upload didn't use this asm.

I'll upload the third compile with "pow34.asm" used (use the .obj file from cvs to link).

Edit: the third compile upload down.

This post has been edited by Enig123: Jul 15 2005, 15:36

[rjamorim]

when (if) the quality of the encoder has been checked out, would it be possible to "borrow" some ideas and implement them into LAME? Or maybe vice versa? If, as Gabriel states, the code is much more simple to understand?

The licenses are conflicting.

[Garf]

Licenses can't prevent you from borrow ideas.

Patents do that.

[Enig123]

The project file for compilation uploaded.

There's 2 files modified by CML, who compiled it. It's "tomp3.cpp" and "xhead.c"

You can download it here:

http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....showtopic=35540

[Mo0zOoH]

Licenses can't prevent you from borrow ideas.

Patents do that.

True. One doesn't have to copypaste anyone's code, he can just write the same thing by himself.

[Gabriel]

when (if) the quality of the encoder has been checked out, would it be possible to "borrow" some ideas and implement them into LAME? Or maybe vice versa? If, as Gabriel states, the code is much more simple to understand?

Well, if there are good ideas, perhaps they will also be used in Lame. However, please note that the Real encoder is way simpler than Lame, and its quality is probaly lower than the Lame one (but it should still be a overall good encoder).

Regarding implementing stuff from Lame into Real's encoder, I am wondering why would anyone do that, except people from Real. Remember that Real's encoder, while beeing open source (ie source are available) is still Real's full property.

However I like seeing clean audio encoders that work well, this is refreshing fo me.

[nyaochi]

I was surprised at the encoding speed of Helix MP3 encoder and made a comparison with other MP3 (and some codecs for reference) encoders in 128kbps range. Helix VBR mode (with ASM enabled) is really fast and impressive. IMHO the sound quality of -V75, which gives roughly 128kbps, is even better than F-IIS CBR 128kbps (no detailed comparison done, sorry). Quality comparison with Gogo3.13a -b128 might be interesting for impatient users.



Here's a list of binaries I used for this comparison:
- Helix MP3 Encoder (the third revision, with assembly code enabled)
- Fraunhofer IIS MPEG Layer-3 ACM Codec (professional) (with ACMENC)
- LAME MP3 Encoder 4.0 alpha 14
- LAME MP3 Encoder 3.97 alpha 11
- GOGO-no-coda ver. 3.13
- Ogg Vorbis aoTuV beta 4 with speed optimization (Lancer 20050709)
- MPC Encoder 1.15v
- Monkey's Audio 3.99
- FLAC 1.1.2
- WavPack 4.2

EDIT: I added the list of binary links.
EDIT2: I added "LAME4 -V4 --noreplaygain" (just for reference ) since it's 20% faster (according to Takehiro).
EDIT3: I added the results for Helix MP3 encoder with "-U2" option enabled. Now "gogo 3.13a -b128" and "mp3enc -V75 -X2 -U2" are tied in terms of encoding speed.

This post has been edited by nyaochi: Jul 19 2005, 14:50

[rjamorim]

Insane speeds indeed.

And I'm amazed that so many encoders are faster than MPC. I had never seen a comparison like that.

[mixderax]

Does those results use the new faster compile of mppenc 1.15v

[nyaochi]

Does those results use the new faster compile of mppenc 1.15v

Yeah, I downloaded mppenc yesterday from musepack.net .

[[JAZ]]

I was surprised at the encoding speed of Helix MP3 encoder [...]

Since Helix MP3 encoder is based on Xing version 2, and that encoder performed 8x faster than the encoders of that time (at least that was the slogan), I don't see this as much as a surprise, but as a confirmation of the source, and a good job at maintaining the efficiency when improving the encoder.
It performed almost realtime (or maybe a bit faster) in a P-133 while LAME of that time ( 3.20? 3.40? can' remember) took around 20 minutes for a 4 minute song in the same machine.

On the other side, nice graph. Now, as you say, the interesting thing is the ABX test against gogo

[Pri3st]

nyaochi,
Did you try the latest binary? For my PC Helix MP3 Encoder is the fastest.

WAV 45:23
Helix MP3 Encoder 0:37
GOGO 3.13 1:52
Ogg Lancer 1:56
MPC 1.15v 2:27
FAAC 1.24.1 4:16
Lame 3.97a10 4:45
Nero 3.2.0.7 6:11

WinXP SP2, AMD Sempron 2400+, 512mb ram

[nyaochi]

Did you try the latest binary? For my PC Helix MP3 Encoder is the fastest.

Yes, the third version as I wrote in the list of encoders. I have no idea why Gogo is so slow on your machine, but the other figures look reasonable to me.

[DigitalDictator]

Regarding implementing stuff from Lame into Real's encoder, I am wondering why would anyone do that, except people from Real. Remember that Real's encoder, while beeing open source (ie source are available) is still Real's full property.

Naw... I don't know if I want that really... I must say I'm totally lost when it comes to licences and patents. You say it's open source but still full property of Real's? So, can the encoder be forked? Are third party allowed to tune it? Or do you have to ask Real before you release a tweaked version? Are they still working on it?

I tried it out and the speed is jaw dropping. I will try to ABX it at around 128 kbps. I totally suck at ABXing but I'll give it a try.

[Enig123]

Everybody,

Helix mp3 encoder can be even faster when use -U2 switch, which include optimization for P3 (SSE?).

With all these speed optimization, the output MP3 file are not bit-identical. But it may not suffer the quality much (someone can explain if this statement is true?).

Edit: some error corrections

This post has been edited by Enig123: Jul 17 2005, 03:38

[Enig123]

New project uploaded. Code cleaned and all asm can be compiled by MASM now.

[karl_lillevold]

Thanks for all your tweaking, compiling, and testing. I will download the latest exe and try it out myself I have to admit, this is much more feedback than I had ever expected when I announced the release on doom9. I was going to announce on hydrogenaudio too, but kurtnoise beat me to it ...

[Enig123]

Thanks for all your tweaking, compiling, and testing. I will download the latest exe and try it out myself I have to admit, this is much more feedback than I had ever expected when I announced the release on doom9. I was going to announce on hydrogenaudio too, but kurtnoise beat me to it ...

All these works are due to my friend CML, who do all these tweaking, compiling, and testing.

I'll thank you, karl_lillevold. You bring us this good mp3 encoder.

Now we all are expecting for guruboolez's next test report on lossy codecs @ 96k.

[guruboolez]

About my next test: few words to say that I'm currently in holidays, and I can't consequently work for my test. Don't expect anything before 2 weeks I'd say

[Squeller]

~16 seconds for a 5:18 Minutes track on my old Intel PIII500 with "-V90 -X -U2" this is a ratio of almost tracktime/20! With Lame vbr-new I have somewhere between 3-4 and 2 in old vbr mode.

This post has been edited by Squeller: Jul 17 2005, 15:53

[Enig123]

There's some 'hidden' switches to play with this encoder. But some of them don't even have notes in the source code.

For example, there's a '-tx', default is 8, later altered to 6. With larger -tx, the produced file became bigger. Can someone tell me what the hell this switch down?

The correspond source is in bitallo3.cpp, line which contain

CODE

f = ba_control.test1;

And I wonder if there's something can do with the lowpass frequency. Default lowpass never exceed 16k Hz.

[DigitalDictator]

Maybe Karl Lillevold can tell us a little bit more about those switches, e.g. -U2, what happens with the quality when you add it? Are there any switches that bring down the speed but increase the quality?

[Enig123]

Helix mp3 encoder windows binary rev4 uploaded.

This version has more detailed switch description with -Help

Edit: This rev5 has no restriction to -hf switch.


As of the quality with high frequencies encoded, can someone with good hearing do some listening tests?

This post has been edited by Enig123: Jul 18 2005, 11:06