NSTL WMA Pro listening test, MS claims test proves WMA Pro > HE-AAC Options

[[JAZ]]

i think they are 'supposed' to represent a % quality.. but they are just high-to-low (or should it say low-to-lower... uh oh.. i better watch out for tos8)

Have you heard problems with a ~240Kbps VBR (Q98) wma 9.1 file to say it is low quality?

[Woodinville]

i think they are 'supposed' to represent a % quality.. but they are just high-to-low (or should it say low-to-lower... uh oh.. i better watch out for tos8)

Have you heard problems with a ~240Kbps VBR (Q98) wma 9.1 file to say it is low quality?

How about this new report (DBT and all) on WMA Pro quality?

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsme...Comparison.aspx

[Woodinville]

I must admit that I am both offended and annoyed by the various insinuations in this thread. Hence, I shall say nothing here, and await evidence of the various insinuations and suggestions.

[Garf]

I must admit that I am both offended and annoyed by the various insinuations in this thread. Hence, I shall say nothing here, and await evidence of the various insinuations and suggestions.

I'll make 2 factual observations:

1) If I follow the test procedure, the Nero files will be 64kbps LC-AAC, not HE-AAC. In their very detailed description, they simply didn't enable HE-AAC in the settings dialog. You can easily verify this with Nero 7 (even the free demo version should work).

Edit: Since this behaviour seems to have been fixed/may not have existed in the version used, you can ignore this for the sake of argument. I'll replace it by: 1) It seems impossible to verify the test results and setup.

2) They consulted with MS how to set up WMA and got new tools that are apparently not publicly available. They didn't consult with us, and used an old version of the Nero AAC encoder.

This post has been edited by Garf: Jan 14 2006, 16:02

[Latexxx]

1) If I follow the test procedure, the Nero files will be 64kbps LC-AAC, not HE-AAC. In their very detailed description, they simply didn't enable HE-AAC in the settings dialog. You can easily verify this with Nero 7 (even the free demo version should work).

If this is the case, somebody should contact Microsoft because they can't keep that comparison online if they know that it is completely false. Of course they could still keep it on their page but that would likely be illegel if they keep claiming that the paper proves wma's superiority to he aac.

And doesn't that mean that Microsoft's hyper super ultra new and amazing WMA 10 Pro + is only tied with lc aac instead of he aac.

This post has been edited by Latexxx: Jan 14 2006, 14:03

[guruboolez]

Of course they could still keep it on their page but that would likely be illegel if they keep claiming that the paper proves wma's superiority to he aac.

Illegal? Do you mean that results of a test shouldn't be revealed if one term of the comparison is buggy?