I quickly performed a wma9 standard and wma9 called PRO test, based on the 12 same samples of the AAC 128 kbps listening test, launched by Roberto Amorim.
I used dBpowerAmp for this (I'm still on Win98SE, and WMEncoder 9 didn't work on this platform).
Settings are :

• WMA9 "Standard" 128 two-pass
• WMA9 "PRO" 128 two-pass

File bitrate is pretty reliable (128 kbps in all case). Microsoft named the 2-pass mode as 'VBR' ; I suppose 'ABR' to be a better name.

I didn't spent too much time for this test (20 minutes). Don't put too much attention is the absolute notation ; hierarchy was my only goal.



WMA9 PRO wins easily. Only failure was with Death2.WAV - absolute killer for wma9pro at 128 kbps (wma9 std is really bad too).
=> WMA9 PRO is, according to my subjectivity (ear, training, tastes), the best competitor of the WMA lossy family at ~128 kbps.

I don't understand your conclusion, do you mean that from this test, WMA9 Pro and WMA9 are the two top codecs @ ~128kbps ?

Sorry for my bad english.
I just said that WMA9 PROFESSIONAL is better than WMA9 STANDARD, at least for me, and on 11 of the 12 samples tested here. In the optic of a general listening test at ~128 kbps, WMA9PRO should be prefered to WMA9 'STD'

Ok. Thank you for the clarification.
So, at ~128kbps the worst aac codec (~3.5) sounds generally better than wma9pro (~3.2) which sounds generally better than wma9 (assuming results are comparable).

I repeat my preliminary warning :
« Don't put too much attention is the absolute notation ; hierarchy was my only goal. »

Thanks a lot for this test, Guruboolez. It will be very useful to the extension test.

I'm now testing, for fun, and in the same conditions, vorbis GT2 and vorbis PCVS. Results are coming soon



EDIT : results are posted here.

A comparison with Lame at preset 144 would be very interesting.
I'm a owner of a Jukebox 3 from Creative and have to decide between two possibilities to save space (convert over 200 CD's):

WMA9-2-pass at 128kbps (ABR) or preset 144.
At this moment, I prefer Lame, would be nice to know your opinion in this case ;-)

excuse me ?

AlfO4: does the jukebox 3 take <EDIT> WMA9PRO ?
I don't think so....

I've tested it :

The Jukebox takes WMA 9, even with 2-pass-encoding.

There are no Problems with fast forward/rewind-Function if the actual Firmware is installed.

And what about WMA9 PRO ? I don't think that any portable player in the market supports this format. WMA9 standard is not really interesting at ~128 kbps, compared to LAME --preset ABR, except in encoding speed.

I'm pretty sure WMAv9 and WMAv9 PRO are backwards compatible with older WMA.

...hm doubtfull about pro, would be good though

Yes, you're right. This Jukebox doesn't support WMA9 pro.

BTW: a conclusion in this case is, that there' no reason (except speed is important) to use WMA9 standard anyway ?

Pro seems to be either a different codec or modded so much it won't work on normal WMA players.

I'm not sure at all. Software player can't play 'pro' version without new decoder (try with winamp for exemple). I can't imagine hardware decoder being more responsive. BTW, I asked some people to try with their portable (Additek, iBead, iRiver), and WMA9 PRO files were not played.

Wow, I had never seen this thread. WMA Pro is significantly better than WMA. Now I know why Roberto's test only used WMA Pro.

Given that the recording industry seems set on WMA, and to a lesser extent AAC, for digital distribution - does anyone know how we can contact MS and convince them to only allow the higher quality WMA Pro recordings to the industry and, more importantly, get firmware upgrades out into the market ASAP! I have tried but can find no forum.

I find it intesresting that WMA Pro is not even an option for encoding with WMP - which is what 99% of the people who make WMA encodings use. I use dBPoweramp.

Any suggestions? I would like to help. WMA Pro for digital distribution and portable use does not seem like such a terrible option. (Yes, I know everyone in this forum wants OGG for distribution but is just not likley to happen).

Pardon me, but I find the logic understandable.
He's just saying that when we do any future 128 kbps tests, we should be pitting wma9 PRO against the other rival codecs as it is IHHO the best of those produced by Microsoft .

ok, WMP XP doesn't have any encoder called Pro since MS ended BETA test. What do you refer to as pro and non-pro? CBR, VBR, Lossless?

If memory serves, Lossless was called PRO in the early Betas.

They do, at least here:

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsme...decs/audio.aspx

and there is a bunch of profiles created for WMA Pro, but they are either 24bit, or 5.1 I think with the custom profile creator you could create what ever profile you wanted.

<I'm blind>

To Spoon's point, there are 3 codecs - WMA 9, WMA 9 Pro, WMA 9 Lossless.

The problem is, only the 1st is compatible with portables and the Pro version is where the comparatively high quality is achieved at the 128 VBR level. Lossless is, well...lossless. Great for archiving, not much else.

So the question is repeated, does anyone know how we can contact MS and convince them to only allow the higher quality WMA Pro recordings to the industry and, more importantly, get firmware upgrades out into the market ASAP

Of course you are! There's a black strip in front of your eyes.

IMO, if Microsoft convinced the industry to support only WMA pro now, they would be shooting their own feet.

I can only imagine that an user will be extremely pissed when he finds out that the WMA pro tune he just bought at some site isn't playable in his portable player.

I think M$ will only start to seriously advertize WMA pro after it gets widespread support.

Regards;

Roberto.

@ezra
who cares, since wma pro didn't win the contest either. industry should be convinced to drop any wma derivate and use AAC aditionally to the standard mp3.

Well, in a perfect world, industry would use MPC - its better even than AAC and more importantly, gapless. But this is not a perfect world. M$ has the muscle to get their codec in use. That is just the reality of the world. 4 new players are debuting this summer. The RCA and Philips HD players are great. Both are MP3 and WMA compliant, not AAC or MPC or OGG.

If we are destined for WMA, and unless something major happens with AAC, we are - we might as well seek the highest quality available.

Of course if you continue to buy your own CDs and encode yourself, you can use whatever the heck codec you want - just very limited on where you listen to your tunes unless they are WMA or MP3.

In a perfect world some huge company like MS or say Apple would go and buy all the MPC technology and support & promote it within the industry. Without this we will see no hardware MPC players in our lifetimes (except for PDAs indeed, but that's a different story) Can you imagine DVD player which is MPEG4 Video/Voribs/MP3/MP3PRO/AAC/MPC compatible and with good parts connected to your sound system? I would pay 500+$ for such device

One of those mini pcs the Size of a brick?




If they purchased a DRM WMA Pro from 'Microsoft Music Online', I am pretty sure WMP will convert it on the fly to a portable, the end user wouldn't know it was no longer WMA Pro.

@ rjamorim
is cdex able to encode wma9 pro files?

Non

It looks like rio is finally giving the OGGies their player. That's good news!!! Now let's hope, Rio supports WMA9 Pro as well. Hard to tell. They support WMA, but indeterminable if Pro.

For one thing its Ogg not OGG, and for another I think most people on this fourm would FAR perfer to see MPC for distribution.

how come? Your program can encode wma files, so why not wma9 Pro files? Will there be an update in the near future?
thanks

Add me to that list! If your statement is true, the the MPC folk are far quieter than the OGGies.

I would love it if all the legitimate music sites 'standardized' music distribution with the MPC codec around 160, supported my multiple players.

Gapless, highest quality, what more do you want?

Until then, I like the prospects for WMA9 Pro. Big company support, gapless, fared very well in sound test.