If you are reading this Thread take this in consideration:

1 - I don't need hardware support, because i record in real time for MiniDisc, so no need of portable players that support exclusively Mp3 or Ogg or anything Else.

2 - I only want QUALITY, i don't have my full CD'S in wave because just take to much space and that is just stupid with good lossy codecs out there.

3 - Take note that i use Gnu/Linux OS, Red Hat to be more precise.



Now what i want:

I Like OpenSource stuff like Xvid or Ogg, and i thought to encode all my stuff in Ogg Vorbis...i have made some questions in Ogg Forum to know more about this codec, i was entusiastic because by default Red Hat Support it....

But


I have seen some threads as well Polls that prefer MPC for instance (Take note I want the most possible Quality, i dont care for low bitrates), say's that MPC is the best regarding High Bitrates, in special above 160KB.It would be a good choice to encode all my stuff with this Codec??


Questions:

1 - If Mpc is really the best out there, how can i encode a movie (Divx or Xvid) with MPC audio (i only have seen support to Ogg, Mp3, Aac, AC3)??

2 - Again (No one have so far answered me this) How can i trim an Mpc, with a tool similar to MP3 Trim??

3 -So wich is the best regarding ONLY QUALITY??(I don't want to make mistakes because you must know the trouble it takes to encode all again without transcoding, and some CD'S aren't mine either).


Thanks for all your reply's and sorry if i'm asking stuff that you have answered before.

would the lossless formats take up too much space for you? That is all I use for the master archives, especially when I am borrowing the source 33/45/78 or CD.
edit: I normally use Flac for lossless and Ogg-Vorbis for lossy. Just started looking at Musepack but not sure how much I will use it.

I recommend you use MPC in braidead mode.

You'll get very good quality, but you won't be bitrates as high as lossless codecs would give you.

I have read this between Lossless and Lossy

The term "lossless" implies no loss. But no loss of what? > Audio fidelity. Lossy codecs [such as MP3 and Musepack] generate smaller files by discarding selected bits contained in the original songs [bits it thinks you won't notice when they're gone], Lossless codecs, on the other hand, keep *everything* .. all the audio information [bits] contained in the original song(s). Lossless codecs merely shrink the size of the original file/song by >compressing< it [usually by half].


Wich Lossless Codec do you recommend??

Flac, Monkey's

I heard that Flac support Linux but Monkey's Don't.

Xvid/DivX Movies can't have MPC playback yet AFAIK. For movies I use Ogg with q1 or q2, for my audio collection I use MPC Q5 which has IMHO good enough quality.

Your options seem to be:
Lossless (would occupy around 4 times more space): FLAC (better multiplatform support) BTW Monkey's Audio has Linux decoder binaries available as well, maybe there's an XMMS plug-in somewhere. Monkey's Audio has better compression ratio and support of bookmark style track access via APL files. FLAC has replaygain support.

Lossy: Musepack. I use "--quality 8 --xlevel --ms 15" but you can find some setting that suits you. Refer to the sticky thread in the Musepack forum.

Thanks Atici, Your reply's are very appreciated

AFAIK there's no cutter/splitter for MPC. Probably there'll be one sooner or later when Stream Version 8 is finished (will be open source IIRC). If you use foobar2000 you can use cue sheets as "replacement".

There are some threads about transcoding lossy codecs to minidisc (tested by Den). Wavpack lossy seems to be best for this purpose. Should be in one of these threads.

Musepack's Linux support is excellent. En/Decoder binaries are available at Case's and Klemm's site, which also has the latest XMMS PlugIn and linux compiles of APE. For lossless I'd personally prefer FLAC though.

dev0

This is the link for Monkey's Audio linux binaries. You can probably find an XMMS plugin because this link mentions the existence of one. This is another relevant link. This and this link are good for Monkey's Audio vs. FLAC comparison.

You also have one more option:
Nonperceptual lossy codecs: OptimFrog Dual Stream, WavPack lossy. These codecs are useful if you consider transcoding and looking for a codec that does not have an psychoacoustic ear model.

If you want very high quality then this is how the average bitrates compare:

MPC insane preset : around 240kbps
MPC braindead --ms 15 : around 280kbps
WavPack/OptimFrog : around 400kbps
Lossless: around 700 kbps

Thanks for all your reply's and help


I think i made my choices

To my favourite CD'S i will use Lossless, i think i will go for Flac, i don't want to loose a single bit from my Guns N' Roses Collection or U2.


To the Others i will use MusePack, with Insane Preset.

The problem will be when i share music from my FTP or by P2P, I think people will thought i have renamed my file Extension from MP3 to MPC


Well i think i will manage now, again thanks for all your knowledge.

Don't the rules of this forum mean you can't make a statement that goes against popular belief without backing it up with proof that its true? The popular belief is that mpc in standard mode is 99.9% transparent and that samples that arn't transparent arn't usually any better with higher settings...

For MPC, use standard... if you want that warm fussy feeling, use extreme, but no higher! There really isn't any need and most people will back me up on this!

So, to answer Sniffer's questions, it sounds like your best bet is mpc at quality 5 (standard)... unless you wan't DivX/XviD compatibility then its Ogg, but you arnt going to encode your mpc music files into video streams are you? so use MPC for music, Ogg for movie...

Hope this helps!

Now, we know you arn't talking about sharing pirated music are we?

Yes,

That's a good choice ogg to movies, i have read that ogg do at least the same or better job than a MP3 File,

I think for movies i will go for Open Source Road

OGM File
XVID Codec
OGG VORBIS Audio




For my CD'S i will take another Road , so maybe there isn't enought point going higher then Standard Quality, hmm..... I think my ears will tell something then, when choosing the right preset.

PS: I'm seeing the Flac and Monkey's options now, they have different option in compression, for instance they will affect somehow quality if i choose different ways of compression, i have in FLAC

From 0 to 8

in Monkeys

i have fast;normal;high

How do you know there're no MPC sharing communities out there?



Well that's also your personal opinion, what proof do you have? As you go higher in the quality scale your resulting file approximates the original better. There's no doubt to that because you can explicitly calculate the encoder noise. Therefore one might need qualities higher than standard MPC because of DSP usage and transcoding needs, which are normally difficult to reconcile with lossy codecs. That's why the nonperceptual codecs are chosen over perceptual ones sometimes, because perceptual lossy codecs do not assume post processing in their bitrate calculations to achieve transparency. Refer to this discussion.

Not really, all my stuff the ones i really like are originals and i encode them to get it all in my PC

Altought

I get music in MP3 And others formats in sharing and If i like it much, i go to a shop and i bought the original, so when i encode i get awesome quality, I only encode music from Originals CD's because the pirate ones you always get artifacts and some others noising stuff too. B)

Yea i totally agree that its my personal opinon, but its also the opinion of many people of this forum... there is no doubt that a higher quality setting results in a higher quality file, but on 99% of music, standard is sufficient. Also when standard fails, it fails at higher settings too (just not as badly) and most people on this forum would agree with me. And when MPC fails, the most sensitive ears on here sometimes don't hear it. All I was doing was reminding people of dibroms rule about spreding innaccurate information based on opinions without the facts to prove it. I don't need to prove what i'm saying as it doesn't go against what is common knowledge on this forum; It has been discussed and exausted many times on this forum. He also didn't mention the requirement of transcoding (although minidisc is transcoding ) so unless he wants maximum transcoding ability there really isnt any need for anything more than standard... if transcoding is important, then he really should use lossless (as he says bitrate isn't important)

Sorry if this has come across as offensive, but its unintentional and essencial!

use mpc
1. the fastest in encoding - decoding
2. one of the best in quality (for me it's the best)
3. gapeless (suitable for live recordings ripping)

you can listen to your music with winamp

With MPC, the current rule is that standard is enough.
I'm however going to test more.

It it's not true that standard problems are not solved at higher settings.
Amnesia is nearly solved at insane. It's still ABXable, but is nowhere near annoying as in standard.
Xerophase's 2.wav sample is also solved at insane. ( http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....125#entry116538 )

I didn't try Astral nor Transwave at insane.

Sniffer, if you losslessly copy the Ac3 stereo audio of the DVD, you get 192 kbps in stereo. Why transcode to save so few bits ?

winamp??? Oh yeah, that thing I completely uninstalled a while back

I certainly missed something during the last year. In the growing library of --standard probem samples, I can't remember one file claimed to be non transparent at --insane or --braindead.
On rare cases, and extreme listening conditions (> 100 times the same second), I found some remaining artifacts with musepack --insane : one harpsichord sample, the Jump sample, and castanets.wav last year. At --braindead, the harpsichord sample was fully transparent. And for castanets.wav, ABX results weren't entirely trustful.

Standard profile is obviously very good, but certainly not perfect. It doesn't mean than mpc isn't able to keep an artifact-free sound : higher bitrate will correct most problems. Could you, please, give your links for samples or discussions about --insane/braindead problems ?

LAME 3.90.3, LAME 3.90.3, LAME 3.90.3

atici:


You mean, by listening to the difference file between encode and original? Come on, don't start that again, please...



So... if you have a --standard and an --insane file which sound exactly the same (both transparent), the --insane one will somehow magically sound better than the --standard one when passed through a DSP? I'd like to see you ABXing *that*.

I'm a regular Minidisc user, and all the lossy codecs I have tried have caused some degree of artifacts when transcoded to Minidisc, at all bit rate settings, except two, Wavpack lossy and Optifrog Dualstream. B)

(I have found artifacts in certain pieces when transcoding from mpc, vorbis, mp3 and AAC to Minidisc, including at the highest bit rate settings.)

If required I have samples that demonstrate this, but they are also posted elsewhere on this forum...

The classic "lossy codec transcoding to ATRAC killer" is Blue Monday - New Order.

Later,

Den.

Come on man. What a waste of space. If you don't care about space, use lossless. If you do, use mpc standard. Anything over standard gets you the worst of both worlds.