I have about 50 CDs to rip. And i have a question about the recommended version of the MPC encoder. Which of them is better to use?
Yes i have read the "Recommender MPC Settings" at the top of the forum, but i want an answer from those who have really tested both versions.
I am going to use "--quality 5 --xlevel" settings.
Just in case: the CDs are mostly Pink Floyd bootlegs+some PF studio albums.

Quality is approx. the same. Sometimes 1.15r is better, sometimes worse. For most people and most samples, there's no audible difference.
1.15r is slightly less efficient (bitrate increase: 2...15 kbps per track)
1.15r don't store the profile name in metadata (replaced by "unstable/experimental")
1.15r have a bug with some wav file, when metadata are added at the end (problem founded by Pio2001).

Thanks!
I actually was thinking about using 1.14, but nedded some opinions that would ensure me

1.15r files aren't properly supported by the Winamp plugin as far as Replaygain info is concerned (the RG tags are written, but the plugin can't read them). Most people I know still use Winamp2/5 as their primary player, and this means 1.15r files with Replaygain tags are a pain. Having the encoder profile visible is also a clear plus to me.

The profile, encoder revision can easily be stored in the comment field.


This shouldn't effect CD audio which is what's most commonly used.

I thought it was agreed that at quality 7 & above 1.15r out performs 1.14b?

Yes, but in some cases, it's not as useful (cf. Mpeg Audio Collection for exemple, or fb2k "mpc_profile" string).

As far as I can tell, you must be doing something wrong when replay-gaining. I've been using 1.15r for months with no problems. Playback in Winamp 2.81/Musepack plugin .98 with replaygain title based/clip protect off is flawless with encodes all the way back to Klemm's .90i (the earliest I could find in my collection). Foobar .7.7b seems to work perfectly as well.

I've got over 10,000 encodes in the last 2.5 years, all replaygained within the last 18 months and I have yet to find a problem. The combination of musepack's fidelity, regainability, gaplessness, speed, and file size make it a hard option to ignore. Maybe someday we'll get stand alone hardware compatibility as well. One can only hope.

Posts related to the disadvantages of choosing MPC are split here as the topic is the choice between two MPC encoder versions only. Please continue related discussion there.

I use 1.14 purely for the fact that it doesn't put the "Unstable/Experimental" tag in my files. On MusePack it is very very hard to spot differences at high bitrates (I use --xtreme --xlevel) so I don't bother using the Alphas for anything else other than testing.

Regards

AgentMil

I remember it was the other way 'round. And that was the result of a test with a very specific sample.
No reason for me to stop using 1.14b

edit: link to thread