Hi, I'm tired of MPC and I'd like to use Ogg.
Would someone tell me which quality I better used if I want to get the same quality than Xtreme MPC preset.
Thanks

Vorbis isn't as high quality as MPC at any bitrate yet, unfortunately. It can get close in many cases, but the consistency, in comparison to MPC, really isn't there yet.

However, if you'd still like to try and shoot for something comparable, I believe -q6 or -q7 might do it.

Thanks for answering.
I know MPC is finalized and is the best today's encoder but so many say that it's better to encode braindead instead of standart or xtrem to prepare to transcode when OGG will be good....
I'm afraid MPC could die in 5-6 years..., I have some MPCs I want to keep for a long time.
I'm listening Classic or Metal, no electronic music, so I think OGG could be good enough now to give me what I need (being franc, I can't hear any difference between Ogg q-6 and the cd on a Wagner opera).

When you say "Vorbis isn't as high quality as MPC at any bitrate yet", do you mean that even q-9 ain't as good as Mpc at any bitrates or just that I have to use Ogg 256 where I used MPC 192 (that's just an example).

Just one more question: can I tag my oggs with APE?

planning 5-6 years into the future is impossible in this world.
IMO the best thing you can do is shoot for best quality NOW and then be able to transcode if it should ever be neccesary.
Anyway, given the amount of ppl that are actually using mpc and that the decoder is open it should be possible to play the files in the future.

OGG is not tuned for high bitrates, and anything above -q6 is not as effective as you may think. Right now I believe all the tuning is focused on the lower bitrates until OGG is competitively strong.
OGG hasn't reached the same 'maturity' as MPC thus being slightly less reliable.

Cheers,
David

At the same bitrate, at least down to about 160kbps (possibly down to 128kbps according to ff123's test... maybe even more so with Frank's PNS implementation), MPC should win out almost all of the time I believe.

The main issue is consistency and reliability. There are many samples where ogg still has problems; it still has lots of tuning left to be done. You may be able to drown some of this out by using extremely high bitrates (300kbps or so), but there's no guarentee that will work as often as is thought either...

This isn't to say that ogg isn't good.. it certainly is, but I wouldn't really go to Ogg expecting to get identical quality to MPC at this point.



I don't think so, but why would you possibly want to? The Ogg tagging scheme is much more suited for the format and really is quite robust.

Oh, and about planning for the future, I agree with Jan here. It's almost impossible to know what is going to happen in 5-6 years. There's still no absolute hard certainty that Ogg Vorbis will be around then either, though I do agree it's much more likely to gain more of a foothold than MPC in that period of time. I think the important part is that you will always be able to decode your MPC's since the decoder is open source. I also think that it's fairly likely that in 5-6 years, it'd be possible to get portable audio players which are programmable in a manner in which adding support for new formats is fairly trivial... so hardware support shouldn't be so much of a concern then either.

'tired'?

Xtreme is very high quality. Are you sure that you need to encode at that quality? Speaking for myself, I don't notice any artifacts past -q 5 with Vorbis... (that's around 160kb/s).

Have fun trying out Vorbis. The best thing you can do is to try out various quality levels for yourself. If you are one of the 0.01% with batlike ears, you may not find Vorbis good enough for you - but it's certainly good enough for me

When I wrote "tired of MPC", I was not thinking about quality (MPC standart is perfect for me) but about this "obsession" which consists in encoding braindead to transcode (to ogg) later.

Just a question : "no problem to play my MPC in the future because the decoder is open" , what does it mean:
-I will always be able to decode my MPCs to wave ?
or -I will always be able to decode or play my MPCs ? (I know that decoders are used to transcode or decode, but I don't know if they're also used for plug-ins, ... ).

A decoder is anything that converts encoded data back into something resembling its original form. In the case of audio, the original form would be standard PCM data.

When people say the decoder is "open," they mean that the source code is freely available for developers to use and modify (within the limits of the license, of course). This means that if some OS doesn't support MPC, a decoder could be written for this OS by anyone willing to spend some time doing it. The mppdec source is highly portable and can be compiled pretty much anywhere.

I wouldn't worry about MPC dying. It has support from people who wouldn't let it die.

Decode to wave and playing is basically the same thing. The only difference is what you do with the decoded data.

/Andreas

Edit: I was to slow...

have no fear. any musepack encoder binary within this year will beat the sheit out of any other format now, and in the future [maybe not psytel aac... ivan is the man, you know] at or above whatever the standard profile can handle.

the decoder and plugins will always be free.

and as long as Case, Trelane, or Klemm are still around, the format really can't die under any circumstances short of nuclear winter...that might squash any myoozepack dreams...

there will always be a community of musepack users because it maintains "the sheit" status in any audiophile community other than the deep forests of brazil.

if you are planning to transcode, use at least "--insane --minSMR 0" as your source,
but if the future format is mp3...don't bother with the increasing the bitrate more, as mp3 will just chop it all away anyhow.


later
mike

I am thinking this is a stereotype. Eveyone has there own opinion though.

Both formats really strive for physcoacoustic diffrences to achieve subjective transparency. I don't want to get into the main details, because like always this will turn into a shouting match rather than people stating there opinions as if so often does. MPC is a physcoacoustically strong codec that Andre Buschmann and Frank Klemn not to mention a few others have put a lot of hard work into and experimented with various diffrences to make MPEG physcoacoustics algorithm better over time, however please don't quote me on this. Don't forget a lot of the the physcoacoutic principal the codec makes use of are still patented and it is not entirly free, next to the decoder which is open-source. Vorbis on the other hand is an open-source codec, that for the current time being may not be as physcoacoustically strong as MPC, but at the same time is open and free for everyone. The format does not infringe upon any patents and the codec is design from the ground up. This is a big accomplishment for many lead developers like Monty who did extensive research and put in a lot of effort and time as well into the codec. I am not saying the codec is better don't quote me on that either, however over time like MPC it will eventually become better, because it is free and open.

P.S can we please stop making posts about other formats that are not format specific to these forums. This is what brings about much greivence in many. I think a better title would have just been "I have a question about OGG" didn't need to add MPC in front of it.

being free and open in no way guarantees that progress will be made.

on the contrary, klemm has been working his ass off and has released dozens of binaries incorporating much change and improvements.

sure, when ogg vorbis is a higher quality format then musepack, i will use it... but just because it is open source doesn't mean i will drop my trousers for the *SOLE* beneficial aspect of the gpl [bsd actually, thanx roberto].

i have yet to pay for any musepack software, and right now musepack is free and far more advanced than ogg vorbis will be in the near future... [or ever be - most likely]

and the "stereotype" is quite true, and in no way argued by even developers of the other formats.

aac, mp3 and musepack all share the use of patents...but no one shouts about mp3 not being free...i wonder why?

it isn't people like me that create wars...it is the people who call a fact a sterotype. "EVERYONE CAN HAVE THEIR OWN OPINION" ...this is true, but only one will be the correct one...i see you don't have it, either.

believe it or not, but usually [i dare not say all the time] the posts follow the thread and the questions arisen by members...and this being an audio community, i don't see why other formats should be left unanswered for...if you wan't that kind of behaviour perhaps the r3mix board is more your place...

everything in this post is factual, btw.


later
mike

Quick correction: Vorbis libs are released under BSD license. Not that it's much better than GPL. Oh, well. :-P



I agree, we can't lock a thread to the forum subject where it's located. Since this is a discussion, it's perfectly natural that it goes from one subject (or format) to another.

Besides, the thread author wanted to talk about MPC and Vorbis (Specifically, compare eachother). Since there isn't a "MPC and Vorbis" forum, it think it's righteous that he can choose the MPC or the Vorbis forum to post his thread.

Regards;

Roberto.

No, it doesn't, but still you can't bargain with it something that is open-source and free. I don't want to get anyone else involved in this, but Frank Klemnn certainly didn't build the physcoacoustics algorithm from the ground up, he did make some major improvements on the codec though and he deserves credit for that and he does work hard. The codec was Andree Buschmann's idea, but since he was rather quite "busy' he doesn't get to work on it rather much no? and don't forget the physcoacoustic algorithm is still patented in some form or another and the ideas are rather "borrowed" for the design of the codec, but if you had to choose between improving upon an algorithm or building one from the ground up? which one would you pick? more than likely you would want an algorithm that conforms to the "standards" or one that you can greatly improve on rather than trying design one yourself. no?




Why would they have to? nobody else's opinion seems to matter much to you. I don't want to get into a shouting argument, and im sure you don't neither. It seems that way to me at least though.



Well, I don't know about that physcoacoustically different would probably be a better choice of words, because they are.



Some facts are stereotype's in a way though? no?



In one sense that's true in another I am not so sure.
every other day I hear people shouting about free "music" on the internet. RIAA is always getting on someone's case about something, and Fraunhoffer is making a hefty penny on everyone that "borrows" there patents. I might have misunderstood your answer here if so I obligue you to correct me.



My questions get left unanswered all of the time go figure. I was just saying that each section is format specific for a reason, not that it wasn't right to post to other forums, but it always causes large uproars like so and we would be "better off" if there was no cross-talk "sometimes".

With that said feel free to enlighten me

my understanding is that klemm has completely rewritten the format. and i would take buschmann's 1.7.9 over any ogg vorbis version any day.

are you saying that monty didn't borrow a single idea for ogg vorbis? i hope not.

i will pick the best format.

the rest of this sentence makes absolutely no sense...i hope YOU know what you are trying to say...



congratulations. your opinion is officially the only opinion i couldn't care less about.



i still don't know what you are talking about...



i hope this is just a "for the record" type of statement, because if this is truely an argument...

a FACT can be a stereotype, yes...like saying "if your name is hotshottgg, then you are a moron." is both a fact [possibly] and a stereotype i have just created.



this situation has NOTHING to do with an audio compression format. it does, however, have EVERYTHING to do with the situation of people sharing music they have not paid the artist for [a thing called royalties]. fhg holds some patents, as well as an uncountable amount of other companies, in regards to audio compression - but it is ACTING on these patents that matter.



pehaps if you would state QUESTIONS instead of RANTING it is a possibility that a question that you have hidden in your post would be answered.

and a large majority of questions, believe it or not, are actually NOT locked into a specific format... if they were, then i doubt much progress would be made.


wow
mike

edit: made it hotshotgg-friendly

Hate to interrupt a friendly flame war, but I'd just like to slip in some small points:

1. Opinions are not necessarily right or wrong, but 'different'.
2. I think there are valid points for the potential longevity of ogg-vorbis based on the absence of patents.. simply insofar as patentholders on some of the MPC tech could reign in at any moment (potentially) causing significant grief to the distribution etc of it. (That said, mp3 encoders need to be licensed these days yet lame is still going strong).
3. Given that the two encoders are of different types, is it not fair to say they are 'psychoaccoustically different'? I mean, if you are extremely sensitive to preecho, then you would prefer MPC; if you were sensitive to whatever-the-hell is the weakspot of MPC you would prefer ogg-vorbis no?
4. Perhaps the reason no-one here speaks much about the non-freeness of MP3 any more is because we all tend to use MPC or ogg-vorbis instead.
5. Oh, and xmixahlx, I don't know if you are an MPC developer, or what, but I think it is pretty impolite to:
a) Say the latter part of the following line:
(quote):and right now musepack is free and far more advanced than ogg vorbis will be in the near future... [or ever be - most likely]
b) Negatively refer to someone when it seems they are simply trying to placate you without having to fall to their knees and beg for your mercy, as:
(quote):a FACT can be a stereotype, yes...like saying "if your name is hotshottgg, then you are a moran." is both a fact [possibly] and a stereotype i have just created.

Probably just put myself in the firing line, but hey... I don't care. Said what I wanted to say, and I don't believe any of it was unfair or unreasonable.

gnoshi

Edit: Btw, I agree that *at the moment*, MPC is indeed the best at >160kbps (and possibly even lower as was pointed out). I am not disputing that. This is subject to change (with future encoder improvements or changes in both ogg-vorbis and MPC technologies) without notice.

gnoshi,

thank you for you polite and to the point commentary. it was completely fair and reasonable.

i will try to be more civil.

somehow hotshotgg found my "f**k it" nerve ending[s]...

later
mike

btw... i only *wish* i was a musepack developer

Frank has done some fine development, but I don't think he has completely rewritten it.

And I'm not so sure Vorbis' psychoacoustics can be said to be clearly less advanced compared to MPC. RC4 and further aim to be the best format at 64kbps average, maybe even at lower bitrates. Of course MPC can't ever compete at that low bitrates because of its codec-structure (no trasform coding). But Vorbis, being very good at low bitrates, means that it has to have advanced psychoacoustics and working technical implementation.

Then we end up to the tweaking.. Tweaking for low bitrate and for high bitrate. I personally think that MPC has been a bit easier to tweak than Vorbis. For one, Vorbis needs advanced pre-echo control/block switching, something that MPC doesn't need to worry about. Also MPC could use previously patented and known techniques, while Vorbis has to use non-patented tech. Vorbis was basically written completely from scratch, while MPC is pretty much based on MP2 but with "steroids".

I personally admire both formats and all the devs working on these formats. They are doing a great job.

I like both formats.

My Five Points:

· Musepack is Great.
· Ogg Vorbis is very, very Good.
· Both formats will get even better in time.
· The ppl who write this stuff are gifted and brilliant.
· Software Patents Suck.

Just my $0.02.

...i think i would have paid more for it...

lol
mike

[skipping lightly through the flame war to reply to anubis]



Don't be put off a good format just because of 'current opinion'. I'd say, if you're concerned with long-term archiving, go for lossless and backup to cdr. [even better, go for open-source lossless, so (with the right know-how) you'll always be able to decode it. FLAC, for example]. You'll always be able to transcode to different lossy formats for different uses, without having to re-rip your entire cd collection. With increasing CPU speeds, decoding/transcoding from lossless will become trivial, whereas ripping with any accuracy will remain slower.

Then just go for whatever sounds good now. You know, carpe diem and all that - no-one can predict the future. This way, you'll get to experiment with different codecs and tweaks with having to worry about having a perfect archive copy of your music every time. By definition, perfect copies are impossible with lossy codecs. Very liberating, believe me .

That's enough from me, methinks

cheers, tonderai

I never imagined that so many well-known people would fight for answering me.
I never thought I could be "out" of the thread beacause I wrote it to enter ogg community.
Thanks to everyone

I appreciate everyone's input who did understand where I was trying to get with this. I hadn't in anyway been trying to go one way with either format. I had just been trying to point out the good and bad aspects of both formats, and why sometimes it doesn't seem apporpriate to make ill-mannered comments like so:



clearly this isn't taking into account the respect of other people's feelings.



I do state questions and sometimes they go left unanswered or cannot be answered. I try to answer each question in a clear, logical, and in depth fashion as I can. "ranting" does get the whole point across sometimes rather than writing a two sentence short stingy answer for most people.

With that said, let's get back on the topic of audio compression and off the top of this foolish flame war.

HotShotGG, what questions by you were left unanswered? I'll try to answer them ASAP to best of my knowledge if you provide the questions or URLs to appropriate messages.

Thanks! I sent you a PM relating to this topic. I appreciate it.

MPC and Vorbis are currently two complementary formats: each excels at different parts of the bitrate curve. You can't beat MPC for largely-transparent high-bitrate lossy encoding and you'll have a hard time outdoing Vorbis for highly-listenable low-bitrate encoding. I use both with pleasure.

Not to sound like a logic/philosophy stickler...but opinions absolutely have the potential for being wrong. It's senseless to label opinions as solely being "different". That's a bunch of new-age, PC nonsense. True there is such a thing as the subjective assessment of something being "different" and relative. However you cannot confuse it with the actual objective reality of what you are talking about. As it stands it is found that MPC is indeed a more advanced and reliable codec as compared to OggVorbis. You may disagree, but then you lend yourself to the "that's your opinion" crap that people spit out regularly.

HotshotGG: mixhail isn't exactly required to say things with respect to YOUR feelings. Which is really what you are inferring when you said that to him. Also note that his lack of respect towards your feelings in no way makes his statement invalid of any sort.

Can we let this go already! didn't we end this X amount of weeks ago! Can someone ask JohnV to lock this thread already? let's worry about the format and stop with the "he said... crap" I could care less this discussion is over. Find something else to nit pick over if your that bored. I don't want to start this discussion all over again. That was my opinion and we ended this. We are not here for a lesson in speeching and debating. We are here to discuss physcoacoustic audio compression. Think of a legitimate question to ask pertaining to physcoacoustic audio compression and get off my back. Just let it go. Thank you!

I'll ask him right away.



But some other people might want. Let them be.

It's fine if people want to discuss both formats. That I don't care about. I am through debating over this though. I am sure people have a lot more useful questions to bring about. It's kind of like beating a dead horse. That is why I believe this topic should be closed. The other reason I want to close this topic is, because I wish not to have people pointing the finger at me like so in the post above. State your opinion on the topic at hand. That is fine. Do not single people out though. I appreciate your cooperation. Thank you.

Ok, I think you can obectively evaluate reliability and "advancedness" to an extent (but you need a definition of advancedness).
But the actual sound quality in a psychoacoustic encoder is always going to be subjective to a fair extent, so the "that's your opinion" statement holds true.