Out of the two, I have two of the same albums.

There is the 192KB Album Folder, Encoded in regular Stereo.

And there is the VBR Album folder, Encoded in Joint-Stereo.

The 192KB Album Folder is 93.7MB.

The VBR Album Folder is 86.3MB.

Out of the two, Which would sound better overall, which should I keep and add to my collection, which should I erase to the garbage?

This choice is confusing me and there is no clear answers on this board, I need a clear answer, not a spew of oncoming alternate questions and scnearios like I read in the threads I searched for relating to this before I posted this

Thanks a TON guys!.

Sincerly,

Nigell M.

Well... what you should have gathered from previous threads is that:

Joint Stereo is better than Stereo

VBR is better than CBR

Sooo a VBR Joint Stereo rip will in 99.99% of all cases sound better than a 192kbps Stereo one.

It doesn´t seem that you have obtained these files in a legal way. This is against the rules of Hydrogenaudio.

But you asked a technical question, so I will answer it:
Normally the VBR files should be better. "Normally" I say, because some encoders are a bit buggy in VBR and joint stereo. But if the album is encoded with a proper MP3 encoder (like LAME), the VBR Joint stereo files should be the best.

Thank you,

Both of you.

As for the legal question, It is legal, as this particular album is a local band, and it is okay to be distributed.

I've checked up on the matter.

No worries, eh?

Oh, Rite.

Is there anyway I can figure out if its been encoded with lame, or otherwise?

To finalize the disicion making...

And delete the 192 fixed bit rate.

Thanks, once again.

(Sorry, Im a little anal retentive with my music. I appreciate music very highly, as do all of you.)

You can use the latest version of this new promissing program: Mr Questionman: http://www.burrrn.net/MrQuestionMan04.zip

Just run the program and go to the directory where your MP3 is in. And then you will see all the information of the MP3. Post the "Encoder Info" here.

MPEG 1 Layer III Xing.

(Is what it says.)



Whats this tell me?

Nice, I have been looking for something like that, now if only someone could implement a automatic tagging-function based on this

AtW

One last question...

alt preset fast standard, (J Stereo around 192kb VBR)

Would this be better than an EAC-Encoded FHG V1.263 192KB CBR Album?

Or is the latter choice prefered?

I think the first choice would be preferred, but these are only general guidelines, you should test yourself which suits you better.

Just so I can grasp the concept and answer my first question at the same time,

Out of two choices of the same freely distributable album, which would be my best choice? I relize that Jstereo VBR is better than CBR Stereo, Thanks to your replies; however this particular VBR is Xing encoded. Not sure how this fits in with everything as I've heard some VBR J-Stereo is bad.. This is where I need you guys to help me. (Simple Yes or No)

MPEG 1 Layer III Xing. VBR J-Stereo 44.1kHz (192KB-ish VBR) [86MB Folder]

_Versus_

Lame 3.92 Encoded 192KB CBR Stereo 44.1kHz [91MB Folder]

As I said earliar I am anal about my music, and I have use Klipsch Promedia 5.1 Ultra's with an addon SWS Sub and Klipsch RSX4 Sat replacements for all 5 channels. So I use the best possible audio files I can grasp.

Thanks again.

-Cide

Hmh, why not listen to and compare those two tracks. For example using an abx test and then just keep the one that sounds better to your ears.

even simpler: no yes and no no.
the _best_ way would be to test for yourself what sounds better to you. after all, nobody can hear with your ears than you.
as for xing vs lame and vbr vs cbr here... well, if the bitrate goes up, most encoderes tend to reach transparence. lame is generally a little better than xing (depending on the version), but vbr is normaly better than cbr... so, not much point thinking about that here IMO, as you don't know which version of xing has been used.

if you can't hear a differnece btw 160kbps and 256, there's not much point of wasting space, except the 'warm fuzzy feeling' you might get... you might want to think about that and compare for yourself.

links:
http://www.rjamorim.com/test/mp3-128/results.html
http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....howtopic=16295&

how about reading the hydrogen audio MP3-FAQ?

Most questions asked in this thread are already answered there.

Just to answer the guys question, throw away the Xing files! Its one of the worst mp3 encoders, especially at VBR & joint stereo..

Actually that supposedly seems to depend on the xing version. AFAIK xing especially got a bad reputation due to it's early versions at 128kb/s cbr.

Now I absolutely don't want to defend xing here, but if you make such claims it would be nice to have them backed up by some kind of abx evidence.

Anyway to Tell what version of Xing it may be?

What I know is older Xing = 1. Xing (old) 2.Xing (new)
is using 100% long blocks in encoding

"mathematically", using 100% long block will hurt coz pre-echo will occur

But I've heard that newer Xing in RealOne Player uses short blocks too, I'M NOT SURE!

yeah, if you just check the latest 128kbps MP3 test (and the thread following it), you'll see the results leaning in favor of Xing's improvements. (don't have a url, sorry)

also, since you guys are being sticklers about legality, FhG v1.263 isn't a legit version.. it's the hacked Radium one i believe, not that i'd know or anything

but yeah, i also agree with the suggestion to blind ABX it... i can't ABX a lot of the samples in the new 128kbps multiformat test how depressing so good luck...