Here is my situation...

I am wanting to get the most out of my music. I currently have all mp3gained 320 kps mp3's, and I am thinking of re-encoding to wav, using wavegain, then encoding to q6,7, or 8 OGG....

I have done a few songs to see if I could tell the difference between any of the files with my current equipment, but, unfortunately, I cannot. For right now I am going to blame my equipment and not my hearing, although I am usually not the most critical listener. I am usually doing other things while listening to music (such as mowing doing, homework, driving, playing games, etc.).

Now I realize that for CD music the uncompressed lossless will sound better than the lossy formats... But I get my music in a very unorthodox way. So im starting to wonder if my wav file IS any better than the mp3. Maybe my problem is not the equipment but the way I get my music.

So if anyone with good ears can help me out it will be appreciated.

What i am wanting is to send someone an mp3 file and a wav file for them to test to see:
a) how the mp3 compares to the wav
and
b) how the files compare to similar files produced from CD's

I know that is a lot to ask but I would really like to know if I am not getting everything I can out of my music. Even if I cant tell, I still dont want to be missing much.

Thanks

If you're encoding the wav into mp3, then chances are you will be getting quality loss. However, if you encode that music using LAME with --preset standard --preset extreme or --preset insane (or fast variants), chances are you won't hear the difference. Neither will very many people on this forum. In fact, I couldn't myself tell apart an original uncompressed (wav or other lossless) from a --preset medium encoding, on a portable player and noisy environments. Chances are, if you haven't invested more than 300 $ on your audio equipment, you won't be able to either.

If you take the MP3 and decompress it to a WAV file, that WAV file will sound exactly the same as the MP3. In order to compare it to the MP3 you need to rip the WAV right off the CD. Once it goes through MP3 compression, you can't gain the data back that you lost during lossy compression.

Siimilarly, if you want to compress to OGG or AAC or whatever, you don't want to re-compress files after they've gone through MP3 compression (transcoding) since then you'll be piling on multiple levels of lossy encoding and it will just sound worse and worse every time you run the file through a lossy compressor. Always compress from the original WAV ripped off the CD.

Yes but the problem is I dont know if my wav files are as good as those that come from CD's...

Ok... I can tell you guys arent understanding and I am sorry.

I DO NOT get my music from CD's

I am paying for a music service and a program to record that music service.
The music service says CD quality but that is what i want to test.

I am not just decompressing the files I already have... I am re-recording them to wav's...

Hopefully that makes more sense

Define "to get the most of my music", please.

Because ... you can't improve something via transcoding to another lossy format even if you make use of a bitrate which is higher than the original one.

Do yourself a favour and leave your files the way they are.
Otherweise you'd make it worse - no matter what.


Sebi

and that is better than decompressing *why* ?

btw: please stop making use of apostrophes if you want to build plural forms


Sebi

A few questions, so we can go see the main site.

What service? What encoder do they use (get encspot and tell us.)

for your purposes, I think ogg q5 would be largely sufficient, but that is not the issue. What do you do with your mp3s, to listen to them? Do you have a PAP? or do you use a discman with AudioCD Compilations of your mp3s?

Is space on your hard drive an issue?

How are you exactly "re-recording" to wav ? (I'll presume you mean PCM, since windows waveform audio files are most often a container for raw pcm data...)

Because I am doing NOTHING with the mp3 file.

I recorded it to mp3 a while ago.

Now i am recording it to a wav from the same SOURCE as the mp3 file not from the mp3 file itself.

So you:
1. Download a WAV file and then convert it to mp3.

And now you want to:
a) "record/decompress" the mp3 to a wav file and compress that wav to OGG?
b) take the original wav file you downloaded, encode it to OGG and compare against the MP3 to see if there was any advantage in using OGG?

If you want to do a) then you better convince yourself that you will not improve the sound quality.

As for b) you *might* improve the sound quality, but then again, you *might* not, 320kbps mp3 is quite a bitrate, if you are willing to have files over that datarate you better consider a lossless format like FLAC.


Cheers.

Sorry, that wasn't clear enough when I started writing this reply.
Yours raises the question what "it" actually is.

If you have the chance of getting your music lossless (by "encoding it to WAV") then I think you should do it and compress is afterwards losslessly with something like FLAC or WavPack.

Sebi

I am using a program called Replay Music. It can record into a mp3 or wav file. In EncSpot it says it uses Gogo (after 3.0).

The Rio Karma I recnetly got is what started all of this. Space on that drive is an issue but I also dont want to compromise on sound. On my computer though space is less of an issue as I have a 60 GB hard drive that can be completly dedicated to Music... I might consider an archive of lossless, who knows.

Again all I want to do is to send someone a couple of files to see how they sound compared to each other and the CD material.

Thanks for all of the help so far and I am sorry this is so confusing...

man ... who cares how something sounds to other people? do you?
you shoulnd't.

but if you want to know if the source is a lossy one, you could try checking it with some tool whose name i forgot (Is it AUCDtect ?). Try the search function.

Sebi

Well I was thinking that I may not be able to tell the difference now, but if i ever upgrade my headphones I might. I want to be prepared I guess.

Go lossless.

What you should consider would be to rip yourself all the CDs you have, to something like lame 3.97 --preset fast medium; This is a very good compromise for portable audio players, and is largely sufficient. If you want transparency, you can also go for lame --preset fast standard

I suggest you read a guide on this forum on how to use EAC (exact audio copy) and Lame together to rip CDs, as this program is a very high quality ripper that reads several times from the source to make sure the data is correct. You can probably find that information on the wiki.

If you find 20 GBs of mp3s is an inssue in terms of space, then you can't afford lossless in 60 GB : it's more than 3 times the size, for a (barely) noticable improvement : it's only useful (in my opinion) if you wish to re-encode your files later.

The reason I suggest lame mp3 instead of, say, Ogg q5 (which is also fine for a portable player, or a computer sound card, if you don't have a headphone amp, for that matter..), is because the Karma is reputed to use less battery power (18 hours total with mp3s, vs 12 on ogg) while decoding mp3s than oggs. Of course, this also depends on the bitrate, and your personal preference.

In any case, do as you wish, and what sounds good enough to you. Keep in mind that to 90% of the people out there, WMA 128 is "cd-quality" (heck.. my cousins think Atrac-3 96 is...)

Have a nice day,
T.

I meant that 20 GB of space would be an issue if I went lossless. I have about 12 GB of 320kps mp3.

Hard drives are so cheap man.

Well, pick a solution, and keep us informed! good luck!

IMO, Lossless is a little overkill for a portable player anyways (just purchased a karma myself; i have nothing over --preset fast standard; highest bitrate is 270. (death grind metal), lowest is 104 (mono 50's jazz)