ok, just a wired thing here.

I'm kinda confused, I prefer the sound of Q6 VBR mp3's over 128kbps CBR mp3's.

Does this make any sence or have I gone mad

Thanks,

Sorry for the simplisity of the question.

~ Danny

It makes sense. Even a Q6 MP3 (LAME) will spike at bitrates higher than 128 in order to handle the complexity, whereas CBR 128 cannot do that. Both are quite lossy, but the VBR allows the algorithm to be better tuned to human hearing.

V6 averaged bitrates can be lower or higher than 128 CBR. But VBR uses bits more efficiently; giving extra bits to difficult sections, while not wasting bits where they are not needed.

Why does Fraunhofer still use CBR only then? They claim to be "professional-quality", and similar stuff.

Personally, I also prefer VBR. I read once someone defined the difference between CBR and VBR as "CBR being fully predictable filesize, while VBR being constant quality".

Fraunhofer encoders do VBR.

That definition is quite good.
It's fairly safe to say that quality-wise CBR<VBR for a given filesize.

Hi, thanks for the answers guys.

That clears it up, I guess its VBR All the way from now on! rofl

note: I was useing LAME 3.97 beta 3 lol

Good decision. Viewed from a point of quality, using constant bitrates isn't timely anymore. They're only interesting for streaming content due to the upper bitrates reached by VBR being too much for dial-up users.

cool taste,good decision and good sound.

regards.