Before voting, please read the following thread first:

http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....showtopic=55371

Then, you can vote. Plus provide whatever reasoning you think below.

Note: The 2 questions of the poll are not really relevant to each other. Each question stands independently.

Additional Note: If you don't have any opinion for both questions above, please do not vote

Firstly, B5 should be "recommended".

Rather than recommending versions, why not use the developers recommended version? They will of done more testing and know the codec better than anyone else. So are in the best position to recommend what version to use.

If that's the case both questions should have a null vote option. I can't really answer Q1, but I can have an opinion on Q2.

Is this achievable with Vorbis? Do Xiph recommend the aoTuV's builds?

Monty has spoken:
http://lists.xiph.org/pipermail/vorbis/200...rch/025710.html


http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....st&p=491641

Not exactly front-page news for noobs...

As long as we have posters like guru and Synthetic Soul HA reccomendations should be kept.

Testing is time consuming. Newbies should be pointed to current versions and not older versions like in most software. Likewise, Current users DON'T need to upgrade whenever a new version is out unless 'bleeding-edge' appeals to them.

So use latest versions for the clueless, do your own testing and decide for yourself for others. Exactly the same thing applies to lossless encoders minus sound quality issues. I think the rarewares vorbis page is perfect.

Yeah, I realized this approx. 10 seconds after posting ...

I was hoping for an explicit request, so I hope you don't mind, but I have now added null vote options.


Personally, given the confusion over Vorbis (i.e.: aoTuV and Lancer), and also some other codecs, I still think that there is a place for Hydrogen Audio recommendations. New users often end up here when searching for information about codecs, and given the knowledge base that this board has, including the fact that many codec developers post here, I can't help thinking that if we don't, who will? I agree that the recommended version will often be the latest, but on those occassions that it is not I think it is extremely important that new users are given some guidance.

It's an interesting poll.

Thanks! And sorry to those who have inadvertently voted with a no-null option.

Ah, I suddenly have an idea: What if we recommend only the make of the encoder (e.g. aoTuV & Lancer), instead of the build of the encoder (e.g. R1, B5, etc.) ? For the build, maybe just put in a statement such as:

" You may safely use the latest version (v0.666) as peer-review has shown that the latest version is stable. "

Or something to that effect.

Voted.

Beta 5 is good enough IMO, I'm using it (lancer build) since it's out, and it rocks. Never had any problem with hundreds of tracks, and quality is excellent

For the HA recommended encoders, I can't make up my mind.

Edit : pepoluan, your idea is good

I have just voted.

I use Beta 5 and have not had any problems with it - judging by the general consensus I think it is suitable enough to become the next Recommended Encoder.

As for the relevance of the HA Recommended Encoders? - definitely keep. Just pointing to the "latest version" is not always the best option - the stability of new encoder version varies quite a lot, and may not be deemed suitable for "noobs" who just want a decent codec/audio file.

madorangepanda's idea about the Developer's Recommended Version is a reasonable idea - would give the user more freedom of choice. However, whether it is really necessary... .

So, the current consensus heavily recommends b5 to dethrone R1 as the HA-recommended encoder.

As to whether we should keep this "recommendation", those who are 'for' outweighs those who are 'against' by a 50% margin.

So, the final verdict:
- The recommendation system stays.
- aoTuV beta 5 is now the HA-recommended encoder

Case closed. I will update the wiki shortly.

Edit: I have updated the 'history' section. Was about to edit the next section but realizes that RareWares has only 1 compile, and that is ICL compile... for what processor? Discussion continues in this thread.