i'm using a flash(video) encoding program that only gives the option of using fraunhofer. my colleagues on the video side like the filesize of 96kpbs. we have found that at 96-16bit-44100-mono it is highly distorted. flip it over to stereo it is not as bad but still distorted. does anyone know a better setting that will remove the distortion and maintain the character of the original file being input? thanks!

Stereo sounding less distorted than mono might be a hint that your problem could be a downmixing problem, with your original stereo signal being mostly out of phase.