hello

which is the best codec to use in order to record at best quality conversations from a portable voice recorder?

thanks

The best quality voice codec is a lossless: FLAC, Wavpack or plain PCM.

Ahem, I didn't expect such a reply.

Of course, he doesn't specify how does he record them, and where does he want to play them (and more importantly, use them for), but.. sincerely.... a lossless for a voice recording?

Answer for the scenario "I record to .wav and will play on PC, don't need to edit".

Speech codecs:

speex is a good option, at its highest quality. AFAIR, it works best at 32Khz.

Lossy codecs:

Really any of the popular ones should suit. Don't use HE-AAC. there's no need and may change the sound in an unwanted way.

Don't be fooled by "it's a voice recording, so i use a low setting". That logic is actually backwards. It shouldn't be stupid to use LAME -V 3 or so. Also don't play with the stereo setting. The default method should work it out.


You just asked for the best quality, without talking about the scenario. Absolutely best quality is obviously lossless. Here you have the "not that much needed" option.