Which one has better quality?

One would tend to guess cbr 320, but you would be hard-pressed to hear any difference in most material.

...and if anyone can, please present your blind test results here(*).

There is no difference in quality for those who cannot.

(*) Also, please consider weighing in on this discussion:
http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....showtopic=67840

Thanks

-V0 is better in many ways.

1. Smaller filesize.

Ummm...

I think that's about it.

So I end up assuming that CBR 320 kbps and VBR -V0 have the same quality and the only difference is file size.

Except for some extremely rare examples, yes.

Having had a look at the relevant wiki entry on hydrogenaudio - it appears that 320 has an insignificant improvement but the amount of space for that improvement really can't be justified. I've got around 100GB of music using -V0 using 3.98.2 and I can't tell the difference.

Doesn't it have a better encoding algorithm as well?

Better in what sense? If you mean that it achieves better sound quality, then no.

Has anyone dared to estimate the scale for law of diminishing returns for LAME? It might help with some of these posts that ask, "Is X setting better than Y?"

example:
-V 5 = 95% likely to be transparent
...
-V 2 -Y = 98% transparent
-V 2 = 98.5 % transparent
...
-V 0 = 99% transparent
-b 320 = 99.2% transparent

Of course, it's not supposed to be empirical, just some stats based on other members' posts.

The point is, that the bit rate trade-off is less justified.

I'd like to add something in layman's words... Even though VBR mode (0) doesn't use 320 kbps for every frame, as offcourse CBR 320 mode does, it has to my understanding a more sophisticated way of using psychoacoustics and such so it can actually happen that the CBR 320 mode has some artifacts, whereas VBR mode 0 does not! So, the best VBR mode > any CBR mode! That goes even for ABR, so I dare to say it's actually like this: VBR > ABR > CBR in terms of probable quality one gets. Every mode offcourse has it's flaws, but the VBR algorithm has been worked on to oblivion, whereas the CBR is obsolete these days, IMHO.

There is the graph in the wiki, but it meant only as a very general guide (quality scores provided by Gabriel with file sizes for one album ).

This is the second suggestion that -V0 has a better algorithm. Can anyone accurately deny or confirm this?

V0 is never better. The psy parameters are not worse either and actually more conservative. You can check with --verbose.

It is true that the analysis done while encoding in VBR is different than the one done for CBR.

From the help that I updated to be included in an upcoming version of LAME: (if they still remember... )

(Note that this also denies that ABR is the same than VBR)

So yes, there exist examples where an VBR encode does not show an artifact that a CBR 320 encode does ( and viceversa ).

-V0 is targeting ~ 224k . It could be competitive with 256k cbr?? but I've never seen it beat 320k or --abr 287 -h. There are still some problem samples for vbr and maybe vice versa. In abx tests i've done --abr 287 was always better when V0 had artifacts.

In short it may be that ABR suffers from a different artifact, Yet i'm not convinced that VBR 224k can take on 270 ~ 320k ABR. It might have chance if the psymodel was perfect but its not and there is too much bitrate difference.

I don't think a V0 could compete against 256 kbps in that type of comparison. The ABR of a VBR file doesn't determine it's general quality. It's each frame that has to be compared because you may have some frames going as low as 64 kbps if there is silence, or as high as 320 kbps if there is a heavy chorus.

d_headshot, I think you have a very arguable point here. The fact that -V 0 goes as high as 320 kbps for "complex" frames, suggests that it potentially can cope with those "complex" frames better than any CBR mode lower than 320 kpbs can... With this logic, -V 0 beats any CBR mode, except arguably 320 kbps.

Offcourse, my theory here is based only upon logical thinking and not on tests I have done, unlike shadowking's findings, for which he has test results to support his claims.

edit: Unfortunately we are debating about such high bitrates, that we can not ABX test our theories, as all of these modes are transparent, except for problem samples, which exist for all of them. So, it's a difficult debate. We can only debate indefinitely which mode is potentially better. Or maybe we could count problem samples found for each one of the modes and the one that has fewer of those is better. But that can never be achieved, because we just don't have all the possible sounds that exist to test them all...

I think we are not going to reach an undisputable conclusion.

This is a theretical consideration, and as such it is not correct.
Because of the bit reservoir there is no direct relation between frame bitrate and audio data bitrate. CBR 256 can have a very high audio data bitrate at problematic spots because it can use bits from the previous frame. On the other hand the bits available for audio data purposes within a 320 kbps frame can remain unused at critical spots. In fact because of a certain compatibility precaution for mp3 playback with WMP and due to some inaccuracy in the mp3 specs regarding the audio data capacity of 320 kbps frames current LAME doesn't make full use of the audio data capacity of 320 kbps frames. The latter fact is the reason why the lossless mp3packer procedure reduces filesize of CBR 320 or very high bitrate ABR encodings significantly. mp3packer has the same positive effect on the 320 kbps frames of VBR encodings. (BTW no problem is known for mp3packer improved Lame encodings, even for WMP.)

Which doesn't tell about quality, but shows that a simple frame bitrate based theoretical discussion doesn't help.

With a good VBR implementation as done with 3.98, -V0 is expected to usually yield the better quality compared to CBR 256 in those rare cases that there is an audible difference between -V0 and CBR 256. It may not be so in every such situation.
As long as ABR and CBR mode is implemented correctly CBR 320 and very high bitrate ABR (for instance shadowking's ABR 287 -h setting) are expected to usually yield the better quality compared to -V0 in those rare cases that there is an audible difference between -V0 and CBR 320 resp. ABR very high bitrate. It may not be so in every such situation.

There had been some suspicion that CBR and ABR mode aren't implemented fine with 3.98, but there has never been real evidence for this IIRC.

/mnt gave a sample recently where -V0 failed but ABR 287 suuceeded, and shadowking made the same experience.

It always comes to the point where to put the sweet point, and this is a very personal decision.
-V0 is so good that not many people really need a better quality setting.
On the other hand with today's storage technology even on DAPs many people nowadays and more so in the near future don't have to care about file size and can afford the best quality mp3 can offer.
Moreover because of their robust quality headroom CBR 320 and very high bitrate ABR are kind of an insurance against situations where the implemented psy model fails unusually badly. This was the case for 3.97 for the sandpaper noise problem and for all versions prior to 3.98 with the trumpet sample. -V0 was real nasty in these cases because VBR heavily relies on the psy model which failed here, and CBR 320 or very high bitrate ABR improved things a lot. No such failure is known for 3.98, looks like 3.98 -V0 is robust against nasty results.

You've brought this bitrate up before, why 287?

Sometimes V0 can sound worse then V2 or CBR, but it rarely happens though.

A couple of examples:

LAME 3.97 -V0 --vbr-new



Flanging on the harpicord at 0:23 (yes there is a harpicord on a Metallica song).

V2 vs V0 (LAME 3.97)



Artifact is gone or possibly softer on V2.


LAME 3.97 -V0 --vbr-new



Drum smear at 2:07.

V2 vs V0 (LAME 3.97)



No drum smearing on the V2 encode.

It keeps me stable for days
In FLAC



I find this sample to sound better at V0 then 320 CBR on LAME 3.98.2, due to it's new psy model that --vbr-new now uses.



IMO V0 sounded better then the 320kbps encode. Although both encodes are far away from being transparent.

This is to get an in-between 256 ~ 320k setting. With lame 3.98 there is a restriction on bit reserve that bloats bitrate at very high bitrate, so -h works a little better and 288 is too close to 320k.

plis i'm looking 2 days for some 100% perfect information about that:

i don't care about the mp3 file size its can be 100MB i don't care:]
but plizzz tell me
how to make the best sound quality of the mp3

for examlpe
if im using easy cd-da extractor 12.0.1 build 1
you can download fully functional trial http://www.poikosoft.com/

and i want to make the best quality mp3 the best of the best
from my orginal cd audio
i should use

stereo or joint stereo?
44100 or 48000
cbr or vbr?
if cbr then 320
if vbr???
new vbr
compresion lvl0

???
plizzzz someone who know enything about this ripping to mp3 for a anserw

You haven't looked hard enough, evidently, as the answer is widely available (and very simple).

If you want the highest possible quality (read: likelihood the MP3 will sound indistinguishable from the source) use 320 kbps CBR.* The command line is -b320. That is all.

-V0 will probably achieve almost identical results from most sources, while not wasting space on 320 kbps frames when they're not needed.

Some more pointers: Don't use simple stereo. Don't resample. And it's "please".


* Freeformat MP3s can have higher bitrates, but are not as widely supported, if at all.

thanx so...
easy cd-da extractor options
the best of the best options

mp3
Bitrare: cbr 320 (not vbr 0: min bitrare 320 / max bitrate: 320 NEW VBR)
mode: joint stereo (not stereo)
Quality: highest quality
samlerate: 44100 (not 48000)
FIltering:
lowpass - automatic
highpass - automatic

[V] orginal
[ ] copyright
[V] use CRC error Protection

sorry for next post but i can't edit my erlier text
have i right about that? :

thanx so...
easy cd-da extractor options 12.0.1 build 1
the best of the best options

mp3
Bitrare: cbr 320 (not vbr 0: min bitrare 320 / max bitrate: 320 NEW VBR)
mode: joint stereo (not stereo)
Quality: highest quality
samlerate: 44100 (not 48000)
FIltering:
lowpass - automatic
highpass - automatic

[V] orginal
[ ] copyright
[V] use CRC error Protection

and thanx for anserws

CRC error protection is useless. There is nothing that even looks at it. It takes away bits that could instead be used to encode audio so it technically degrades quality.