Howdy,

I've been out of the loop for the past couple of years and have recently started using the combination of v0.99PreBeta5 of EAC and v3.98.2 of LAME. Both have changed during this time, but probably the most significant changes appear to be with LAME. Particularly the new VBR settings.

In the past the "--alt-preset standard" was the recommended setting. According to the HydrogenAudio Wiki it would now appear to be "-V 2 --vbr-new". As I understand it, the "--vbr-new" is the default setting in v3.98.2 of LAME, so the change is to "-V 2" over the default "-V 4". However, the "--alt-preset standard" also uses "-V 2" as it's default. So, would it be fair to say that the "--alt-preset standard" is the same as "-V 2 --vbr-new" and that it doesn't matter which one is used?

Another observation has to do with EAC and LAME tagging. While the minimum padding available in EAC is 2k, this setting has no affect when LAME is used to tag a file. To make both the same, I turned off tagging in EAC and use:

--alt-preset standard --add-id3v2 --pad-id3v2-size 2048 --ta "%a" --tt "%t" --tg "%m" --tl "%g" --ty "%y" --tn "%n" %s %d

And then with EAC's padding option set to 2k, I then turn on tagging in EAC and use:

--alt-preset standard %s %d

This resulted in the following:


If trying to get the smallest size file is important, then it would probably be better to let LAME use it's own 128 Bytes of padding since EAC can't go lower than 2k. Which I suppose is why the HydrogenAudio Wiki recommends using "--pad-id3v2" over "--pad-id3v2-size <value>".

The only difference between the two encodes is that file 1 has a Header Position of 2374 bytes and file 2 has a Header Position of 2232 bytes, a difference of 42 Bytes. All other aspects (ie: frames, bitrate, etc) appear to be the same. However, if both encodes of the same WAV were padded with the same amount, in this case 2k, shouldn't the files be the same size?

I realize that 142 Bytes isn't much of a file size difference, but I'm wondering if this might indicate that I have something set wrong or, it's just the nature of these beasts.

Thanks.

Apparently there is a significant difference between "--alt-preset standard" and "-V 2 --vbr-new". The results were:


The above shows that using the same source file, "-V2 --vbr-new" added 4.291494842 percent to the size of the file. This is without adding any tagging information. If example file 1 and 2 both use V2, and VBR-New is suppose to be the default for both, why would the file increase nearly 4.3 percent in size?


Still would appreciate any input on this one.

One other thing I've been wondering about. The HydrogenAudio Wiki provides a tagging command-line. It is also the order in which the information is constructed in the header. For playback on devices other than a computer, wouldn't it be better written like this:


Or, is there some other reason that I'm not aware of that makes the original better than the suggested?

Thanks.

"--alt-preset standard" = "--preset standard" = "-V2 --vbr-old".

"-V2 --vbr-new" = "--preset fast standard".

Thank you for your reply. So, based on the above and the LAME defaults, in EAC's "Additional command-line options" one could use the unnecessarily long HydrogenAudio Wiki version:

-V 2 --vbr-new --add-id3v2 --pad-id3v2 --ta "%a" --tt "%t" --tg "%m" --tl "%g" --ty "%y" --tn "%n" %s %d

Or, one could achieve the exact same thing by using:

-V 2 --pad-id3v2 --ta "%a" --tl "%g" --tn "%n" --tt "%t" --ty "%y" --tg "%m" %s %d

Since neither the "--vbr-new" or "--add-id3v2" are needed. The former is the default and the latter is taken care by the presents of "--pad-id3v2". Illustrated here are four different ways of doing the exact same thing.


Internally, byte for byte, all four files are exactly the same file.

If tags aren't need it gets even simpler, just use "-V 2 %s %d" and you're done.

Thank you ever so much for clarifying it.

As to the other two questions I posed; I'll chalk the difference in the 2K padding to either EAC or LAME as being buggy. And, the last question about the better order of including tags, as mines better. Hehe. At least until I hear differently.