quality of MP3's

Posted:
in General Discussion edited January 2014
Let me give you some background info:

I'm a musician (musician, not rock star) and have an extensive music library. I bought a WesternDigital Firewire external HD so i can put my CD library all into one drive and carry it to class to play selections for my students (FW HD with an iBook and a 1/8>RCA serves as my portable music library).



Now, that's a pretty good set up for portability. After playing with iTunes for a long time and explore its features, I like to use iBook as my CD player at home (playing AiFF files instead of mp3's). I like the fact that i don't have to go get a CD from the shelves and eject/find track business.



Now i'm contemplating if i should even be coding my Aiff's to mp3's anymore. Since the 200 gig WD is gonna be available pretty soon, I think i can just build an array of 3 or 4 of these (2/3 to 4/5 of TB), and put all my CD's (as in AIFF files) into these drives and i'll never have to go to the CD shelves, find the CD and locate which track i want. and don't have to do deal with converting CD's to mp3's. I have a 40x reader, so i can rip Aiff's fairly quick, has anyone else out there thought of doing something like this?



Mp3's are fine for pop stuff but when i code classical music into mp3's, they sound awful (320kbps, 16bit 44.1 khz). I've played CD's off the cd drive on the ibook and CDs sounded a lot better then the mp3's so i know the problem is in the source, i.e. Aiff vs. mp3.



btw, if hooked up to my stereo at home, i'll just use the usb 1/8 + SPDIF out doohickies to get better sound from the ibook.



[ 08-07-2002: Message edited by: Wagnerite ]</p>
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 25
    pevepeve Posts: 518member
    mp3 is a compressed file-format and therefore there is allways a loss of quality.



    why not think of a real server instead of an array of disks?
  • Reply 2 of 25
    arnold2arnold2 Posts: 29member
    Take a look at:



    <a href="http://www.vorbis.com/"; target="_blank">http://www.vorbis.com/</a>;



    This is a newer encoding method, and has much better audio quality (the BBC have a few streams going, and chose it because of this). There are a few player/encoders for OSX.



    At least this would save investing in all those HD's !
  • Reply 3 of 25
    giaguaragiaguara Posts: 2,724member
    one more thing is that ibook nor any laptops have really hifi speakers...
  • Reply 4 of 25
    pevepeve Posts: 518member
    hi mulattabianca



    in your signature there is a vote what is better of the following:



    1) mac

    2) windows

    3) sex

    4) food



    ...and mac wins?

    come on!

    the mac is a great computer (hard- and software) but sex should beat it (unless people are doing something wrong).
  • Reply 5 of 25
    progmacprogmac Posts: 1,850member
    [quote]Originally posted by arnold2:

    <strong>Take a look at:



    <a href="http://www.vorbis.com/"; target="_blank">http://www.vorbis.com/</a>;



    This is a newer encoding method, and has much better audio quality (the BBC have a few streams going, and chose it because of this). There are a few player/encoders for OSX.



    At least this would save investing in all those HD's !</strong><hr></blockquote>



    I would also really take a minute to look into OGG Vorbis. You can get some great quality with this, especially compared to MP3. Better yet, Frankenstein isn't involved.
  • Reply 6 of 25
    groveratgroverat Posts: 10,872member
    <a href="http://www.monkeysaudio.com/"; target="_blank">Monkey's Audio</a> lossless compression.



    I hear good things about OGG and mp3Pro as well.
  • Reply 7 of 25
    matsumatsu Posts: 6,558member
    Mp3pro is cool in that it will play back through a regular MP3 player/decoder (though without the extra quality, kinda like HDCD). I guess that really isn't an issue with computers or programmable iPods, but it's nice if you have one of those MP3 playing DVD/home stereos.



    I think you might want to use MP4 (AKA AAC) as iTunes/Jaguar/QT will support it soon and it's supposed to get very good quality without taking up a lot of space. You won't have to buy extra hard-drives or software and you can be pretty sure of seamless operation and file compatibility. Plus you can use the extra cash you save on HDD's for more CD's!!!
  • Reply 8 of 25
    [quote]Originally posted by peve:

    <strong>



    why not think of a real server instead of an array of disks?</strong><hr></blockquote>



    like a cheap wintel box full of HD's and networked with the ibook?
  • Reply 9 of 25
    giaguaragiaguara Posts: 2,724member
    [quote]Originally posted by peve:

    <strong>hi mulattabianca



    in your signature there is a vote what is better of the following:



    1) mac

    2) windows

    3) sex

    4) food



    ...and mac wins?

    come on!

    the mac is a great computer (hard- and software) but sex should beat it (unless people are doing something wrong).</strong><hr></blockquote>



    Yea. I want to know who is the sick one that has voted for WINDOWS.

    <img src="graemlins/bugeye.gif" border="0" alt="[Skeptical]" /> shoot him. must be sick



    Well i always have my Mac. What can i do with the sex when the male i was interested in lives 1662 km from me??
  • Reply 10 of 25
    giantgiant Posts: 6,041member
    [quote]Originally posted by Mulattabianca:

    <strong>



    Yea. I want to know who is the sick one that has voted for WINDOWS.

    <img src="graemlins/bugeye.gif" border="0" alt="[Skeptical]" /> shoot him. must be sick



    </strong><hr></blockquote>



    No kidding! That means he thinks Windows is better than food or SEX!
  • Reply 11 of 25
    dfilerdfiler Posts: 3,420member
    [quote]Originally posted by peve:

    <strong>hi mulattabianca



    in your signature there is a vote what is better of the following:



    1) mac

    2) windows

    3) sex

    4) food



    ...and mac wins?

    come on!

    the mac is a great computer (hard- and software) but sex should beat it (unless people are doing something wrong).</strong><hr></blockquote>



    You know... 1, 3, and 4 aren't mutually exclusive ;-)



    Back on topic: I can't stand anything below 160 and encode all my mp3s at 192VBR highest. This usually produces mp3s which list as around 200-210kbps. I can still hear the difference between this and the original, but only on my bad-ass home theater system. In the car or on the system my computer is connected to, the difference is inaudable.
  • Reply 12 of 25
    pyr3pyr3 Posts: 946member
    [quote]Originally posted by Mulattabianca:

    <strong>



    Yea. I want to know who is the sick one that has voted for WINDOWS.

    <img src="graemlins/bugeye.gif" border="0" alt="[Skeptical]" /> shoot him. must be sick



    Well i always have my Mac. What can i do with the sex when the male i was interested in lives 1662 km from me?? </strong><hr></blockquote>



    So? My gf lives 3000 miles away. Doesn't mean that I enjoy sex with her any less when we get to have it. I'm sorry, but if I had to chose between sex with my gf and Mac, Steve Jobs would by public enemy number one.
  • Reply 13 of 25
    If you like iTunes (and it is the best) then your options are mp3 or aiff. If you need no holds barred quality then use aiff--it's CD quality and convenient as no encoding needs to be done.



    If you are a musician listening through a home stereo set up then you will hear the artifacts in mp3s whether encoded with iTunes' built in encoder or lame (which is much better). You will also hear artifacts in ogg vorbis, aac/mp4, mp3pro, mpc or any other lossy codec. Of these only mpc is close to audiophile (or as close to audiophile as CD anyway).



    Of the lossless codecs flac is the best but has no support in iTunes (unlikely) or Quicktime (might happen). Windows folk get uppity about Monkey's Audio getting an extra 2% compression (typical obsession with 'objective' measures) but flac has better support on unixes like os x, has lower decode requirements and therefore better hardware support, has more open source and is better suited to streaming if you go that route amongst other benefits. The lossless ogg squish project is also rumored to be resurrected now that vorbis is at 1.0.



    What you are suggesting is the way I am going with my collection. It is the obvious choice for music fans with a good home stereo system to listen to rips of their own CDs (as opposed to downloaded music). Remember that you can buy an ibook or imac to use as a server at a later date, plug in the drives you are buying now and add in a little Rendevouz goodness when Jaguar arrives.



    In the final consideration I went with aiff because the iPod supports it and a 20GB iPod will still hold plenty of uncompressed songs. Unfortunately it means I only have 1000 songs from my 500 CDs on my hard drive but it will come with time (and money).
  • Reply 14 of 25
    wagneritewagnerite Posts: 174member
    No problem in building server or buying extra drives. As long as the files stay in aiff and sound identical to CD's.



    No way will I digitize my LP's though.
  • Reply 15 of 25
    klinuxklinux Posts: 453member
    Most audiophiles or enthusiasts believe MP3 recorded at 256kpbs or above are virtually undistinguishable from CD originals. An example of this from the study done last year by the folks at Stereo Review comparing codecs (MP3 vs WMA vs REAL).



    Now, their study is not perfect but is the best I have seen yet to date i.e. using double blind tests with multiple samples from different musical genres judged by professional listeners in a controlled setting using real audio equipment and so on.



    Their opinion is far better than the kind of opinions one usually receive from most message boards e.g. people comparing one kind of music (typically electronic) listening on their PC with cheap speakers or people automatically say vorbis is better simply because it is open source or dump on WMA simply because it is from Micro$oft [sic].



    Therefore, I think encoding in 256 kbps should be fine for you. Any artifacts or problems you might notice are more likely electrical noise/interference from your iBook or the PSU or from the conversion 1/8 to RCA than from the MP3 algorithm.



    I know in the PC world we have the SB Audigy which can go from USB to digital optical out. I do not know if there is a version for Mac.
  • Reply 16 of 25
    pyr3pyr3 Posts: 946member
    [quote]Originally posted by Wagnerite:

    <strong>No problem in building server or buying extra drives. As long as the files stay in aiff and sound identical to CD's.



    No way will I digitize my LP's though. </strong><hr></blockquote>



    If you use the lossless format you don't lose anything from the aiff files. It's basically like storing them in winzip or stuff-it files and then playing them when you want. I think that plus the harddrives would be the way to go for you. As far as lossless music formats, you don't half to worry about quality since none of them lose any quality from the original. You're just compressing the data that's there, you aren't discarding info like mp3s do. With lossless audio formats you just have to look at the compression rates , the speed to compress and/or the players that support that format.
  • Reply 17 of 25
    [quote]Originally posted by klinux:

    <strong>Most audiophiles or enthusiasts believe MP3 recorded at 256kpbs or above are virtually undistinguishable from CD originals..



    Therefore, I think encoding in 256 kbps should be fine for you. Any artifacts or problems you might notice are more likely electrical noise/interference from your iBook or the PSU or from the conversion 1/8 to RCA than from the MP3 algorithm.



    I know in the PC world we have the SB Audigy which can go from USB to digital optical out. I do not know if there is a version for Mac.</strong><hr></blockquote>



    best audiophiles will tell you to use nothing but 320kbps LAME MP3 encoding...and with that, you really can't tell the difference. Having tried that, a full 74 minute CD (650MB) is compressed to 'bout 175MB. (you can work out the math for exact numbers) (I don't have good enough equipments to tell the difference, but I can say that it sounds noticeably better than 160kbps on the cheap stuff that I have: MDR-V6 and PortPro)



    As for USB-&gt;digital optical out, I don't think there's anything...but there is something from HK is worth looking into...(too lazy to look up the URL, just got o their site and it's easy to find)
  • Reply 18 of 25
    Paging Eugene...
  • Reply 19 of 25
    klinuxklinux Posts: 453member
    First, there is plenty of study out there that shows 256 kbps on fine audio equipment is undistinguishable from the original CD. On the otherhand, I have seen no empirical study that shows 320 kbps sounds any better than 256 kbps. If you have something that is not an anecdotal evidence, I would be more than glad to see it and learn from it.



    Now, if someone has virtually unlimited HD space, by all means, store them in AIFF/WAV or compress it 320 kbps or whatever format one likes. However, does MP3 encoded at 320 kbps sound better than 256 kbps coming from a laptop with a 1/8 to RCA jack - I think not.



    I was concerned about using the word audiophile because the word is so fraught with meaning. I hope we won't see a debate of $200 cables versus $100 cables here.
  • Reply 20 of 25
    matsumatsu Posts: 6,558member
    Audiophiles are a silly bunch, even the best playback system/listening room and recording method they can devise doesn't come close to re-creating a live acoustic performance. They all insist that it can (so they can go out and spend tens of thousands of dollars on little odd shaped boxes) but the second you hear a live performance you know even the best system you ever listened too doesn't sound like it.



    Save the money, buy a decent system and use the extra on lots of concert tickets.
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