MYSTERY:a burned disc is it WAV or Mp3 (SOLVED #32)

[audiorapture]

I always thought it was better to go from a quality sound if it's MP3, (if you can call MP3 quality...there I said it "shigzeo") at 320 to 192; than try it the other way, from 192 back up to 320. I want to keep my "good stuff" in WAV formats and let the car or the boom box use the MP3's.
It seems you can't just put in a burned disc, press play, look at "properties", and it will tell you what the original recording for that burned disc was copied at, as far it's 320 or 192, or whatever...

[audiorapture]

p.s.:
Congrats to "shigzeo" for going over the 3000 posts;
"ericj" and "Great Dane" for going over 5,000 posts;
the homerun king "Krmathis" for going over 16,000 posts...
I appreciate your time and effort...

[Zodduska]

Originally Posted by audiorapture

I always thought it was better to go from a quality sound if it's MP3, (if you can call MP3 quality...there I said it "shigzeo") at 320 to 192; than try it the other way, from 192 back up to 320. I want to keep my "good stuff" in WAV formats and let the car or the boom box use the MP3's.
It seems you can't just put in a burned disc, press play, look at "properties", and it will tell you what the original recording for that burned disc was copied at, as far it's 320 or 192, or whatever...

If the files on the cd are .mp3 you can right click > properties > details to see the bitrate in windows.

If the cd was burned as a standard audio cd from an mp3 source there is not an easy way to tell what that source was that I know of, as others have mentioned earlier you can use a program to look at the spectrum analysis.

To echo GreatDane, you can never "add back" what has been lost by lossy compression, so there is no point going from 192 to 320 for example.. In fact it's probably never a good idea to convert an already lossy format (.mp3) to another lossy format regardless of the bitrate, even to a lower bitrate with the intention of saving space ex: 320 to 192. The general principal applies to a lot of things; Garbage in = Garbage out.. GIGO

[GreatDane]

I try to help and not confuse with bad info. Maybe not this time but this is +1 post for me...I believe the term is post whore. (I wasn't referring to me)

Hey Mr. rapture we need to have one of those super-mini meets again so you need to buy some new stuff to show off.

[bundee1]

Cant you check the size of the file? Wouldnt a .wav from an mp3 be smaller than a file that began originally as a .wav?

[audiorapture]

Yes Great Dane, we could pick a Saturday afternoon and have some burgers from my grill and add that pizza. We could open it up to the Norfolk, Chesapeake, VaBch local area and see who might interested?
Thanks again for your input and when I get the pick small enough I'll add the picture of the Senn 280 with the meter cord I use on the flights to Helsinki...

[audiorapture]

Bundee1; how would you go about checking the file, (step one..., step two...), as I obviously need all the help I can get. It doesn't open up to the properties to tell me anything.
I am using the WMP but I also have the NERO 7 for a 30 day trial and I like NERO better.
Maybe its me, but I think Windows adds just too much unneeded stuff and kind of bloats the player and the rest of the program.
Just my very limited opinion of course as I don't know the functions and all the possibilities of the program. (And now, it's short-comings)

[GreatDane]

Originally Posted by audiorapture

Yes Great Dane, we could pick a Saturday afternoon and have some burgers from my grill and add that pizza. We could open it up to the Norfolk, Chesapeake, VaBch local area and see who might interested?
Thanks again for your input and when I get the pick small enough I'll add the picture of the Senn 280 with the meter cord I use on the flights to Helsinki...

That would be cool. It's your house so you make that call. If you're serious about this idea you could start a new thread to attract interest.

I'm there!

[audiorapture]

I'll get with my wife and her schedule and see about the 20th or 27th from like 2-6.
Which is o.k. for you. ??
How many Head-Fi ers are in this area anyway?
I'll put it up this weekend.

[GreatDane]

I'll check and get back to you re the dates.

There are a few members in this area but I don't know if they're all active posters who will notice.

[nick_charles]

Originally Posted by audiorapture

how would you go about checking the file, (step one..., step two...), as I obviously need all the help I can get.

Monolith has given you the answer but getting there is a bit involved.

1) You need to get a track from this mystery CD onto your hard drive for analysis. If the CD is a lash-up it will probably contain WAV files. If so you can just copy one from the CD in Windows Explorer or in My Computer.

If the CD is a normal CD the files will be in CDDA format and you will need to rip a track into WAV format. You can use NERO to do this.

Once you have a WAV file you need to analyse it using an Audio ediing program. You can use Audacity to do this

Audacity: Free Audio Editor and Recorder

Install Audacity and then load up a file. Select a portion of the file and then use the Plot Spectrum option from the Analyse menu.

If the file is derived from an MP3 file it will show the sharp drop in the high frequencies if not the spectrum will show a nice gradual slope...

[audiorapture]

this certainly sounds like the way to go. I, of course, was hoping for a simply two step answer like select this, click, here is your answer. I will try this over the weekend and report back. thanks for the info..d

[progo]

Technically CDDAs don't have a file system, nor do they have "wave files" there on disc. It's just pits and bits there. When you rip a CD losslessly the data will be converted to wave format and then compressed to flacs, mp3, wma etc.

[nick_charles]

Originally Posted by progo

Technically CDDAs don't have a file system, nor do they have "wave files" there on disc. It's just pits and bits there. When you rip a CD losslessly the data will be converted to wave format and then compressed to flacs, mp3, wma etc.

Technically a CDDA disc shows up as a set of .cda files - these are of course a set of pointers so we have a set of start points (addresses) and a set of pointers to these start points that looks a lot like a basic file system to me

Back on topic Audio CDs files have an extensive set of subcodes on the first 8 channels these incorporate some metadata about the CD including the Q subchannel that stores data about the recordings and the media catalog number. A hooky CD created from MP3 files will almost certainly not have this data - though I do not know if you can easily read these subcodes ?

[gpalmer]

Just had to drop in to see why this thread is going strong on its 3rd page. Very interesting folks, carry on!