Good settings for "quality-file size" trade off with MP3s?

[Joe Mac]

Thanks to this board I was able to upgrade my mp3 equipment, headphones, and software.

I have a flash player and I use it for urban walking with open style headphones (got to hear the crazies coming).

In this respect, I have always been happy with 128Kbps CBR MP3s for my pop song compilations.

I now have the EAC + LAME > VBR MP3 setup and have been through the tutorials and love the results using the standard preset. (Again thanks to the threads and pointers from this board.) However, the files are roughly 40% bigger than the 128Kbps CBR files. Too big for my flash player (great for my computer stero).

Has anyone come up with settings or tweaks that either produce a) better sounding VBR MP3s at roughly the same file size as 128Kbps CBR, or B) equivalent sounding VBR MP3s with file sizes smaller than 128Kbps CBR?

Thanks!

p.s. I want to stick with MP3 format.

 

[stallion11msu]

hydrogen audio is probably the best forum that deals with audio compression. You might be able to find something there.

 

[mtillman]

Can you really hear the difference between 128 and aps?

If you can, does it really matter anyway, under the circumstances?

(Test yourself, and be the first to reply... - look at the Golden Ears - Return of the Codecs 'thread' in this forum)

 

[Joe Mac]

I'm quite sure I don't have audiophile ears. I do, however, respond quite negatively to pops and skips and other crap that takes you out of the music. Hence, my equipment and software upgrades. It looks like I got too caught up in all the chatter. I was assuming 128Kbps was crap and even a tin ear like me could do better with a little effort.

For the record I heard no differences in the sample on my crappy notebook speakers. I'll take the test at home and try some tests of my own.

Good information. Thanks for the post!

I wonder if I do VBR with 128Kbps max if I'll get the quality I'm used to and slightly smaller files? More research

 

[PodMan]

VBR is optimized for quality, not bitrate. if you want to tune for a specific bitrate, you need ABR.

in lame, try --alt-preset 128. this generates a file with an average bitrate of 128. Should be of slightly higher quality than 128 at constant bitrate. You can substitute any bitrate for 128 and LAME will do an average bitrate for it.

for more quality, you can also try --alt-preset standard -Y which generates a cutoff at 16khz for frequencies. The default cutoff for 128 is also 16khz as well. so if 128 sounds good to you, this should sound even better because it has the advantage of the internal tweaking of the standard preset. The -Y option should lower bitrate from the standard preset by 20kbps or so, depending on the music.

also I might add that they are working on an alt-preset medium setting for portables in 3.94. But that's still in early testing so I would just stick with 3.90.2 which is the version that is most widely tested.

 

[JahJahBinks]

I suggest you to try encoding in ABR at 160 (--alt-preset 160). If you are okay with the file size then everything's set. If not then try 128 (--alt-preset 128)

 

[Joe Mac]

looks like i got lots of experimentin' to do. appreciate the tips!