[seanohue]

Not to thread crap but how can I set iTunes to take all my lossless files that I have on it to 320 AAC which I like to play on my iPod? I can't figure out how to get iTunes to convert JUST the lossless files to 320 kpbs, because it tries to convert everything (128-even the 320s) and I end up with 3800 songs (1900 originally).

 

[memepool]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Febs Should I keep five different versions of my music on my portable, all EQed differently? By the way, do you have any familiarity at all with Rockbox's eq?

I havn't seen the Rockboxes EQ no, as my Ipod is 3G won't support it, but I doubt that it will stand up to the eq in apps like Protools or even Cool Edit.

I could of course be completely wrong and should really try it before casting aspersions though, so if it's the best one you've tried then I guess it fits your needs.

But I would generally stand by the ideal that if you want the best from your music you are better off addressing the playback equipment, rather than trying to fiddle with what has been done in the studio with a freeware pluggin.

Especially since what you are re-eq'ing has probably had massive amounts of compression applied in the studio if it's modern pop music, then had most of the life squashed out of it by a compression codec like MP3. Frankly to claim that this can approach Hi-Fidelity by applying further eq of the standard found in most consumer level equipment is a nonsense.


Quote:

Originally Posted by Chri5peed Most likely, but that doesn't stop LAME being the best mp3-encoder(by general consensus, not my opinion) and therefore wouldn't it be considered sensible to use Lame, especially as its free.

Personally I would use Cool Edit Pro (now Adobe Audition) with the complete Fraunhoffer MP3 Pro exporter pluggin as this gives the most flexibility and best results in my experience. Autodesk Cleaner is also very good for batch processing really large amounts but both of these packages cost hundreds of pounds and I don't have to pay for them personally so....


Quote:

Originally Posted by Chri5peed 99% of people probably haven't heard of AKG, Beyerdynamics or Etymotic, doesn't stop them being great headphones. People will use what they're given, they percieve as the best or is easiest until they're shown better..

Without recourse to argument from popularity, which you are quite right doesn't necessarily equal quality, but you did use first, all the brands you have mentioned, except Etymotic, would be fairly well known to anyone who has ever had any reason to buy headphones or microphones in the last 50 years anyway. LAME is just a tad more obscure than this.

Quote:

Originally Posted by seanohue ..how can I set iTunes to take all my lossless files that I have on it to 320 AAC which I like to play on my iPod?..

Go into the preferences>advanced>importing tab and select 'mp3' and 'custom'. This will open the custom settings and allow you to set Bit Rate and VBR quality etc.

Next Right click (PC) or Control Click (Mac) on the categories at the top of the library and check 'kind'. Then arrange the view to 'kind' by clicking the top of the 'kind' column. This will show all your Apple Lossless files together. Select them all then and re-encode by Right click (PC) or Control Click (Mac).

 

[Febs]

Quote:

Originally Posted by memepool Especially since what you are re-eq'ing has probably had massive amounts of compression applied in the studio if it's modern pop music, then had most of the life squashed out of it by a compression codec like MP3. Frankly to claim that this can approach Hi-Fidelity by applying further eq of the standard found in most consumer level equipment is a nonsense.

You're making a number of bad assumptions.

I rarely, if ever, listen to modern pop music. Aside from the fact that there is not much in the way of modern pop music that appeals to me musically, I hate the modern trend of limiting the life out of music.

The use of MP3 is completely irrelevant to when and where I use EQ, because I encode MP3s that are perceptually transparent to me (confirmed by extensive ABX testing). To the extent that I use EQ, I would apply it the same to an MP3 as I would to a lossless version of the same song.

In short, we can agree to disagree. Just recognize that there are people for whom Rockbox's parametric EQ is a compelling feature.

And finally, I never claimed that anything was or was not "Hi Fidelity" (whatever that means). In fact, to the contrary, I indicated that I tend not to use EQ, but when I do use it, it is in portable situations, where EQ can compensate for shortcomings of (for example), my car stereo. Would replacing the stereo result in higher fidelity? Of course. I don't argue that. But Rockbox's 5-band parametric is a very effective and practical way to achieve this end. Using a DAW to effectively re-master my recordings is not, for me, a practical solution.

 

[memepool]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Febs And finally, I never claimed that anything was or was not "Hi Fidelity" (whatever that means). In fact, to the contrary, I indicated that I tend not to use EQ, but when I do use it, it is in portable situations, where EQ can compensate for shortcomings of (for example), my car stereo. Would replacing the stereo result in higher fidelity? Of course. I don't argue that. But Rockbox's 5-band parametric is a very effective and practical way to achieve this end. Using a DAW to effectively re-master my recordings is not, for me, a practical solution.

In the same spirit of anal exactitude, my assumptions can't be 'bad' because that is a value judgement, they can be 'correct' or 'incorrect', so as I already said if the Rockbox is the best one solution you've found to fits your needs then I can't argue with that.

Hi-Fi is short for High Fidelity which as Fewtch pointed out absolutely correctly to me recently is 'the highest possible fidelity to the source' and I beleive that is what this forum is dedicated to so that is what we are here to discuss.

The idea that an MP3 equates to uncompressed music so far as re-eq ing is concerned is unsound because you have already chucked away a lot of the frequency range. The best solution, as you say, is to improve the car stereo by adding better / extra amplifiers and/or speakers which needn't cost an arm and a leg and in fact would probably be way cheaper than the bespoke headphone amps and other gadgets people round here blow so much money on.

 

[Febs]

Quote:

Originally Posted by memepool In the same spirit of anal exactitude, my assumptions can't be 'bad' because that is a value judgement, they can be 'correct' or 'incorrect', so as I already said if the Rockbox is the best one solution you've found to fits your needs then I can't argue with that.

That's a fair point. I should have said that you are making assumptions that do not apply to me.

 

[fongalv]

can someone confirm a quick query thats along a similiar line to ripping?

does encoding in flac8, which gives a slightly smaller file take more CPU to read than same file in flac1, both of which obviously have the same quality but the former being more cpu intensive and thus meaning less battery life?

thanks in advance.

 

[RichA]

I find that Ogg offers the best sound quality to filesize ration when on the move. Around the 128kbps mark sounds infinitely better than most mp3's. 170-200kbps and you'd really, really struggle to find any differences.

FLAC is awesome, but a space hog compared to the lossless codecs. MP3 is versatile and well supported, but sonically inferior to modern codecs. It does sound good at higher bitrates, but other codecs can achieve the same sound quality in a heap less space.

Do an ABX between a low-bitrate Ogg, a high-bitrate Ogg, low and high mp3, and FLAC. To me, Ogg offers the best compromise between sound quality and filesize.

--Rich

 

[fierce_freak]

what i'll be doing when i receive my imod is to compare wavpack lossless against lossy at different bitrates (i've decided wavpack is the top of the heap lossless codec, for me) against ogg at a couple bitrates against my current 320kbps mp3's.

I'll be back to relate my impressions (will probably be at least a week til I receive the imod, though).

 

[scottder]

Quote:

Originally Posted by fierce_freak what i'll be doing when i receive my imod is to compare wavpack lossless against lossy at different bitrates (i've decided wavpack is the top of the heap lossless codec, for me) against ogg at a couple bitrates against my current 320kbps mp3's. I'll be back to relate my impressions (will probably be at least a week til I receive the imod, though).

Just out of curiousity, why did you pick wavpack for lossless (not that it makes much difference with sound quality, lossless is lossless).

 

[mnhnhyouh]

Quote:

Originally Posted by RichA I find that Ogg offers the best sound quality to filesize ration when on the move. Around the 128kbps mark sounds infinitely better than most mp3's. 170-200kbps and you'd really, really struggle to find any differences. --Rich

Have you done ABX testing on this?

h

 

[K2Grey]

While we're somewhat on the topic of lossless vs lossy size, I actually have a CD in FLAC where the average bitrate is 316kbps. So if I transcoded this to 320kbps mp3 I would actually increase the bitrate (and probably decrease SQ).

Strange.

 

[scottder]

Quote:

Originally Posted by K2Grey While we're somewhat on the topic of lossless vs lossy size, I actually have a CD in FLAC where the average bitrate is 316kbps. So if I transcoded this to 320kbps mp3 I would actually increase the bitrate (and probably decrease SQ). Strange.

I doubt there would be a noticable difference. But be a quiet CD to get 316kbps

 

[seanohue]

Quote:

Originally Posted by memepool Go into the preferences>advanced>importing tab and select 'mp3' and 'custom'. This will open the custom settings and allow you to set Bit Rate and VBR quality etc. Next Right click (PC) or Control Click (Mac) on the categories at the top of the library and check 'kind'. Then arrange the view to 'kind' by clicking the top of the 'kind' column. This will show all your Apple Lossless files together. Select them all then and re-encode by Right click (PC) or Control Click (Mac).

How do you uncheck a mass of items?

EDIT: found it

 

[wanderman]

wavpack use it and love it. for all questions about codec quality, newest version and testing I would head over to http://www.hydrogenaudio.org.

For my portable and laptop I use lame 3.97 v2 and have all those songs in wavpack on my desktop at home. I choose mp3 and more specifically lame because of the vbr mode, dreamtactix291, abx'ing, and guaranteed assurance of compatibility on nearly every device. lame also saved my battery unlike vorbis. Foobar really is a killer app btw.


-wanderman

 

[fierce_freak]

Quote:

Originally Posted by scottder Just out of curiousity, why did you pick wavpack for lossless (not that it makes much difference with sound quality, lossless is lossless).

Looks to have the best combination of encoding/decoding speeds, average size, id3 tags, and the ability to create lossless and lossy wavpack files at the same time.