[jack963]

Hey, I used to download a lot of my CD's and junk, but then I started caring about quality, so I stopped, and started buying stuff, but I am sick of watsing my money already. So anyway, say I download a 128 kbps, is there any way to improve the quality of this file? If so, how would I do this? This may seem like a pretty beginner question to you all, but I have never even thought about taking the time to do this before. And sorry about the forum choice, I was not quite sure about where to post this, so I chose Portable Audio for some reason

Anyway, any input would be greatly appreciated, thanks a lot.

 

[Braver]

nope, MP3 is lossy. you could try and EQ it a bit, but you can't increase the quality.

buy CDs, cheap *#$%@

 

[jack963]

Alright, thanks a lot. How about converting them to another file format, would that help at all? I really don't know what I am talking about here, I am literally taking a stab in the dark. Thanks.

 

[blessingx]

Yeah, compression questions tend to fall here or the Source forum.

Sort answer: no.

Long answer: You can do some manipulation to the files in a sound editor to increase aspects you find missing in the file (say more bass), and then transcode it back to MP3, which would degrade the quality and so.... no.


Head over to Hydrogren Audio and explore their MP3, AAC, OGG, etc. forums for info.

[EDIT: oops already been answered. So to take on the next question- new formats are not going to help your problem with existing lossy files.]

 

[Gojira]

Transcoding, converting one file format to another, will reduce the sound quality significantly. Not a good idea. If you want free music you have to live with what you get. My suggestion would be to try other P2P programs. I use soulseek and am sometimes able to find 256kbps and 320kbps files. I can almost always find 196kbps. It's only the ultra-rare files where I have to live with 128.

Another option would be to buy the CD used, burn it to your hard drive and then sell the CD. Doing this, you can often get away with only losing around $5 (mostly in shipping) for the whole CD. Borrowing CDs from the library can also work if the music is not very rare.

And, yeah, I think the sources section would be the place for this question. A moderator will probably move it for you.

 

[lan]

If you have a computer file, all you can do is try and increase the quality of equipment playing the music.

 

[jack963]

So basically, there is no solution, and I should just buy the CD's, right? Thanks a lot for the help.

 

[Sweet Spot]

Quote:

So basically, there is no solution, and I should just buy the CD's, right? Thanks a lot for the help.

Yes and no. For one, dont' be such a cheap person. You want quality...you pay. But how many albums is it that you want to buy every day ? I'm sure you can afford to buy an album every week or so no ? (assuming you have a job.)

Option 2 (the "I'm going to continue to be a cheap person" method.)
One word: Usenet

We'll not continue this conversation here, and I'm usually working so, PM me and we'll talk. Otherwise, I'd suggest you not wait for me, and find out what you can about it till we speak.

S.S.

P.S. If you dont' have hight speed access then don't even think about it.

P.P.S. Don't bother the people here about what it is too much either...there are alot of those who think that file sharing is an incorrect thing to do, and we dont' want to stomp on anyones opinions.

 

[jack963]

Thanks a lot for the input and the offer to help, but I think I'll just start buying CD's again, and waiting for Christmas and birthdays to roll around

. And I do have a job at Best Buy, so there's a source of money and I gte the discount

. Thanks again.

 

[blessingx]

Depending on your musical tastes, check out eMusic for -aps hassle-free MP3's. You can experiment for cheap.