home hardware prices news articles forums photos user reviews
Go Back   Tech Support Forums - TechIMO.com > PC Hardware and Tech > Multimedia and Audio
Ask a Tech Support Question (free)!

Best way to encode music these days?

Reply
Get bargains at  »  Dealighted.com
 
Thread Tools Search this Thread
Currently Active Users: 2286
Discussions: 200,919, Posts: 2,379,038, Members: 246,287
Old June 11th, 2006, 10:28 AM   Digg it!   #1 (permalink)
Ultimate Member
 
JayMan's Avatar
 
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: Sydney, Australia
Posts: 3,705
Send a message via ICQ to JayMan
Best way to encode music these days?

Howdy all,

I havent updated the way I encode all my music collection for quite a while now...

I'm still using MP3 rather than the newer formats...

I currently use EAC to rip my CD's, then use LAME with the '--r3mix' settings string to encode to an 'archive quality' VBR mp3 file. This use to be rated one of the best quality mp3 encoding settings, while still keeping the file sizes reasonable.

I find the quality of these files to be excellent, which is why i havent changed for years... But i figure there are alot of new formats out there, and just curious on other peoples prefered way of encoding their music.

Basically, I'm after:
-excellent/near perfect sound quality (i.e. so i'm not able to tell difference from the CD)
-good compression rates (don't want massive files)
-format to support ID Tags of some sort (like the ID3 tags from MP3)
-Easy to convert to MP3 if needed (e.g. for car stereo, portable MP3 player, mobile phone etc...)
-Able to use as an external codec for EAC.

So... anyone wanna tell me there way of encoding or point me to some good guides for producing high quality files?

Cheers!

JayMan
JayMan is offline   Reply With Quote
Old June 11th, 2006, 09:00 PM     #2 (permalink)
Ultimate Member
 
crazyray's Avatar
 
Join Date: Oct 2001
Posts: 1,226
I've chosen to stay with MP3's as well because they can be used in my car and on my portable music players. I also use EAC but I prefer LAME VBR extreme settings. Many folks I know are using EAC and FLAC. Sound quality is supposedly identical to wav but the reduction in file size is just ~50%. Hard drive space is cheap these days.


Regardless of the codec, the smaller the file size, the larger the drop in fidelity. Whether you can hear it (or care) is up to you.
crazyray is offline   Reply With Quote
Old June 11th, 2006, 09:53 PM     #3 (permalink)
Ultimate Member
 
JayMan's Avatar
 
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: Sydney, Australia
Posts: 3,705
Send a message via ICQ to JayMan
Just found www.hydrogenaudio.org , seems to be a nice forum regarding audio stuff...

Had a quick dig around and it seems '-Vx --vbr-new' is the new way to go with LAME... Where x=quality (lower number = better quality)... might try V2 or V1 & see how that turns out...

Might also checkout some of the lossless compressions... As ya say, harddisk space is cheap... (but then i look at my 3000+ songs @ ~6-8mb each, and think of them @ 20-30MB each... Thats a big difference)

JayMan
JayMan is offline   Reply With Quote
Old June 12th, 2006, 02:51 AM     #4 (permalink)
Ultimate Member
 
crazyray's Avatar
 
Join Date: Oct 2001
Posts: 1,226
The Foobar player offered at HydrogenAudio is recommended for playback of MP3's and FLAC files. I haven't spent any time there in quite a while but I know there are people who are up on the latest hanging at that site. I'm still using LAME 3.90 as it provides seamless playback on Foobar. I recommend the high quality VBR's you mentioned; LAME VBR extreme is the terminology for similar files with 3.90. Good luck and good listening.
crazyray is offline   Reply With Quote
Reply
Thread Tools Search this Thread
Search this Thread:

Advanced Search

Similar Threads
Thread Thread Starter Forum Replies Last Post
Re-encode DivX Program Russian Wall Multimedia and Audio 7 June 20th, 2005 03:52 PM
after days and days of browsing HOTORNOT.com, I have ONE match emsox IMO Community 30 March 24th, 2004 08:19 PM
how to encode in word to make it readable? kruseman Applications and Operating Systems 2 March 2nd, 2003 03:39 PM
how to encode this file???????? robin801 Multimedia and Audio 12 September 7th, 2002 06:12 AM
Upgrading computer to edit and encode audio Yar1182 General Tech Discussion 3 April 29th, 2002 10:10 PM


Currently Active Users Viewing This Thread: 1 (0 members and 1 guests)
 
Most Active Discussions
Is It Just Me? (2844)
Why is Khalid Sheikh Mohammed even .. (9)
Obama the Muslim (9)
Is the PSU I received dead? (10)
windows vista security holes (7)
HIS HD5770 graphic card question (15)
Install XP pro and a Vista laptop ?.. (9)
Foreign voltage (8)
A good PSU? (10)
Dept. of HS: NSA 'Helped' Develop V.. (15)
Print spooler problem (10)
New Computer wont recognize XP disc (7)
Ideal cheap graph card for PC-Gamin.. (15)
EVGA 9800 gtx help with finding a g.. (8)
Recent Discussions
FiOS modem/router interfering with ne.. (7)
Browsers wont load websites (2)
Virus Doctor Popup? (1)
Help getting around port 80 for camer.. (1)
[F@H SPAM 11/16/09] ! 1/2 months to r.. (31)
Foreign voltage (8)
Dept. of HS: NSA 'Helped' Develop Vis.. (15)
windows vista security holes (7)
Install XP pro and a Vista laptop ?? (9)
EVGA 9800 gtx help with finding a goo.. (8)
Modern Warfare For the PC (32)
Problem with speed step/turbo boost? (1)
monitor will not turn on at all, (0)
Modern Warfare 2: Who Bought It? (61)
World's largest Monopoly Game using G.. (330)
Print spooler problem (10)
SIS 740 and Widescreen (8)
Baffling Problem with my CPU/MoBo's. .. (0)
Display shows 3x5 inch in middle of s.. (0)
HIS HD5770 graphic card question (15)
Best file format to play on Windows H.. (0)
PSP Go bought in Japan (0)
Asus P4G8X Mobo (3)
Need hard disk drivers (4)
windows 7 internet problem (4)


All times are GMT -4. The time now is 06:04 PM.
TechIMO Copyright 2009 All Enthusiast, Inc.



1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28