jazzman4133 Posted January 9, 2004 Report Share Posted January 9, 2004 I'm still confused about the difference. If a wav. file of the same song is sometimes as much as 4 times the size of the same song as an MP3 doesn't it contain more information? If it does contain more information then wouldn't I be safer in burning the WAV. version rather than the MP3 version? When I was downloading a great deal of albums from e-music (before they changed over to a download limit) they would come in as an mp3 file. Often, after burning the file to a CD there was all kinds of little annoying noises. Subsequently upon a suggestion from another e-music user, I converted each file from mp3 to a wav. file and never had a similar problem occur. By the way, for those of you not familiar with e-music, they have loads of old Prestige, Riverside, Contemporary, Fantasy complete albums available for download. Now, however, downloads are limited for the monthly fee to 60 tracks, which could be ten albums. Still, $14.99 (I think) a month is a bargain for ten such albums, many of which are long out of print, especially the Jimmy Raney Xanadu albums which are all there. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jazz Groove Posted January 9, 2004 Report Share Posted January 9, 2004 If the file was created as a MP3 it will never get back what it would have had if it were a WAV file from the start. To make the file size smaller something has to be lost. Most of the average listeners would not notice the difference. This could be said about CD’s to albums. There are some that can hear how much softer albums sound over CD’s. Digital recordings do lose the overtones which analog recordings capture. MP3’s just cut more of the nuances out of the picture. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daniel A Posted January 9, 2004 Report Share Posted January 9, 2004 If by 'burning the file to a CD' you mean burning an audio CD, playable in an audio CD player, the files have in fact already been converted to the WAV format by the burning software. If there's a difference between the sound quality of that disc, and a disc of files converted to WAV before the burning, it appears that the MP3 to WAV conversion of the burning software is flawed. Regarding the overall sound quality of MP3, one has to keep in mind that serious MP3 compressing software offers an large number of different settings which affects the resulting file size as well as the sound quality. I'd say that on a good stereo setup the difference between a typical MP3 file and the original source is perfectly audible, while an MP3 file compressed with a good software (such as the LAME MP3 encoder) and without too much compression (an average bitrate of around 200 kbps, which gives a compression ratio of about 1:7) is very hard to distinguish from the original. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rockefeller center Posted January 9, 2004 Report Share Posted January 9, 2004 (edited) Burning audio CDs from mp3 sources at higher speed than 4x results in flaws with my burner (LiteOn LTR-52246S). The music will sound as if a flanger effect has been applied. I can burn audio CDs from wav at 52x speed and mp3s at 4x without any problems. So, if you want to burn audio CDs from mp3s and you're tired of decoding them to wav first, try to burn at low speed (4x) - if you haven't already tried that. Edited January 9, 2004 by rockefeller center Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Claude Posted January 9, 2004 Report Share Posted January 9, 2004 (edited) The reason of these problems is that the PC has to do two things at the same time: convert mp3s to wav (which takes some processing power and hard drive speed) and burn the CD. The same can happen when copying a CD directly to a CD-R (CD reader to CD writer) "on the fly". It is safer to extract the CD first and burn the CD-R afterwards. Most CD burning software have such an option. Edited January 9, 2004 by Claude Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rockefeller center Posted January 9, 2004 Report Share Posted January 9, 2004 The reason of these problems is that the PC has to do two things at the same time: convert mp3s to wav (which takes some processing power and hard drive speed) and burn the CD. The same can happen when copying a CD directly to a CD-R (CD reader to CD writer) "on the fly". It is safer to extract the CD first and burn the CD-R later. Many CD burning software have this option. Yesss. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Noj Posted January 9, 2004 Report Share Posted January 9, 2004 Can any of you knowledgeable cats explain in lay-man's terms what causes an MP3 to be "corrupted" such that it renders extraction and burning impossible? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rockefeller center Posted January 9, 2004 Report Share Posted January 9, 2004 Can any of you knowledgeable cats explain in lay-man's terms what causes an MP3 to be "corrupted" such that it renders extraction and burning impossible? I'm not knowledgeable but this problem (physical damage, transmission errors) occured to me several times and in most cases it was possible to recover/decode such files with the RazorLame/Lame mp3 software. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jim Dye Posted January 9, 2004 Report Share Posted January 9, 2004 You might try fixing the headers using the MP3 software Foobar2000. http://www.foobar2000.org/ It's a great program (if you use Windows) B) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Noj Posted January 9, 2004 Report Share Posted January 9, 2004 Whoa, cool! Thanks RC, I'll give that a try when I get home. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Noj Posted January 9, 2004 Report Share Posted January 9, 2004 Thanks to you too, Jim Dye. Unfortunately I'm on Mac at home. Usually throws a wrench in most of my free software ventures. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jim Dye Posted January 9, 2004 Report Share Posted January 9, 2004 I would never feel unfortunate using a Mac! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rockefeller center Posted January 9, 2004 Report Share Posted January 9, 2004 Whoa, cool! Thanks RC, I'll give that a try when I get home. Please forgive my ignorance, Noj. The software link I provided is for Windows systems and I'm not sure whether there's a Mac version available yet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Noj Posted January 9, 2004 Report Share Posted January 9, 2004 I should have specified. The Mac version will come out and cost $150.00, and will only run on the latest Mac software (I'm lagging back on OS 9). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mmilovan Posted January 10, 2004 Report Share Posted January 10, 2004 (edited) If you are "seriously into jazz" never, never, never use mp3 format to listen to it. It is compressed format. I know that I probably will get opposite answers but difference CAN be heard (in expensive as well as in cheap systems - listen to for an example to cymbals and you will hear the difference). About annoying noises: some mp3 machines have problems while reading from particular media - some of discs are suitable for them, some not. The same occurs if media is burned at faster speed, some of them are not well readable. There is no general rule to that - some people say that media with silver dye have better results, the other say green media etc. The best way is to do an experiment for yourself and try to find out what combination of media and burn speed is the best. But, I wouldn't go for mp3, anyway. Edited January 10, 2004 by mmilovan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rockefeller center Posted January 10, 2004 Report Share Posted January 10, 2004 (edited) If you are seriosly into jazz never, never, never use mp3 format to listen to it. I know that I probably will get opposite answers but difference CAN be heard (in expensive as well as in cheap systems). The mp3 format is, no matter how bad the quality might be, a valid and useful format and its sound quality was not subject of this thread. Anyway, pick a tune from "Kind Of Blue" and I'll send you a disc that has 10 tracks consisting of the tune of your choice, two tracks will be encoded to mp3 at 320 kbps before burning. I don't want to argue with you about the inferiority of the mp3 format (you're right of course - it is a lossy format) nor do I want to imply that I don't believe that you are capable of identifying the mp3s. I'm just curious and it would be cool if you would accept the challenge. Any takers? Edited January 10, 2004 by rockefeller center Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Parkertown Posted January 10, 2004 Report Share Posted January 10, 2004 I would say the biggest cause of "artifacts/noise" in an MP3 files would be bad encoding. The emusic MP3s used to be hit or miss. Some were okay, some sucked. This was when they were all 128kb CBR. Now they're using the Lame encoder with a VBR that makes much better sounding MP3s. They re-encoded most of their files, but some have not be upgraded. The VBR ones sound purty darn good....for an MP3... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Son-of-a-Weizen Posted January 10, 2004 Report Share Posted January 10, 2004 Any takers? Yes. May I forward a blank disc for you to use? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rockefeller center Posted January 10, 2004 Report Share Posted January 10, 2004 Any takers? Yes. May I forward a blank disc for you to use? Fine, thanks for participating (not necessary to send me a blank). Please PM your address. Pick a tune from "Kind of Blue" (I have the Columbia CK 64935 [sBM CD] release), please. If you prefer a tune from another album, please suggest one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mmilovan Posted January 10, 2004 Report Share Posted January 10, 2004 (edited) I'm just curious and it would be cool if you would accept the challenge. Any takers? This is good idea, I like that album very much. Maybe "Blue In Green", if I'm not asking too much. Not knowing what are mp3 and what are wav originals it would be big challenge to try to detect them. You can also put multiple copies all random mixed up - wav and mp3 - that will make game more interesting. I think you have my adress, right? And I am sorry for missing the point of this discussion in some aspects. Edited January 10, 2004 by mmilovan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rockefeller center Posted January 11, 2004 Report Share Posted January 11, 2004 This is good idea, I like that album very much. Maybe "Blue In Green", if I'm not asking too much. I think there's not much going on in the treble range on "Blue In Green" so this could be the most difficult choice. Weizen suggested "Freddie Freeloader" - what do you think? Not knowing what are mp3 and what are wav originals it would be big challenge to try to detect them. You can also put multiple copies all random mixed up - wav and mp3 - that will make game more interesting. Yes, the track order will be randomly selected. Before you post your answers, I'll provide you with a link to a password protected zip file that includes the track order so that cheating is impossible. Milan, sorry - lost your address. Please send it via private message, thanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jazzman4133 Posted January 12, 2004 Author Report Share Posted January 12, 2004 Thank you one and all for your responses. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RDK Posted January 12, 2004 Report Share Posted January 12, 2004 I'm not going to participate since I'm in Rock's camp and pretty certain of the outcome, but I'll be curious to see the results of this "blindfold test" nonetheless. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mmilovan Posted January 12, 2004 Report Share Posted January 12, 2004 Yes, this is our audio blindfold test! Great! rockefeller center, it could be "Freedy...", of course. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daniel A Posted January 12, 2004 Report Share Posted January 12, 2004 Rockefeller center, what MP3 encoder are you going to use, and what encoder settings? Just curious... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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