Sound Quality

[Pyscrow]

OK stepping on tippy toes here, and not wanting this to go down the path of music theft ....

Whilst mucking about converting some digital TV captured music filmclips to DVD, I noted that the *.mpv audio files from the demuxing process were about twice the size you would expect of an mp3 of the same song. This intrigued me.

So quickly bunging the .mpv file into winamp showed me a quality of 256kbps at 48hz. Substantially better than CD quality music (128kbps at 44kz).

What is the actual quality of these sound files? Are they better than CD quality, or is the kbps and hz just overkill for music? (Or alternatively Winamp is reporting the wrong quality!)

[Slogra]

It's probably mpeg1 layer 1... instead of mpeg1 layer 3 like mp3 (check this at the info box of Winamp). Mpeg1 layer 1 is less complex than mp3. This means it doesn't perform as good at lower bitrates as mp3, but it might be just as good as mp3 at higher bitrates (or even better).

btw mp3@128kbps is certainly NOT cd quality. I guess mpeg1 layer 1@256kbps might even be closer to cd quality.

[Pyscrow]

Originally posted by Slogra

btw mp3@128kbps is certainly NOT cd quality. I guess mpeg1 layer 1@256kbps might even be closer to cd quality.

No, but I am pretty sure that *.CDA's are 128bit - mp3 is lossy therefore not "CD" quality at 128bit, (technically not at any bitrate, but it gets indistinguishable at some point).

For this reason I am of course more interested in the comparison against the original *.CDA files!

[Soulhunter]

Originally posted by Pyscrow
No, but I am pretty sure that *.CDA's are 128bit - mp3 is lossy therefore not "CD" quality at 128bit, (technically not at any bitrate, but it gets indistinguishable at some point).

For this reason I am of course more interested in the comparison against the original *.CDA files!
Ehm... You mix up bit and kbps info here !!!

CDA is 16 bit, not 128bit !!!

The mp3 is 128kbps n' also 16bit, not 128bit !!!


For audio files is usually 4 infos interesting...

1. Samplerate - The frequency range (CDA is 44.kHz)

2. Sample precision - Sampling depth (CDA uses 16bit)

3. Bitrate - Datarate per second (Bitrate = quality)


PS: My ears tell me that no mp3 below 192kbps sounds good... ;)


Bye

[Pyscrow]

Originally posted by Soulhunter
Ehm... You mix up bit and kbps info here !!!

CDA is 16 bit, not 128bit !!!

The mp3 is 128kbps n' also 16bit, not 128bit !!!


For audio files is usually 4 infos interesting...

1. Samplerate - The frequency range (CDA is 44.kHz)

2. Sample precision - Sampling depth (CDA uses 16bit)

3. Bitrate - Datarate per second (Bitrate = quality)


PS: My ears tell me that no mp3 below 192kbps sounds good... ;)


Bye

Yeah - sorry tired - kbps of course. For me kbps rate that sounds good for mp3's varies, generally anything over about 112 for rock sounds ok, instrumental or opera needs to be higher. Probably due to the legacy of hearing most of the rock I like over the radio, and being used to a lower quality sound!

[KpeX]

Higher bitrate is not always equal to higher quality (especially when comparing different formats).

MPEG audio or any other lossy compressed format is never the same quality as an uncompressed source at any bitrate.

[Soulhunter]

Originally posted by KpeX
Higher bitrate is not always equal to higher quality (especially when comparing different formats). Just said Bitrate = Quality... :D


Bye