New Fraunhofer (FhG) AAC encoder

[IgorC]

New Fraunhofer (FhG) AAC encoder

New version of Winamp has it.
winamp.com

[shon3i]

They dropped support for Dolby/CT AAC or this is as optional solution? And is avaible CLI wrapper like for CT encoder?

[IgorC]

They dropped support for Dolby/CT AAC
It seems so.

And is avaible CLI wrapper like for CT encoder?
Probably will be later. :)

[ReinerSchweinlin]

Thanx for the news. Is it available stand alone? Which lizense is it?

[LoRd_MuldeR]

Thanx for the news. Is it available stand alone? Which lizense is it?

I think it was licensed by the Winamp developers under a commercial license and is only available from within Winamp (not standalone).

At least it seems to be available without restrictions in the "freeware" edition of Winamp. Unlike their MP3 encoder, which requires the "Pro" edition.

[ReinerSchweinlin]

Ah, thanx for the feedback. I will investigate Winamp now, a good AAC Encoder is always welcome :)

[sneaker_ger]

Changes in Winamp 5.621:
* Fixed: [enc_fhgaac] Default ADTS bitrate; Writing of gapless data
* Fixed: [enc_fhgaac] HE-AAC compatibility with iTunes

[IgorC]

A CLI wrapper for FhG AAC encoder (winamp's enc_fhgaac.dll)
http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index.php?s=&showtopic=89518&view=findpost&p=763079

[IgorC]

New version FhG AAC 3.2.3 is available.

Multichannel is supported too.

[sneaker_ger]

Changelog:

Winamp 5.622
* Fixed: [enc_fhgaac] High bitrate upsampling bug
* Updated: [enc_fhgaac] Fraunhofer AAC Encoder v3.2.3

[b66pak]

up to date CLI wrapper (fhgaacenc-20111104) can be found here (https://github.com/tmkk/fhgaacenc/downloads)...
_

[Midzuki]

up to date CLI wrapper (fhgaacenc-20111104) can be found here (https://github.com/tmkk/fhgaacenc/downloads)...
_

:thanks:

[mindbomb]

just curious, is this good for 5.1 audio?
ie, good channel coupling and what not?

i suspect so, given that FHG did mp3 surround back in the day, right?

[IgorC]

The encoder was updated.
In my experience FhG HE-AAC encoder has the highest quality in class of HE-AACs.

[sneaker_ger]

just curious, is this good for 5.1 audio?
ie, good channel coupling and what not?

I asked about AAC channel coupling some time ago on hydrogenaudio, and it turns out that 5.1 AAC is essentially stereo+stereo+mono+mono, meaning that there is no channel coupling between the front and the surround speakers for example. This is a limitation of AAC, though, so it applies to all AAC encoders and not just Fraunhofer.

[ReinerSchweinlin]

Thanx for the update Igor.
@sneaker_ger
Oh, this is surprising, does anybody know why it was done this way? It would have been rather easy to implment some channel coupling like in joint-stereo to save a lot of bandwith, or am I mistaken?

[kypec]

It would have been rather easy to implment some channel coupling like in joint-stereo to save a lot of bandwith, or am I mistaken?
I'm not an expert, just an average user but I highly doubt that for instance LFE channel could be reasonably well coupled with any other channel in 5.1 configuration. It's been designed to contain only very low frequencies hence its bandwidth can be encoded by lossy codec with use of very low bitrate which allows more bits to be allocated to another kind-of-special channel (for instance center AKA dialog) without the need to mess with any stereo coupling at all.
The conclusion: stereo (Front L & R) + stereo (Surround L+R) + mono (Front Center) + mono (LFE) coupling model seems like optimal for 5.1 AAC encoding to me! :D

[ReinerSchweinlin]

In most cases, Front and Surround Sound are more independent than the L/R Channels to each other, true. My thinking was: Cpu-Horsepower we have enough, why not simply check for correlations between all channels... There are cases, where it would safe bandwith.
How about variable bitrate? If there is no dialog, is the free bandwith used by other channels when using the FHG Encoder?

[LoRd_MuldeR]

Cpu-Horsepower we have enough, why not simply check for correlations between all channels...

We need to think about decoding complexity as well. Just think about embedded/mobile devices with very limited CPU power...

(And keep in mind that AAC first appeared in MPEG-2, to which AAC was added back in 1997)

[ReinerSchweinlin]

That´s true, didn´t think about that. But on the other hand: Does a mobile phone need surround sound? :)

[burfadel]

How does the quality of the output (considering size) compare to the Nero AAC encoder?

[sneaker_ger]

http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=161957