Audio (MP3/WMA/Digital)

[Hawkbit]

I'm an absolute newbie to digital audio outside of owning and playing CDs.  I listened to vinyl for entirely too long and got left behind with all this new-fangled internet music stuff.  About 7 years ago my wife bought $15 worth of music from Napster right after they went pay2play, and after two reinstalls of the o/s on her system she lost access to her music permanently due to maximum downloads.  So we never looked back at internet music, because when I pay money for it, it should be mine for life.  Sooo...

A few months back I bought an MP3 player, a little cheapie 4gig Sansa.  I started ripping CDs from Windows Media Player and copying them to the player by just dragging and dropping the folders.  But there's something wrong with the files... they play properly, but there's something missing from the tracks.  It's almost like there's a noise in them, or maybe its better described as there's something missing from them.  What I can't tell is if this is caused by a cheap player not producing sound properly, cheap headphones or using a WMA format over lossless.

Now for the questions:

1.  What audio ripper/player do you use for your music?
2.  What format do you keep your music in?
3.  Do you know any good intro/guides for learning how best to learn about this technology?  (I've read through format wiki articles)
4.  For the musicians out there, what format are home studios recording in?

I realize this all likely sounds simple to most of you, but think of me as the Grizzly Adams of internet media.  Thanks in advance.

[Trippy]

Can you hear the sound problem(s) when listening to the converted files on your computer or do you only hear it on your portable player?

If it's the former you'll need to figure out what they were reencoded into. There's a bunch of different ways of doing that but probably the easiest for us would be for you to install MediaInfo from here:

http://mediainfo.sourceforge.net/en

Use it to take a look at one of your converted sound files. You can switch to "Text" mode in the View menu and copy and paste the results into here.


For my computer music collection I use a variety of tools to beat the songs into shape. I actually wouldn't recommend my workflow to most people but it'll give you some ideas of what to look for in your tools.

For ripping CDs I use Exact Audio Copy. It's been the standard for ripping CDs for quite some time now. It can access freedb for auto-populating info about your CD (album, track names, etc.). It's not as good as GraceNote (fucking thieves) but it works well enough for the music I listen too.

I store my CD ripped song files in an loseless format, usually WAV.

For playing on portable MP3 players I use LAME via winLAME to convert the WAV files to MP3 using a higher than average bitrate (128 Kbps is the average and I consider that too low).

I use MP3Gain to adjust the volume level of the tracks so they are roughly equal. That way I don't have to keep fiddling with the volume on the MP3 player.

I use TagScanner to set the ID3 tags in the MP3 files. It has some nice "bulk" tagging features based on the file names, which you can match up in EAC.

[bhodi]

I use audiograbber for the one-click goodness. I encode into VBR MP3s.

[Hawkbit]

I just took a listen off my PC and I'm noticing sound degredation from both my computer and the player.  I'll play around with some of the programs you've listed, though I'm guessing part of the issue is that the music seems to be ripped at 128kbps.  I'm thinking that's what's causing the issue, because there's literally part of the music missing.  I think. 

For example:

General
Complete name                    : C:\Documents and Settings\Tanis\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5\3S1Y8UDT\05%20Catastrophe%20and%20the%20Cure[1]
Format                           : Windows Media
File size                        : 7.33 MiB
Duration                         : 7mn 56s
Overall bit rate mode            : Constant
Overall bit rate                 : 129 Kbps
Maximum Overall bit rate         : 129 Kbps
Album                            : All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone
Track name                       : Catastrophe and the Cure
Track name/Position              : 5
Performer                        : Explosions in the Sky
Composer                         : Chris Brasky
Publisher                        : Temporary Residence
Genre                            : Alternative
Recorded date                    : 2007
Encoded date                     : UTC 2039-02-12 19:18:24 / UTC 2008-06-06 04:46:01.218
Provider                         : AMG
WM/ProviderRating                : 6
WM/ProviderStyle                 : Rock
PeakValue                        : 32673
AverageLevel                     : 7803

Audio
Format                           : WMA2
Format profile                   : L1
Codec ID                         : 161
Codec ID/Info                    : Windows Media Audio 2
Description of the codec         : Windows Media Audio 9.2 - 128 kbps, 44 kHz, stereo 1-pass CBR
Duration                         : 7mn 56s
Bit rate mode                    : Constant
Bit rate                         : 128 Kbps
Channel(s)                       : 2 channels
Sampling rate                    : 44.1 KHz
Resolution                       : 16 bits

[MahrinSkel]

When you say 'part of the music missing', do you mean that a frequency range seems to be gone, or that the sound seems distorted?  Both are normal effects of compression, most people don't notice it but if you're one of those with a more sensitive ear, you could.  You can try higher bit rates/lower compression, and some ripping software will have settings to let you preserve particular frequency ranges better (to try and keep a particular instrument sharp, for example).

--Dave

[stray]

4.  For the musicians out there, what format are home studios recording in?

Anything fairly serious is some variation of PCM/uncompressed, and can be exported as .wav, .aiff, .sd2, etc.. Each track/instrument file is large, and the resulting mixdown is even larger. At the highest khz settings, mono instrument tracks can be as big as 32mb per minute. At the lowest, about 5mb. Either way, everything's big.

[Miguel]

PCM, 24 bit @ 48 KHz is what I use on my home DAW (Digital Audio Workstation).  I haven't heard any audible difference by going to 96KHz sampling rate, but there is a huge explosion in file size (about double).  This format is easily exportable to WAV at CD quality (which is 16 bit @ 44 KHz), and most software can read it (e.g. Sonar, Logic, Pro Tools, etc).

For MP3, I think 192 kbit VBR is a good balance between quality and file size.  I agree with Trippy:  128 is too low, but 320 is too high.

[rattran]

For ripping CDs I use Exact Audio Copy. It's been the standard for ripping CDs for quite some time now. It can access freedb for auto-populating info about your CD (album, track names, etc.). It's not as good as GraceNote (fucking thieves) but it works well enough for the music I listen too.

This. EAC is reasonably fast, and great. I encode into FLAC (lossless) for computer use, then lame apx for mp3 use on my Zen.

[stray]

I haven't heard any audible difference by going to 96KHz sampling rate, but there is a huge explosion in file size (about double). 

Technically, "something" is there. There are even 192khz rates. Technically, something is there too. But the human is ear is only capable of hearing 44.1, not even CD audio 48khz, for that matter. Bats are probably hearing shit in Metallica songs we aren't though. Maybe that's the purpose for it. I really have no fucking clue why there is 96khz, let alone 192

[Trippy]

I just took a listen off my PC and I'm noticing sound degredation from both my computer and the player.  I'll play around with some of the programs you've listed, though I'm guessing part of the issue is that the music seems to be ripped at 128kbps.  I'm thinking that's what's causing the issue, because there's literally part of the music missing.  I think. 

For example:

General
Complete name                    : C:\Documents and Settings\Tanis\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5\3S1Y8UDT\05%20Catastrophe%20and%20the%20Cure[1]
Format                           : Windows Media
File size                        : 7.33 MiB
Duration                         : 7mn 56s
Overall bit rate mode            : Constant
Overall bit rate                 : 129 Kbps
Maximum Overall bit rate         : 129 Kbps
Album                            : All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone
Track name                       : Catastrophe and the Cure
Track name/Position              : 5
Performer                        : Explosions in the Sky
Composer                         : Chris Brasky
Publisher                        : Temporary Residence
Genre                            : Alternative
Recorded date                    : 2007
Encoded date                     : UTC 2039-02-12 19:18:24 / UTC 2008-06-06 04:46:01.218
Provider                         : AMG
WM/ProviderRating                : 6
WM/ProviderStyle                 : Rock
PeakValue                        : 32673
AverageLevel                     : 7803

Audio
Format                           : WMA2
Format profile                   : L1
Codec ID                         : 161
Codec ID/Info                    : Windows Media Audio 2
Description of the codec         : Windows Media Audio 9.2 - 128 kbps, 44 kHz, stereo 1-pass CBR
Duration                         : 7mn 56s
Bit rate mode                    : Constant
Bit rate                         : 128 Kbps
Channel(s)                       : 2 channels
Sampling rate                    : 44.1 KHz
Resolution                       : 16 bits

Yes there are 2 problems with that file.

One is the 128 Kbps bit rate that you noted and I mentioned above I consider too low, even for portable music player listening.

The second is it's encoded at a constant bit rate instead of variable (or average). A constant bit rate means every "frame" of music is encoded with the same amount of bits, even though certain frames might sound identical encoded with fewer bits and other frames would sound better encoded with more bits. With variable and average bit rate encoding the encoder will vary the amount of bits allocated per frame giving you a file with overall better sound quality using the same overall bitrate.

[Lt.Dan]

Technically, "something" is there. There are even 192khz rates. Technically, something is there too. But the human is ear is only capable of hearing 44.1, not even CD audio 48khz, for that matter. Bats are probably hearing shit in Metallica songs we aren't though. Maybe that's the purpose for it. I really have no fucking clue why there is 96khz, let alone 192

I'm no expert on this and I'm sure someone else will jump in and correct me but the sampling rate has little to do with the frequency of the audio being sampled. 

A 16 bit 44khz sample takes a 16 bit sample 44,000 times per second.  A 24 bit 192 Khz sample takes a 24 bit sample 192,000 times per second.  As I understand it the number of bits represents the available range of frequencies in original audio sample (less a few bits for sampling error).  I would imagine higher sampling frequencies would provide a "better" sample for more dynamic music (ie music where the source frequency varies significantly over short intervals).

[stray]

Oh. Makes sense. I'm not much of an engineer myself, but I always wondered what applications 192 could fill. Probably symphonies? Especially the variety where all instruments are recorded at the same time/live/not heavily multitracked.

[Mosesandstick]

I'm no expert on this and I'm sure someone else will jump in and correct me but the sampling rate has little to do with the frequency of the audio being sampled. 

I know nothing about audio engineering but the quick and fast rule with sampling is that your sample rate should be at least twice the highest frequency you want to sample. However if you want an analog wave to be accurately sampled and reconstructed you probably want your sampling rate to be much, much, higher than the audible frequencies.

When you have interaction between analog and digital devices there's a lot of room for signals to basically be 'levelled off' in a sense. What that does is it produces all sorts of nasty sounds, the kind of sounds you hear if you try and turn the volume up on your speakers further than they can go.

[Miguel]

is that your sample rate should be at least twice the highest frequency you want to sample

Yes this is the Nyquist rate.  So 44 KHz makes perfect sense, because the highest frequency that can be heard by (most) human ears is about 20 KHz  (actually there is some debate that realistically this is more like 12 KHz for the vast majority of people).

It still doesn't explain 96+ KHz sampling....to capture frequency content that's three times above the range of human hearing?

I suppose one might argue that higher sampling rates give more data points for a dithering algorithm to choose from.  At 44 KHz, there is no choice:  every sample must be used.  At 96KHz, then you have two samples to choose from (or possibly average together) per audio frame, and at 192 KHz you have 4+.  So I could believe that one might write differing algorithms to make use of this information in useful ways (when dithering down to CD quality).

24 bit on the other hand (and even 32 bit) make sense, as it increases the dynamic range of the captured signal.  Each bit gives you +3db of dynamic range, which is useful in most musical situations.  But even 24 bit increases file overhead by 50%.

However when I've A/B'd those high sample rates, I just don't hear the difference, at the cost of a 400% increase in file size.  When you've got 8+ tracks going at once, 192 KHz can really choke a bitch (the bitch in this case being the computer processing the audio in real time).  If you've got real-time effects then forget it.

[MahrinSkel]

Every stage of processing loses information and adds distortion.  The more of the original sound you start with, the more slack you have as you process it.  No, people can't hear that high, but there may be harmonics, beat frequencies, and such that would be lost if you didn't make an effort to preserve them.  Or the ability to create those effects later might be lost.

I understand the basic theory of it, I just lack the ear or the touch to do it.

--Dave

[Sky]

I believe the unheard frequencies interact with the audible freqs, much like two audible freqs will interact with each other.

1. iTunes
2. AAC 192kbps VBR
3. No
4. My MR8HD records and exports WAV files.

I've been wanting to get a big drive to rip uncompressed or at least good lossless versions of my CDs. Then bump them down for the ipod. Right now I just have a ton of stuff on my work computer in a mishmash of formats. My ipod is also way too small at 30GB. An 80 would be ok, but I really could use something over 100.

[stray]

I rip everything at 256, and have about 15 days of music (give or take some things that weren't directly ripped from CD). Amounts to about 40 gigs... still can't fill my 80 gig. MP3's are pretty small, relatively speaking.

[Murgos]

I rip everything at 256, and have about 15 days of music (give or take some things that weren't directly ripped from CD). Amounts to about 40 gigs... still can't fill my 80 gig. MP3's are pretty small, relatively speaking.

Not too long ago if you had told someone you had 40 gigs of data, much less music, they would have called 911 and asked for help with the crazy person.

[Sky]

Should throw VBR on that, Stray. I've got 16 days at 31GB. At this point I'd say that represents about half my collection plus a few things from the library collection.

I hate not having everything at hand, though. Last night I wanted to listen to some Fantomas and it's not on my ipod due to size constraints. Boo!

[stray]

Haha. I actually took off every Fantomas album (besides the movie covers) due to too much idiosyncratic shit popping up on shuffle at the wrong times. I'm less of a album completist as used to be too. I had about 50 gigs on here at one, but quite a bunch of it was worthless (imo).

[Arnold]

Haha. I actually took off every Fantomas album (besides the movie covers) due to too much idiosyncratic shit popping up on shuffle at the wrong times. I'm less of a album completist as used to be too. I had about 50 gigs on here at one, but quite a bunch of it was worthless (imo).

Have they done anything lately?  I got The Directors Cut and thought it was pretty cool.

[stray]

They had a few albums after Director's Cut, but haven't come out with anything in a few years. None of them are like Director's Cut though, in that nothing else they do is even close to traditional song structure. They don't even have lyrics, for that matter. More like some fucked up thrash metal band with the Tasmanian Devil as the lead singer, and albums with about 40 tracks each, each track being about a 30 seconds to a minute long.  There are some gems though...