Hanslow

OK, finally got myself a fandangled MP3 player and I intend to rip a number of my legitimately bought CDs onto it. It's a 20GB job, and we've currently got around 600 CDs in our collection.

Now, I know these aren't all going to fit on unless I do them at a low bitrate, and obviously quality will suffer. What I was planning to do was rip them at 192 which I think is a sufficient balance between quality and filesize. However, if I need to drop to 128 to squeeze those essential albums on, would there be a huge difference in recoding down from 192 to 128 rather than ripping direct from source at 128?

I know the bit rates are low for certain environments, and I'm aware of the loss in quality at these rates, which are not an issue for me, as most of this will be listened to in non-perfect environments.

Iain Young

In theory, you might get more pronouced artifacts in the sound, (you should in theory get a batter result by ripping directly to 128 rather than converting down from 192) but the sound quality is so bad at 128 that I doubt you'd really notice the difference.

bioforger

iTrader: (1)

I disagree, 128 doesn't sound bad at all, 192 is near CD quality, not that you would be able to tell the difference to a CD, unless you were in a lab analysing it. So 128 is ideal for squeezing on as many albums as possible. But yeh I would rip from the source to 128 directly to.

Iain Young

Had this argument before, but I can easily tell the difference between 192 and a cd, without the use of anything but just my ears. I can't understand why other people seem to not be able to tell the difference. 128 (imo) just sounds horrible. All the stuff on my ipod is recorded at 192 or higher, and even then I only listen to it on the move (or in the car). Can't bear to stick it through the hifi as it sounds nowhere near as good as the opriginal. If you can live with it though, then good for you

It does depend on what type of music you listen to though. If it's pop / rap etc music you are compressing then the effects aren't so bad because the majority of that music uses a very small dynamic range. The problems become more apparent when you try to compress an orchestral symphony for example. It's really easy to hear the difference then.

But back to the original question....

When ripping music, you are effectively using fancy algortihms to junk a load of the sound information from the cd, producing a smaller sized file that sounds roughly the same. During this process, it is possible for "artifacts" to appear in the encoded file, (bit like pixellation on a video signal). If you then rerun the compression on the file, it will likely increase the effects of these artifacts and so make them more noticeable. If you go straight from the cd to 128 instead, then the artifacts will no be present in the source, and so in theory you should get a better result.

Hanslow

I already have a number of MP3s ripped to CD that only get played in the car. Given the acoustic environment, 128 is fine in there. I'm just trying to avoid ripping them all twice from source if poss. I suppose I could rip to some lossless format and then convert from that to the relevant bitrate.

Hanslow

Thanks for the info Iain I take it you have some sort of acoustics background?

Most of the music is some form of 'metal' with a few other styles and types thrown in for good measure

messiah

I originally ripped all my stuff at 192 and have since redone it to 320. To be honest there isnt a lot of noticable difference - although I think the ripping software used has a bit of influence.

I use iTunes being an iPod owner but I've also downloaded stuff from the iTunes store whih is all at 128 - if I burn tracks to a CD for use in the car there is a noticable difference between the 2 rates - but not so much when listening through headphones, but sometimes depends on the track being played - I've got a lot of dance tracks and film scores which both seem to suffer at the lower rate, bass seems a bit blurry and orchestral stuff doesnt seem quite as "open".

To be honest I think it depends on your end usage - If I'm listening to the music through headphones I can barely tell (although I'm planning on getting some good quality ones for the holidays), there is a difference when burned onto a CD and there is also a difference (between 320 & 192) when listening to it from the HDD.

Like I said, the ripping software makes a differnce I think, I've DL'd some stuff from torrent sites which has been encoded to 128 and it sounds top notch.

messiah

PS - do you absolutely need every track from every CD? You may also want to consider the Variable Bit Rate route.

Iain Young

I'm a musician. Been playing the cello in numerous amaterur and semi-pro orchestras for years, so I guess my ear is well trained

In that case, I would guess that it wouldn't be too much of a problem. I must admit that I have tried encoding my Iron Maiden / Metallica cds at a lower bitrate, and haven't noticed much difference. You notice it much more with quiet / gentle stuff, (i.e. jazz, classical etc).

Hanslow

Thanks for all the input guys

Not in all cases, but I wouldn't be able to pick which Slayer, Alice In Chains, Metallica songs to drop (and probably other artists).

It's a bit of a quandry as I should be able to get about 300 odd albums at 192, and about 500 at 128. Will definitely have a look at VBR encoding and compare against CBR and ABR encoding.

Iain, I figure your ear is a lot better trained than mine. I've just been going to very loud concerts so mine are probably knackered