Results 1 to 10 of 10

Thread: CD Ripping/Encoding Options - Need Advice

  1. #1
    Downsized Chinasaur's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2001
    Location
    WA Wine Country
    Posts
    1,847

    CD Ripping/Encoding Options - Need Advice

    Hey all,

    My mp3 collection dates from the '98-'99 timeframe @ 128. Some normalized. Most are muddy/bad/just plain suck. I plan on re-doing the whole 5GB's at 320K, VBR @ Highest and Freq at 44khz. I have a mild hearing loss in upper and middle registers.

    Question:

    1. Should I rip at 48kHz vs 44kHz?

    2. For my hearing loss can I downgrade sampling to 256 and not hear it? I can differentiate between 192 and 256.

    3. I don't burn to CDDA but should I rip/encode at highest available to protect my options even if I can't hear everything?


    Thanks


    Last edited by Chinasaur; 11-25-2003 at 04:11 PM.
    Agent Smith was right!: "I hate this place. This zoo. This prison. This reality, whatever you want to call it, I can't stand it any longer. It's the smell! If there is such a thing. I feel saturated by it. I can taste your stink and every time I do, I fear that I've somehow been infected by it."

  2. #2
    has been eaten by a grue.
    Join Date
    Jun 2003
    Location
    Detroit, MI
    Posts
    384
    I've got a slight hearing loss in the mid-range, but I can still tell when something isn't ripped at a pretty high rate. If you lower the encoding rate, you lower it for all the frequencies, I think.

    Also, it isn't just hearing that affects how one experiences music. It is also vibration. My mother, who was the first teacher in Michigan to teach music to deaf kids in a public school, found that deaf kids were more on pitch than hearing kids, because of the vibrations.

    So, I'd go for the bigger, lusher files.

  3. #3
    Downsized Chinasaur's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2001
    Location
    WA Wine Country
    Posts
    1,847
    QIbHom,

    Thanks. Yeah..that's where I've ended up. I did 320 vs 192 and I can hear it so I guess I'm not as bad as I thought. Maybe it's just the cheap mp3's

    Now I need a bigger HD

    Agent Smith was right!: "I hate this place. This zoo. This prison. This reality, whatever you want to call it, I can't stand it any longer. It's the smell! If there is such a thing. I feel saturated by it. I can taste your stink and every time I do, I fear that I've somehow been infected by it."

  4. #4
    25/25Mbit is nearly enough :p pointwood's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2001
    Location
    Denmark
    Posts
    831
    Just use FLAC and you'll never have to encode your CD-collection again

    You will need a much bigger harddrive for that though
    Pointwood
    Jabber ID: pointwood@jabber.shd.dk
    irc.arstechnica.com, #distributed

  5. #5
    Downsized Chinasaur's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2001
    Location
    WA Wine Country
    Posts
    1,847
    Pointwood,

    You're not kidding. I saw FLAC format for first time at www.magnatune.com (great music BTW) and wow...2/3rds the size of .wav's.

    Agent Smith was right!: "I hate this place. This zoo. This prison. This reality, whatever you want to call it, I can't stand it any longer. It's the smell! If there is such a thing. I feel saturated by it. I can taste your stink and every time I do, I fear that I've somehow been infected by it."

  6. #6
    25/25Mbit is nearly enough :p pointwood's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2001
    Location
    Denmark
    Posts
    831
    Hmmm...2/3rds? I often find it to be closer to 1/2 the size. Still huge compared to Vorbis, AAC, MP3, etc. but lossless also comes with some cool advantages!

    And yes, Magnatune.com is cool! I think I was the person that convinced him of providing FLAC In any case, it's much better than plain wav which is what he started with.
    Last edited by pointwood; 11-26-2003 at 03:36 AM.
    Pointwood
    Jabber ID: pointwood@jabber.shd.dk
    irc.arstechnica.com, #distributed

  7. #7
    Downsized Chinasaur's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2001
    Location
    WA Wine Country
    Posts
    1,847
    Pointwood,

    Ok. Half is correct. I checked. I bought Beth Quist's "Silver" today and it was 609 .wav and 366 FLAC. I'm downloading the .wav .zip's and ripping to 320... I ccan't afford the overheard of FLAC right now



    Agent Smith was right!: "I hate this place. This zoo. This prison. This reality, whatever you want to call it, I can't stand it any longer. It's the smell! If there is such a thing. I feel saturated by it. I can taste your stink and every time I do, I fear that I've somehow been infected by it."

  8. #8
    25/25Mbit is nearly enough :p pointwood's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2001
    Location
    Denmark
    Posts
    831
    You could also download the FLAC's and encode to Ogg Vorbis, MP3 (or whatever format you prefer) from them - will give you the same quality and the FLAC includes metadata too, plus I could imagine the size of the download would be smaller
    Pointwood
    Jabber ID: pointwood@jabber.shd.dk
    irc.arstechnica.com, #distributed

  9. #9
    Downsized Chinasaur's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2001
    Location
    WA Wine Country
    Posts
    1,847
    Good idea!

    I saw OS X has a FLAC client. And yeah, be a bit quicker.

    Agent Smith was right!: "I hate this place. This zoo. This prison. This reality, whatever you want to call it, I can't stand it any longer. It's the smell! If there is such a thing. I feel saturated by it. I can taste your stink and every time I do, I fear that I've somehow been infected by it."

  10. #10
    You could try Ogg Vorbis as well, its free and compresses better than MP3. Keeps same sound quality though.

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •