UW store music file quality

[revolver9]

I am wondering why they use iTunes to encode the music. It's puzzling to me. It seems like such an inferior encoder. I'm not even someone to fuss about 192kbps as long as it's encoded with LAME or something around that standard. Hmm...

[TheBang]

Just buy the WAV's and then use whatever encoder you want.

[revolver9]

Yeah I'm not that serious about it. I was just wondering because some tracks said 320kbps on the site (which at that high of a cut off I don't really feel using iTunes to encode is an issue) but they were actually 192kbps. No problem. But the new album better be 320! :-)

[stimpee]

I use LameXP on Windows so I cant comment on the quality of the mp3s from iTunes. However, iTunes did get a lot of criticism years ago for the poor quality of the mp3s it produced.

After some sniffing around I've found the source of this:
"There has been some criticism of the quality of Apple's MP3 variable bitrate (http://www.worldlingo.com/ma/enwiki/en/Variable_bitrate) encoding. In a January 2004 double-blind (http://www.worldlingo.com/ma/enwiki/en/Blind_experiment) public participated in a codec listening test (http://www.worldlingo.com/ma/enwiki/en/Codec_listening_test) of six MP3 encoders encoding at 128 kbit/s, conducted by Roberto Amorim, and the iTunes MP3 VBR encoder came last. The author has later acknowledged that there may have been serious issues with how iTunes was tested." Unfortunately the link to the tests is now dead.

A second wave of tests was done in October 2008 and iTunes fared very well:
http://listening-tests.hydrogenaudio.org/sebastian/mp3-128-1/results.htm

The results show that over 14 tests, iTunes scored 0.02 out of 5.00 less than LAME 3.97. The encoding of iTunes has become something of an urban myth and it cant be that bad after all.

If you DO want to use LAME with iTunes on a Mac, you can always try iTunes-LAME from http://blacktree.com/

Do you have personal bad experiences with iTunes@192?

[34958hq439-qjw9v5jq298v5j]

Honestly I'd be really impressed if anyone can tell the difference between 192 and 320 (or even WAV) on anything but a spectacular system.

[revolver9]

I have some mp3s from years back that I encoded with iTunes that I have now encoded with LAME and they sound better as there is more space in the music. It really does make a very worthy difference. I don't think it takes a spectacular system to hear the difference, but still some decent equipment (and affordable). The evidence is in the volume. Most people would draw a conclusion from sitting at their comp or driving down the road with surrounding noise. Who likes to turn up Moaner or Banstyle at home? At 256 and above or with a good VBR the music will attain that crystal clarity. I think it's also dependent on your hearing and although mine is not the best I am still lucky to have great hearing (puzzling as I think back to shows and events)

Also I still think the VBR analysis through iTunes is flawed. LAME VBR is amazing though. And constant bit rate of 256 and above I don't think iTunes and LAME are noticeably different.

[silic0n]

Honestly I'd be really impressed if anyone can tell the difference between 192 and 320 (or even WAV) on anything but a spectacular system.

And even then it would have to be a piece of really 'difficult' audio IMO.

[34958hq439-qjw9v5jq298v5j]

Or something with a lot of crisp tones. Cymbals and hi-hats in particular sound bad with bad encoding.

I agree with revolver9; 256 VBR is about as good as it gets...all else is diminishing returns IMO

[stimpee]

I have some mp3s from years back that I encoded with iTunes that I have now encoded with LAME ... well just as the LAME encoder has improved over the years, i'm sure the iTunes one has as well. And as the results i posted above suggest, it has improved at low bit rates. If it improved at 128, then its for sure better at 192. I dont think Underworld would accept it otherwise and we would have noticed. Why not take the iTunes encoded 192 and take the WAV and encode it at 192 with LAME and do your own listening test?

[ultradave]

I'm not even someone to fuss about 192kbps as long as it's encoded with LAME or something around that standard. Hmm...

No offense to you revolver9, but 192kbps is rubbish regardless of how it's encoded. i'm glad they started offering 320kbps files, but for me, anything underworld needs to be lossless or higher. ;)

[chuck]

No offense to you revolver9, but 192kbps is rubbish regardless of how it's encoded. i'm glad they started offering 320kbps files, but for me, anything underworld needs to be lossless or higher. ;)

That'll be the vinyl option then.

:)