audio codecs

Kev

i'd say the ripper is more important than the encoder for getting good sound quality, so i use EAC( http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/ ) and for encoding i use radium which is a hacked for speed version of fraunhofer iis profesional.

its really good i just wish it did vbr.

Stark

anyone have any opinions on what is the best audio codec out there at the moment?

In my opinion MP3 still sounds great at 192kbps, but I'd be interested in a codec that can do just as well at lower bitrates.

Windows Media Audio 8 claims to do that at 64 kbps per second, but I can hear horrible high frequenc artifacts at that bitrate and at 96 kbps.
Real Audio sounds really good to me, but then again its really closed.

The one that catches my interest is OGG Vorbis. Anyone have any idea what bitrates it sounds good at?

Hecate

I use the LAME codec for encoding all my mp3s, its really fast and produces good quality files.

http://download.infonet.by/download.asp?file=949

llatsni

Nothing I have heard sounds any way like the original below 128kps; mp2, mp3, wma, ra, etc. etc. all included, and hard disks are so cheap these days you might aswell go for the decent quality rather than trying to save 1 or maybe 2 megs here or there.

Personally I swear by EAC (Exact Audio Copy) and the LAME 32bit (new) encoder. I can rip a full CD to 192VBR mp3's in about 25min. It sounds AWESOME!... I'll try dig up some links, but just search and you'll find them.

Stark

yeah I just tried out the MMX enhanced version of LAME and it is well cool. MP3 at 64kpbs 22kHz sounds dull, but still way better than WMA at that bit rate. At least you don't get the artifacts. Not that I'd use that bitrate, i'm just using it for comparison. 192kbps sounds cool. Also when I encode at 96kpbs at home I get good sounding audio, much better than 128kpbs downloaded off the net. In fact 128kpbs downloaded from some sites sounds pretty pathetic. Very lifeless or something.(even with joint stereo). I'm curretnly trying out vorbis at 256kpbs. Its open-source, patent free but still in release candidate stage. Even so, it has support in good applications like Winamp and cdex.

By the way, off topic. what ripper do you recommend for plain WAV files. MMX Lame is extremely fast on my machine(6.5x real time), the only problem is it's faster than my ripper.(not a problem, but I'd like to use it's full potential). I've a 48X Cd-ROM which has 7x audio read, but cdex is only ripping WAV at 2x.

Stark

is EAC fast?

_CreeD_

You could try VQF or Mp3Pro. VQF is aimed at low bitrates and at 96Kbs sounds as good as 128 mp3. Mp3pro is limited to 64Kbs I think at the mo but is not the match for 128mp3 it claims to be imho (though it is better than std. mp3 at that rate)..

For ripping/encoding I use Audiograbber and Lame (LAME is the best sounding encoder out there, by far).
That CD rip speed is actually quite low btw. My 32x PLextor goes from 14-27x. Pioneer 40x Dvd does 8-20x. It might be your ripping software limiting it (Another nice feature of audiograbber is to manually set the rip speed, and ignore detected speeds).