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Topic: WAV background noise (Read 25803 times) previous topic - next topic
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WAV background noise

Hello, as you can see I'm a new user and I was just hoping to get a quick response or answer to my question at hand. I've been trying to find the best way to import cd's size/quality and I find that due to the low amount of cd's in my collection, I chose to use WAV lossless. For any other digitial acquirements in my music collection I chose 192kb/s LAME MP3 to be the best size/quality.

At the note of importing cd's as WAV, I'm on a Mac and I thought the best way to go about it was to import the AIFF files from a CD to Audacity and then export them as WAV. 8bit PCM seems to be the best in little size shrinkage but maintaining quality, but I have a problem.

When I export as WAV 8bit PCM in Audacity (v1.3.5), I get this background fuzzy noise like static in a way. It's pretty quiet, but can be heard during the quiet parts of the song when the song itself doesn't drown it out. Does anyone know of this problem and how to fix it? Any response or commentary is appreciated.

Thanks again for reading my post!

WAV background noise

Reply #1
8bit PCM seems to be the best in little size shrinkage but maintaining quality


You mean you reduce from 16 bit to 8 to save space?
If this is the case I wouldn't be surprised at all if converting the 16 bit WAV to MP3 gives both a better sound quality and more compression.
TheWellTemperedComputer.com

WAV background noise

Reply #2
Hello, as you can see I'm a new user and I was just hoping to get a quick response or answer to my question at hand. I've been trying to find the best way to import cd's size/quality and I find that due to the low amount of cd's in my collection, I chose to use WAV lossless. For any other digitial acquirements in my music collection I chose 192kb/s LAME MP3 to be the best size/quality.

At the note of importing cd's as WAV, I'm on a Mac and I thought the best way to go about it was to import the AIFF files from a CD to Audacity and then export them as WAV. 8bit PCM seems to be the best in little size shrinkage but maintaining quality, but I have a problem.

When I export as WAV 8bit PCM in Audacity (v1.3.5), I get this background fuzzy noise like static in a way. It's pretty quiet, but can be heard during the quiet parts of the song when the song itself doesn't drown it out. Does anyone know of this problem and how to fix it? Any response or commentary is appreciated.

Thanks again for reading my post!
You should be exporting as 16bit PCM (the same as CD audio).
lossyWAV -q X -a 4 -s h -A --feedback 2 --limit 15848 --scale 0.5 | FLAC -5 -e -p -b 512 -P=4096 -S- (having set foobar to output 24-bit PCM; scaling by 0.5 gives the ANS headroom to work)

WAV background noise

Reply #3
Yes use EAC and rip the CD direct to WAV uncompressed.

WAV background noise

Reply #4
maybe you have misunderstood which codec is wavpack?
Do you mean the PCM WAVE codec or WavPack?

When you want to go lossless, then use an efficient codec like wavpack, flac, tak or someone else (flac is mostly used, but wavpack and tak are also a good lossless codecs). This would save more space than PCM Wav 16 bit 1411 kbps (= CD Quality), and keep in mind that there's no loss in quality.
When you want to make your files smaller but keep lossless you won't get another solution. Note that your 16 bit to 8 bit reduction is lossy and not very efficient (large filesize and bad quality). A good alternative would be to go transparent lossy (for example wavpack lossy or lossy wav)

EDIT: I think Audacity shouldn't have problems with FLAC & wavpack when you use a direct show filter.
FB2K,APE&LAME

WAV background noise

Reply #5
Thanks all of you for replying so quickly  It really does help me with the project I wanted to get done today.

I am a new user and interested in the lossless quality, but some of you forget that I'm on a Mac and there is no EAC for Mac users (that I'm aware of).

Audacity does have a FLAC export, but the thing about FLAC is that it's not compatible with the things I need it to be (iTunes [there's probably a plug-in but...], iPod [no RockBox], and the PS3). That's why I resorted to WAV as it is compatible with all of those things (as far as I'm aware of, but if there are other means of getting lossless with compatibility then I am very open to those alternatives).

But some of you forget about the background noise I'm getting. What is that caused from (it plays in iTunes but not in Audacity) and how can I get rid of it?

Thank you again for helping me

WAV background noise

Reply #6
Thanks all of you for replying so quickly  It really does help me with the project I wanted to get done today.

I am a new user and interested in the lossless quality, but some of you forget that I'm on a Mac and there is no EAC for Mac users (that I'm aware of).

Audacity does have a FLAC export, but the thing about FLAC is that it's not compatible with the things I need it to be (iTunes [there's probably a plug-in but...], iPod [no RockBox], and the PS3). That's why I resorted to WAV as it is compatible with all of those things (as far as I'm aware of, but if there are other means of getting lossless with compatibility then I am very open to those alternatives).

But some of you forget about the background noise I'm getting. What is that caused from (it plays in iTunes but not in Audacity) and how can I get rid of it?

Thank you again for helping me
The background noise is caused by requantization from 16bit (i.e. what came off the CD) and 8bit. Therefore, output to 16bit WAV and then encode to FLAC if you want to keep the diskspace down while retaining lossless.
lossyWAV -q X -a 4 -s h -A --feedback 2 --limit 15848 --scale 0.5 | FLAC -5 -e -p -b 512 -P=4096 -S- (having set foobar to output 24-bit PCM; scaling by 0.5 gives the ANS headroom to work)

WAV background noise

Reply #7
By doing that though defeats the purpose of compatibility but still retains the lossless. I can't have a FLAC file, as stated, due to it not being able to be played by iTunes, my iPod, and the PS3.

EDIT: Is there a way to evade that noise from requantization or is there no way to get a WAV file from CD without the noise?

WAV background noise

Reply #8
Just in case it isn’t clear enough by now, 8 bit is inherently very noisy. You can not get rid of the noise. 8 bit is never a realistic consideration for quality audio.

WAV background noise

Reply #9
Rip to Apple lossless
TheWellTemperedComputer.com

WAV background noise

Reply #10
Rip to Apple lossless


Is that worse than WAV 16bit PCM in terms of quality/bit? And what format is that in? AIFF?

Again, the help this forum has delivered in the amount of time I've been a part of it have been absolutely overwhelming. For everyone that has posted to this topic, thank you. I find this to be one of the most helpful forums I've ever encountered.

WAV background noise

Reply #11
There are 2 types of compression, lossless (like WinZip) and lossy like MP3.
AIFF= uncompressed 16 bit PCM
ALAC is like FLAC, lossless compression
Maybe this link is of use: http://thewelltemperedcomputer.com/SW/audio_formats.htmlml
TheWellTemperedComputer.com

WAV background noise

Reply #12

Rip to Apple lossless


Is that worse than WAV 16bit PCM in terms of quality/bit? And what format is that in? AIFF?

http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?title=Lossless
Loss less = No Loss = Same Quality

C.

@ Roseval [to quick for me!]
PC = TAK + LossyWAV  ::  Portable = Opus (130)

WAV background noise

Reply #13
MP3 would be much better then 8 bit WAV or AIFF.  Sounds like you should just be using MP3 if you're so concerned about space.

WAV background noise

Reply #14
Both of you are quick. Thank you very much. I'm guessing that ALAC is the Apple Lossless file format, but I assume that that won't be compatible on the PS3.

ALAC is not compatible with the PS3, so denying the fact that WAV won't get me lossless quality, how can I get somewhat better quality than MP3 from WAV without the background noise? Will the 16bit have no noise at all?

EDIT: At that point, is it even worth it to convert to WAV to retain more quality than MP3? Here are the compatible music formats:

MP3
AAC
WAV
WMA

WAV background noise

Reply #15
ALAC is not compatible with the PS3, so denying the fact that WAV won't get me lossless quality, how can I get somewhat better quality than MP3 from WAV without the background noise? Will the 16bit have no noise at all?


WAV is lossless as long as you don't do lossy things to it, like convert to 8 bit.

WAV background noise

Reply #16
That's great, I'll test it and see if it has that background noise now.

EDIT: Using the iTunes WAV Importer I obviously wouldn't get noise so I'm asking this now before I attempt at importing an entire CD through Audacity

Is Audacity's WAV encoder better or worse than iTunes'? If there's a plug-in for iTunes than I would gladly accept any help on the matter

WAV background noise

Reply #17
how can I get somewhat better quality than MP3 from WAV without the background noise?

What makes you think MP3 is worse in terms of perceptible audio quality?

C.
PC = TAK + LossyWAV  ::  Portable = Opus (130)

WAV background noise

Reply #18
That's great, I'll test it and see if it has that background noise now.

EDIT: Using the iTunes WAV Importer I obviously wouldn't get noise so I'm asking this now before I attempt at importing an entire CD through Audacity

Is Audacity's WAV encoder better or worse than iTunes'? If there's a plug-in for iTunes than I would gladly accept any help on the matter


As I said before, WAV is lossless, so there is no "better or worse".

WAV background noise

Reply #19
I apologize, my better or worse was referring to the amount of quality that was lost compared to MP3 which I know is regarded as a lossy format so I guess that answers my question.

Do any of you know about the WAV importer for iTunes and if it's regarded as the best or worst WAV encoder? If there are better, how can I (a Mac user) get my hands on it?

Thank you everyone again for your contribution.

WAV background noise

Reply #20
I apologize, my better or worse was referring to the amount of quality that was lost compared to MP3 which I know is regarded as a lossy format so I guess that answers my question.

Do any of you know about the WAV importer for iTunes and if it's regarded as the best or worst WAV encoder? If there are better, how can I (a Mac user) get my hands on it?

Thank you everyone again for your contribution.
WAV created from CD does not require encoding. WAV of this type is signed 16bit, 44.1kHz, 2 channel audio (bitrate = 1411.2kbps).

You would be best using an ALAC encoder inside iTunes (I assume such a thing exists, I never use iTunes) and then transcode to whichever lossy format takes you fancy (or is compatible with your chosen player).

WAV straight from CD does not lose quality, it is exactly the same as the CD. MP3 and other lossy codecs achieve compression using complex algorithms and characteristics of human hearing to reduce the amount of data to be stored.
lossyWAV -q X -a 4 -s h -A --feedback 2 --limit 15848 --scale 0.5 | FLAC -5 -e -p -b 512 -P=4096 -S- (having set foobar to output 24-bit PCM; scaling by 0.5 gives the ANS headroom to work)

WAV background noise

Reply #21
Why do you suggest that I use the Apple Lossless and then convert to something else? What does that accomplish over just importing straight from the CD to that format? And if I do convert from CD to WAV, would that be the same as converting from CD to ALAC?

WAV background noise

Reply #22
While I don’t know Macs, I do know that the general high interest in music has to mean there are quite a few DAE programs for that system. Digital Audio Extraction is the process of reading audio CD data onto a computer hard drive (the slang term ripping, or to rip, is frequently used for this process).

EAC is one of the favorite PC programs for this purpose. It can extract, which produces a WAV file, or it can extract, encode into various compressed formats, and automatically delete the WAV data it extracted. There are dozens of other PC programs, most freeware, that do the same extraction. There have to be many such programs for the Macintosh.

All these programs give identical results if the audio CD is in good condition. Programs such as EAC are only particularly more useful if the CD is in poor condition (aside from EACs great flexibility for on-the-fly encoding and other additional options not directly related to your particular interests).

Once you understand that you can transfer the contents of an audio CD to your hard drive, and that playback from the hard drive will be identical to playback from the CD (aside from the question of which hardware path the audio signal takes on its way to the speakers), you should be ready to make progress. Once the audio CD is on your hard drive, you can do anything you want in terms of encoding to compressed formats (lossy or lossless) or making changes to the audio, should that be your interest.

WAV background noise

Reply #23
Why do you suggest that I use the Apple Lossless and then convert to something else?
To save space on your MAC;
What does that accomplish over just importing straight from the CD to that format?
I would assume that you would wish to keep a lossless copy of your CD rather than have to rip it again at a later date;
And if I do convert from CD to WAV, would that be the same as converting from CD to ALAC?
No - the ALAC file will be an ALAC file, however it will contain all of the information required to reconstruct your original WAV file. CD to WAV is half of the process. WAV's are generally considered to be too big for serious use as a music format. You need to encode your WAV file into another format (smaller), either lossless (ALAC, FLAC, Tak, Wavpack, etc) or lossy (MP3, AAC, OGG Vorbis, etc) for use in your player. Having a lossless copy means that you can, at a later date, transcode your "CD" into another lossy format.
lossyWAV -q X -a 4 -s h -A --feedback 2 --limit 15848 --scale 0.5 | FLAC -5 -e -p -b 512 -P=4096 -S- (having set foobar to output 24-bit PCM; scaling by 0.5 gives the ANS headroom to work)

 

WAV background noise

Reply #24
Ah, I see. So you're saying the process of having lossless (ALAC) files stored for the fact of having the CD itself with no alterations on your hard drive and then convert that to MP3 for the common use of a music file.

Is it that the consensus of a WAV file is that it's too big and doesn't hold all the information that a ALAC file would? Because what I'm looking for isn't a storage of a CD on my hard drive, but a higher quality lossless file that isn't as big as the file on the CD which I've discovered isn't possible due to the fact that it's lossless. I will use WAV files to store my music as a common format of lossless because they seem to be the most compatible for the equipment I want to use.

Andy: Thank you for your suggestion. I have heard of EAC and I know it is emulated only on the Windows operating system, but I do have BootCamp and I can use Windows. The thing is, what reason is there to use EAC to convert to WAV if iTunes will do that as well? Does it hold a better compression rate or ratio or contain something that iTunes doesn't?