HydrogenAudio

Lossy Audio Compression => Other Lossy Codecs => Topic started by: DanielWired on 2010-04-02 16:17:09

Title: Questions about VQF and converting to wav/mp3
Post by: DanielWired on 2010-04-02 16:17:09
Hey everyone, I always end up finding answers on this forum via google searching, so I thought I would join the community.  I do have a few questions regarding VQF if anyone can give me advice.  Unfortunately I went through a VQF phase in 1999, so I have about 100 vqf songs.

Since VQF is obsolete, is there any good ways to convert it to wav, I can't seem to find any current (free) software that can handle it.  I can do disk writer with winamp, but it just causes it to crash after a couple songs (and format converter doesnt even try to work).

What do you think would be a sufficient version to mp3?  since it is lossy -> lossy, should I just double the bitrate (96 -> 192) or covert them all to a constant bitrate like 320.

Finally, curiosity, how come Audiochecker reports a wav from VQF as 100% CDDA?

Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated, thanks.
Title: Questions about VQF and converting to wav/mp3
Post by: lvqcl on 2010-04-02 17:11:07
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TwinVQ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TwinVQ) :
Quote
The format was reverse-engineered in 2009 by the FFmpeg (http://ffmpeg.arrozcru.org/autobuilds/) project
Title: Questions about VQF and converting to wav/mp3
Post by: pdq on 2010-04-02 17:20:10
What do you think would be a sufficient version to mp3?  since it is lossy -> lossy, should I just double the bitrate (96 -> 192) or covert them all to a constant bitrate like 320.

Personally I would convert to a high quality vbr mp3, such as -V 0.
Title: Questions about VQF and converting to wav/mp3
Post by: MostlyHarmless on 2010-04-02 18:26:47
If you are already convinced to use such a high bitrate as -V0 or 3l0 cbr, why don't you try lossyFlac (or lossyWv, lossyTak) with --portable preset, so you will loose no quality
Title: Questions about VQF and converting to wav/mp3
Post by: dv1989 on 2010-04-02 18:45:59
You will lose quality, hence the "lossy" in those encoders' names. Perhaps the loss will be less audible due to the different method of perceptual coding used.
Title: Questions about VQF and converting to wav/mp3
Post by: DanielWired on 2010-04-02 20:07:41
You will lose quality, hence the "lossy" in those encoders' names. Perhaps the loss will be less audible due to the different method of perceptual coding used.


Yeah, I am going to keep the original files, just moreso to have those files in a quick format for my ipod/turntables.  It wasn't until recently (like 4 months ago) I began getting into Lossless/FLAC and learned about the lossy->lossy=more quality loss.  God knows how many times I have edited files in the past, saving them into mp3 format consistently.  Especially with my tracks.

It took me a while just to be able to decode the VQF files to wav, in which for most of them I head to install an old version of dbPowerAmp and then use the VQF plugin, and for one the ones that wouldnt decode, I just had to use winamp, running disk writer plugin one by one.

Anyway, thanks for the input.  I'll prob just do like a constant 192kbps mp3 since I am holding on to the originals.
Title: Questions about VQF and converting to wav/mp3
Post by: dv1989 on 2010-04-02 22:15:26
I meant "You" in a general sense, as a reply to MostlyHarmless; a better wording would be "Using preprocessors like lossyWAV will cause quality loss". I wasn't implying that you (specifically!) didn't know that, just clarifying that lossyWAV et al. are lossy (who knew? ).
Title: Questions about VQF and converting to wav/mp3
Post by: MostlyHarmless on 2010-04-02 23:19:29
@dv1989: technically, you are absolutly right about the lossy nature of lossyWav preprocessor. However, there is a consencus (I think), that preset --portable is transparent for normal music (not killer samples). So, I'm pretty sure it would be transparent for vqf sourced material.
OTOH, transcoding from vqf to 192 mp3 gives owful results, IMHO. I've added 'my opinion' just to avoid unnecessary citation of TOS8 and requests for ABX results.
Back in the days (the end of the last century), when the hard disks were not so big and cheap, vqf was also my codec of choise, because it sounded much better at 96 kbps then l3enc at 128 kbps. Few years later, when vqf developmen faded out, I tried to recode my vqfs to mp3, but results were disappointing.
That's why I made my suggestion to the OP.
Title: Questions about VQF and converting to wav/mp3
Post by: DanielWired on 2010-04-03 03:46:23
I tried to recode my vqfs to mp3, but results were disappointing.
That's why I made my suggestion to the OP.


Yeah, I didn't know the lossyFLAC format till you mentioned it... and actually glad you did mention it since I have some mixes I made using mp3's, so this lossyFLAC might be perfect instead of Lossless FLAC as they are now.

I always wondered tho, I heard about VQF capable of going past 96kpbs (up to 192), yet I have never seen a file or software that could do that... that would be fun to at least play around with for curiousity.
Title: Questions about VQF and converting to wav/mp3
Post by: dv1989 on 2010-04-03 10:41:46
@dv1989: technically, you are absolutly right about the lossy nature of lossyWav preprocessor. However, there is a consencus (I think), that preset --portable is transparent for normal music (not killer samples). So, I'm pretty sure it would be transparent for vqf sourced material.
OTOH, transcoding from vqf to 192 mp3 gives owful results, IMHO.

Exactly: I intended to clarify that lossyWAV and co. will (technically) introduce quality loss, but which may indeed be less likely to be audible than that created by other formats. Of course, one would think that surely no one would see the name and believe that it could be lossless, but just in case… 
Title: Questions about VQF and converting to wav/mp3
Post by: Antonski on 2010-04-03 18:08:17
I always wondered tho, I heard about VQF capable of going past 96kpbs (up to 192), yet I have never seen a file or software that could do that... that would be fun to at least play around with for curiousity.


Some time ago Nero (or Ahead?) bought a license from NTT and made a VQF encoder capable for upto 192 kbps. It was included in Nero 6, I believe. Unfortunately, the only player capable for playing the new format was the Nero Wave Editor included in the pack.
I tried it once, just out of curiosity. I think I was able to distinguish the high bitrate (192) VQF from the original, maybe the encoder has not been tuned enough then.
I didn't perform any ABX-ing, just because I had discovered Musepack (then it was called MPEG Plus) and it was producing transparent files at a bit lower bitrates.
I think that Ahead abandoned this format too, but I haven't used it after v6, so I might be wrong.
Title: Questions about VQF and converting to wav/mp3
Post by: DanielWired on 2010-04-03 20:32:51
It was included in Nero 6, I believe.


Ahhh yeah, that's right, I never played with Nero's encoder...  Didn't think of looking there.  Actually I think (if my memory serves me well) Nero can still decode vqf files at least, though I am not 100% either because I jumped off of Nero around the same time.  That software was a prime example of good software becoming consumer bloatware