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Recent Posts
1
3rd Party Plugins - (fb2k) / Re: External Tags
Last post by aelklirion -
If I'm using folder tags, change a file's external tags from foobar and save them (creating a .tag file) and realize I made a mistake with the file name and change it via Windows Explorer, can I open the .tag file with a text editor and change the file name reference in it to the new one so that the external tags are associated with it? Cause I did it and it seems to have worked, but I just want to be sure this is intended use and I'm not breaking something that I can't see.
2
Support - (fb2k) / Re: Foobar2000 v2.* playback sound quality lower than v1.X
Last post by Globares -
A note:  you can load both tracks into fb2k (either v1 or v2), select both, right click, Utilities > ABX tracks and you can do a ABX blind test to see if you can actually tell the difference between the two tracks. Please consider doing this and posting your ABX results!
These samples are too close. Actually I downloaded the ABX utility to check if the "limiter" feature of it would help (it allows to play just a short piece and quickly switch between the samples), but no. I wonder if the author of the recordings can tell the difference listening on his own system. It doesn't mean that my original statement regarding the v1/v2 differences is false! I'm confident since the difference is too big for placebo effect.
5
FLAC / Re: FLAC v1.4.x Performance Tests
Last post by Porcus -
This has probably been well covered over the last nearly-nineteen pages, but:
Is there any particular reason why 64-bit flac.exe should be so much faster than 32-bit?
6
Lossless / Other Codecs / Re: HALAC (High Availability Lossless Audio Compression)
Last post by Hakan Abbas -
Could you release a new version with a "-high" argument which gets a bit higher compression ratio than default but 25-50% slower compression and decompression speed?
X
The graph above shows the change of compression ratio since the first version of HALAC. HALAC is a speed-oriented study and the last thing I want to compromise on speed is. The lossless compression rate of audio data is really limited in most cases.

SQUEEZE CHART is an archive that also contains different types of music used in audio compression tests. It gives an idea in a general sense. Since the first version, there has been an improvement of about 1% in the compression ratio at the same speeds (encode has been slightly faster). At extremely high speeds, this is really not bad. Depending on the current situation, it is a little difficult to predict how much further progress can be made.

HIGH mode has been requested from different people before. I will focus on the compression ratio in later versions. Because I've already mentioned that there is a little more space in this regard.

I started to get interested in the compression ratio with version 0.2.6. However, I had to enter the Player and DLL topic in accordance with the incoming requests. Now, as soon as I have time, I am trying to complete the new dynamic library I have developed for HALAC in a flexible and error-free way. Changes are also made to the file structure and working style in accordance with incoming requests.
10
Listening Tests / Personal blind sound quality comparison of xHE-AAC, Ogg Vorbis, and TSAC
Last post by Kamedo2 -
Abstract:
Personal blind sound quality comparison of xHE-AAC and Ogg Vorbis at around 134 kbps, and the Fabrice Bellard's new AI-based codec TSAC: Very Low Bitrate Audio Compression at 7.5kbps.

Encoders:
Except exhale v1.1.9, all of them are latest as of 7 May 2024.
xHE-AAC: exhale-V1.1.9-00423757_x64, exhale-v1.2.1_x64
Ogg Vorbis: aoTuV_b6.03_2020.
TSAC: Windows version (experimental): tsac-2024-04-08-win64.zip.

xHE-AAC commandlines:
exhale-V1.1.9-00423757_x64\exhale 5 in.wav out.mp4
exhale-v1.2.1_x64\exhale 5 in.wav out.mp4
ffmpeg109823 -c:a libfdk_aac -i out.mp4 -c:a pcm_f32le out.wav

Ogg Vorbis commandlines:
aoTuV_b6.03_2020\venc64 -q3.7 in.wav out.ogg
oggdecV1.10.1\oggdec -b 5 out.ogg --wavout out.wav

TSAC commandlines:
tsac-2024-04-08-win64\tsac -v -m tsac-2024-04-08-win64\dac_stereo_q8.bin -M tsac-2024-04-08-win64\tsac_stereo_q8.bin -q 12 c in.wav out.tsac
tsac-2024-04-08-win64\tsac -v -m tsac-2024-04-08-win64\dac_stereo_q8.bin -M tsac-2024-04-08-win64\tsac_stereo_q8.bin d out.tsac out.wav

Sample tracks:
15 sound samples from Kamedo2's samples(full download).

Total 15 diverse music sound samples, including highly critical samples.

Hardware:
Sony PSP-3000 + AKG K712.

Results (only traditional codecs, at around 134 kbps):


Results (including AI codec at 7.5kbps, it is not a bitrate-equalized comparison):



Conclusions & Observations:
  • MPEG-4 xHE-AAC (eXtended High-Efficiency AAC), encoded by exhale (Ecodis eXtended High-efficiency And
    Low-complexity Encoder), had very high fidelity at around 134kbps, with average score over 4.5.
  • Ogg Vorbis, encoded by aoyumi's aoTuV beta6.03(latest version as of 2024 May), also had very high fidelity at around 134kbps, with average score more than 4.4.
  • It's not clear which encoder, xHE-AAC or Ogg Vorbis, was better, from this test alone. The difference was small.
  • Both xHE-AAC and Ogg Vorbis at around 134kbps were better than the TSAC: Very Low Bitrate Audio Compression at 7.5kbps, at its maximum bitrate setting as of 2024-04-08 version. TSAC used 94.4% less disk space, and this test not meant to be a filesize-wise fair comparison.

Anova analysis:
Code: [Select]
FRIEDMAN version 1.24 (Jan 17, 2002) http://ff123.net/
Blocked ANOVA analysis

Number of listeners: 15
Critical significance:  0.05
Significance of data: 0.00E+000 (highly significant)
---------------------------------------------------------------
ANOVA Table for Randomized Block Designs Using Ratings

Source of         Degrees     Sum of    Mean
variation         of Freedom  squares   Square    F      p

Total               59          86.42
Testers (blocks)    14           1.00
Codecs eval'd        3          83.62   27.87   651.96  0.00E+000
Error               42           1.80    0.04
---------------------------------------------------------------
Fisher's protected LSD for ANOVA:   0.152

Means:

exh119   exh121   ogg128   tsac12  
  4.56     4.55     4.45     1.79  

---------------------------- p-value Matrix ---------------------------

         exh121   ogg128   tsac12  
exh119   0.861    0.141    0.000*  
exh121            0.193    0.000*  
ogg128                     0.000*  
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

exh119 is better than tsac12
exh121 is better than tsac12
ogg128 is better than tsac12

Raw data:
Code: [Select]
exhale v1.1.9	exhale v1.2.1	aoTuV beta6.03	tsac-2024-04-08-win64
%feature 3 xHE-AAC xHE-AAC Ogg Vorbis TSAC: Very Low Bitrate Audio Compression
%feature 10 test tracks avg/albums avg test tracks avg/albums avg test tracks avg/albums avg test tracks avg/albums avg
%feature 11 138.7kbps/130.4kbps 139.0kbps/129.6kbps 143.2kbps/126.1kbps 7.4kbps/7.5kbps
%feature 12 exhale 5 in.wav out.mp4 exhale 5 in.wav out.mp4 venc64 -q3.7 in.wav out.ogg tsac -v -q 12 c in.wav out.tsac
5.000 4.500 4.400 2.300
4.400 4.500 5.000 1.700
5.000 5.000 4.300 1.900
4.800 4.600 4.400 1.900
4.400 4.600 4.800 1.800
4.500 4.600 4.700 1.500
4.600 4.700 4.300 2.100
4.700 4.500 4.600 1.700
4.500 4.400 4.700 1.700
4.100 4.300 4.400 1.600
4.400 4.500 4.200 1.500
4.700 4.500 4.300 1.800
4.500 4.700 4.300 1.700
4.500 4.400 4.200 1.900
4.300 4.400 4.100 1.800
%samples 41_30sec Perc.
%samples finalfantasy Strings
%samples ATrain Jazz
%samples BigYellow Pops
%samples FloorEssence Techno
%samples macabre Classic
%samples mybloodrusts Guitar
%samples Quizas Latin
%samples VelvetRealm Techno
%samples Amefuribana Pops
%samples Trust Gospel
%samples Waiting Rock
%samples Experiencia Latin
%samples Heart to Heart Pops
%samples Tom's Diner Acappella

Other tests: