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Topic: Transparency for most listeners of different encoders? (Read 6203 times) previous topic - next topic
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Transparency for most listeners of different encoders?

Hi.

Can you tell me at wich bitrate the most popular encoders sounds transparent for most listeners at normal pop/rock music?

I think lame 3.97+ ist transparent at ~130kbits (v5) for most listeners.

Whats with aac, vorbis and wma?

Transparency for most listeners of different encoders?

Reply #1 –
Quote from: -Nepomuk- on
Hi.

Can you tell me at wich bitrate the most popular encoders sounds transparent for most listeners at normal pop/rock music?

I think lame 3.97+ ist transparent at ~130kbits (v5) for most listeners.

Whats with aac, vorbis and wma?


Based on the last public test where lots of people had difficulty abxing 128 kbps files, i'd say it's around that range for most untrained listeners casually listening to music.

Transparency for most listeners of different encoders?

Reply #2 –
130k for casual listener.. 190 ~ 250k for trained.

Transparency for most listeners of different encoders?

Reply #3 –
Quote from: shadowking on
130k for casual listener.. 190 ~ 250k for trained.

I'm quite trained, and totally agree with this statement for LAME.
To my ears LAME at about 130 sounds always compressed, whereas Apple aac at about 130 sounds often transparent (based on personal ABX test)

Transparency for most listeners of different encoders?

Reply #4 –
I tested hard electronic samples and Nero free AAC needed 230k in some cases. Then again not exactly normal stuff but AAC quality seems more robust.

Transparency for most listeners of different encoders?

Reply #5 –
~ 130kbps, which is about the average bitrate you will get from the MP3 -V 5 parameter I consider to be only used for portable playing since no lossy encoder is yet able to get clean transparency on difficult samples at this bitrate. Like shadowking already said something around 230kbps VBR should do on most cases.

Transparency for most listeners of different encoders?

Reply #6 –
Quote from: prankstare on
~ 130kbps, which is about the average bitrate you will get from the MP3 -V 5 parameter I consider to be only used for portable playing since no lossy encoder is yet able to get clean transparency on difficult samples at this bitrate. Like shadowking already said something around 230kbps VBR should do on most cases.


Hm, have you ABX it?

I think 130kbit//s (Lame) is transparent for most common listeners on usual music. A very few songs and some special samples needs more bitrate.

~190kbit/s should be transparent for most experienced listeners on usual pop and classic music.
At this quality, there should be only a few samples left, where listeners with "golden ears" can hear differences.

So it seems to be safe to use 130-160kbit/s for music on high quality home stereo equipment.

Any one with a different opinion?

Transparency for most listeners of different encoders?

Reply #7 –
No personal ABX'ing recently, Nepomuk.

But I do perform some casual tests with lossy coders from time to time, and I'd say -V 5 doesn't seem to draw much confidence on my Hi-Fi stereo sytem (even because we're talking about MP3 and not AAC or Vorbis) compared to Musepack --standard or -V 2, for example. Yes, although I know this is not the most trustfully kind of comparison, I'm getting a lot of statements from people saying the same so there must be a piece of truth behind it after all.

Transparency for most listeners of different encoders?

Reply #8 –
Quote from: prankstare on
No personal ABX'ing recently, Nepomuk.

But I do perform some casual tests with lossy coders from time to time, and I'd say -V 5 doesn't seem to draw much confidence on my Hi-Fi stereo sytem (even because we're talking about MP3 and not AAC or Vorbis) compared to Musepack --standard or -V 2, for example. Yes, although I know this is not the most trustfully kind of comparison, I'm getting a lot of statements from people saying the same so there must be a piece of truth behind it after all.


OK


I own a marantz 2230 receiver (35 years old) and old infinity kappa speakers.
this system should be of very high quality also this days.
I think 128-160kbit/s with lame is enough for my listening needs.


Whats with other encoders?


does aac at 96kbits get the same quality compared to lame v5?

Transparency for most listeners of different encoders?

Reply #9 –
AAC 96 might be close to V5  - much better than LAME 96k since no format limitation there, but AAC is similar to V5 at 128k.

Transparency for most listeners of different encoders?

Reply #10 –
For high-end stereo equipment, LAME 3.97 at V 2 would be transparent for most listeners (casual and trained listeners) most of the time.

For vorbis, most users would agree at -q 5.

For portable, LAME at V 5.
"Listen to me...
Never take unsolicited advice..."
 

Transparency for most listeners of different encoders?

Reply #11 –
Vorbis at 96 kbps will be similarly equitable to MP3 in quality at ~130 kbps.

Transparency for most listeners of different encoders?

Reply #12 –
Maybe i should buy a new harddisk (500-1000GB) an use lame 3.97 v2
I own about 1500 Compact Discs. So 100MB per album wastes only 150GB of space. there remains enough space for other things

Transparency for most listeners of different encoders?

Reply #13 –
Quote from: vinnie97 on
Vorbis at 96 kbps will be similarly equitable to MP3 in quality at ~130 kbps.

q2 still doesn't compete with V5. Low bitrate aoTuV squeeze stereo image that will cause audible artifacts on headphone listening.

Transparency for most listeners of different encoders?

Reply #14 –
Quote from: -Nepomuk- on
Maybe i should buy a new harddisk (500-1000GB) an use lame 3.97 v2
I own about 1500 Compact Discs. So 100MB per album wastes only 150GB of space. there remains enough space for other things ;)

Umm... if this thread is for some kind of research on what you should use on personal rips... why not just test? Try various bitrates on various formats until you find what suits your needs, you might be suprised.

Transparency for most listeners of different encoders?

Reply #15 –
Quote from: -Nepomuk- on
I own a marantz 2230 receiver (35 years old) and old infinity kappa speakers.
this system should be of very high quality also this days.
I think 128-160kbit/s with lame is enough for my listening needs.


You should also consider the computer soundcard, which has a great impact on the output quality.

In this case, having a poor-quality onboard sound chip (SiS are horrible) wouldn't help much.

Transparency for most listeners of different encoders?

Reply #16 –
M-Audio Audiophile