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Topic: FFMPEG native AAC encoder. (Read 5026 times) previous topic - next topic
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FFMPEG native AAC encoder.

I want to convert some FLAC files to AAC. As far as I know FFMPEG has a native encoder that is supposedly worse than other encoders.

As someone who doesn't have high end headphones or speakers and just wants to make music that will sound just as good as FLAC files without taking up too much space, can I just use FFMPEG's native encoder at, say 192kbps, to achieve good results? I've tried converting music with it (Lavf58.45.100) and it sounds just as good, but I'm afraid of degrading my music collection accidentally. Should I convert at higher bitrates, instead? FFMPEG's website recommends against using this encoder with VBR, which is why I'm specifying 192/256 kbps.

In general, is this encoder as bad as some people say? How does a 192kbps AAC file converted from FLAC with this encoder compare to a respective MP3 file? At such bitrates, is it practically worse than other encoders or respective MP3 files or do encoders only matter at conversions of low bitrates?

Thank you in advance.

Re: FFMPEG native AAC encoder.

Reply #1 –
Short answer: Stay away from it, it sucks.
If you need AAC use qaac. (Apple encoder)
It is by far the best AAC encoder out there.
This great test by guruboolez shows that AAC files encoded by qaac should be transparent at 144 kbit/s!
Do you plan on keeping lossless FLAC files or not?
If you plan on keeping them (you should!) then you can use AAC, it will work on 90% of devices.
If you don't plan on keeping them, then you should probably use MP3s encoded with LAME using V2 preset.
gold plated toslink fan

Re: FFMPEG native AAC encoder.

Reply #2 –
are your player support xhe-aac? then exhale. or, if no-limits aac`s, try opus.

Re: FFMPEG native AAC encoder.

Reply #3 –
Thanks for the help.

Another question: Some of my music I have from bandcamp is AAC with VBR ~150kbps, sometimes much lower, encoded with fdk_aac. Is this good quality compared to MP3 V0?

Quote from: Markuza97 on
Short answer: Stay away from it, it sucks.
If you need AAC use qaac. (Apple encoder)
It is by far the best AAC encoder out there.
This great test by guruboolez shows that AAC files encoded by qaac should be transparent at 144 kbit/s!
Do you plan on keeping lossless FLAC files or not?
If you plan on keeping them (you should!) then you can use AAC, it will work on 90% of devices.
If you don't plan on keeping them, then you should probably use MP3s encoded with LAME using V2 preset.


What VBR setting should I use? The wiki says it can be between 0-127 with 0 being the default. Should I use the default setting?




Re: FFMPEG native AAC encoder.

Reply #4 –
Sorry for the multiple posts, but I'm not very knowledgeable on this, I just want to be sure if I'm doing this correctly.

I added qaac on foobar2000 and converted a FLAC file using QAAC with the VBR 192 setting. It produced a file with a tool named "qaac 2.71, CoreAudioToolbox 7.10.9.0, AAC-LC Encoder, TVBR q91, Quality 96"

And Foobar2000 says the track has a bitrate of "214kbps".

Should I be using this to encode high quality AAC files? Is the bitrate too high considering that I don't have very high end headphones?

Re: FFMPEG native AAC encoder.

Reply #5 –
fdk_aac is good. You can find another test by our lord and saviour guruboolez here:
https://hydrogenaud.io/index.php?topic=120062.0
It is comparison between different AAC encoders at 128 kbit/s.
As you can see, fdk_aac is pretty good. (But not as good as qaac, obviously.)

AAC files encoded with qaac at 192 kbit/s are great and safe!
It doesn't matter if you have $10 or $1000 headphones, you won't hear a difference.

But you still didn't answer my question :)
Do you plan on keeping lossless FLAC archive?
gold plated toslink fan

Re: FFMPEG native AAC encoder.

Reply #6 –
Quote from: Markuza97 on
fdk_aac is good. You can find another test by our lord and saviour guruboolez here:
https://hydrogenaud.io/index.php?topic=120062.0
It is comparison between different AAC encoders at 128 kbit/s.
As you can see, fdk_aac is pretty good. (But not as good as qaac, obviously.)

AAC files encoded with qaac at 192 kbit/s are great and safe!
It doesn't matter if you have $10 or $1000 headphones, you won't hear a difference.

But you still didn't answer my question :)
Do you plan on keeping lossless FLAC archive?

Thanks again for the help.

I want to get rid of the FLAC files because of storage issues and a music library that gets bigger and bigger. Which is why I want to make sure whatever I encode is on par with FLAC. But my knowledge of how to encode properly is limited. I knew that AAC is better than MP3 when it comes to saving space because AAC files can achieve "transparency" at lower bitrates compared to MP3 . I also know that my devices can play AAC files just fine. Didn't know which encoder to use, however.

Should I just use qaac through foobar2000 from now on?

Re: FFMPEG native AAC encoder.

Reply #7 –
Understandable. If ALL of your devices can play AAC then you can use VBR 192 kbit/s without any problems.
You can use it through foobar2000 or if you are advanced user you can also use command line interface (cmd) to manually convert.
gold plated toslink fan

Re: FFMPEG native AAC encoder.

Reply #8 –
Quote from: Markuza97 on
Understandable. If ALL of your devices can play AAC then you can use VBR 192 kbit/s without any problems.
You can use it through foobar2000 or if you are advanced user you can also use command line interface (cmd) to manually convert.


Tested this before converting anything and all of my devices play AAC files properly. Foobar2000 is a very convenient program in general, so I'll be using that instead of cmd to convert the files.

Thanks for the explanation and the links provided!