128kbps Extension Test - FINISHED
Reply #74 – 2003-08-05 17:05:53
I couldn't help noticing that at both samples that could be classified as classical (Bach and Saint-Saens), WMA9Pro won with pretty good scores (~0.3 above the next "hardwareable" codec (let's face it - MPC will never get widespread hardware support - if any at all). I wonder whether WMA9Pro has such a good performance with all classical music in general, since if so, it might become my format of choice for the classical collection on my portable . Unfortunately I am not able to test that by myself at the moment, since I am on a trip and all my classical is encoded, and trascoding is something I'd like to avoid for this kind of judgment. ~Dologan I noticed it too. I'm looking for an encoder at low-mid bitrate, for storing some discs on my new portable computer, very limited in space. I tried to found good settings/codec at 70-90 kbps, but too many artifacts remained. HE-AAC isn't very efficient at the moment, and can't be seriously considered (nevertheless, i hope fast improvments). Therefore, 128 kbps seems to be a good compromise. Two potential challengers here : AAC MP4 (QT) and WMA9pro . Quicktime isn't suitable for batch encoding, and tagging with WMA9Pro is something impossible with foobar2000. That's really annoying ! Compromise : Nero MP4 VBR --streaming, less reliable in my opinion than QT 128, but good quality, and easy to use (transcoding forom lossless is easy). Vorbis doesn't really interest me : too noisy for my taste, and harpsichord isn't well-reproduced. MPC ? Hmm... I wasn't convinced for classical music and --radio. And my baroque taste will conduct to high bitrate (close to 150 kbps) I'm gonna play the next time with WMApro, with VBR and Two-Pass, at mid-bitrate. I didn't have time and will enough for serious comparison, but for the moment, I didn't noticed something really annoying with this encoder, with all tracks and samples I tested. I have to look carefuly on loud music : wma standard often destroyed the sound, and I suspect PRO encoder to share the same flaw (less pronounced) : may be annoying with grand-orchestra. Anyway, if PRO vbr encoder isn't amazing at low bitrate (try any metal sample at VBR 25-50 : it's obvious), quality seems to be more interesting for classical music (metalic coloration is the most annoying thing) ; bitrate is sometime very low.
Wavpack Hybrid: one encoder, one encoding for all scenarios WavPack -c4.5hx6 (44100Hz & 48000Hz) ≈ 390 kbps + correction file WavPack -c4hx6 (96000Hz) ≈ 768 kbps + correction file WavPack -h (SACD & DSD) ≈ 2400 kbps at 2.8224 MHz