Good evening.
Long time lurker and first time poster in here.
I found THIS (https://sourceforge.net/p/lame/bugs/506/) great sample by Jari Aalto.
He said he had some problems with LAME's V0 setting so I decided to test it myself including the other encoders, too.
MP3 is the most popular lossy codec in the world so let's test it first.
Using latest LAME 3.100.1 from RareWares.
lame -V0 input.wav
foo_abx 2.0.6d report
foobar2000 v1.6
2020-11-14 01:55:49
File A: sample.flac
SHA1: 183a198ef5e7173e51ef8d6f6b125d5ea71376da
File B: lame_V0.mp3
SHA1: 002fd3528d6c042df369a27558e9c76df7c52c72
Output:
WASAPI (event) : Sabre (Hifime Sabre Dac), 24-bit
Crossfading: NO
01:55:49 : Test started.
01:56:00 : 01/01
01:56:08 : 02/02
01:56:13 : 03/03
01:56:17 : 04/04
01:56:20 : 05/05
01:56:25 : 06/06
01:56:28 : 07/07
01:56:32 : 08/08
01:56:35 : 09/09
01:56:48 : 10/10
01:56:48 : Test finished.
----------
Total: 10/10
p-value: 0.001 (0.1%)
-- signature --
b8bd33b3d6b6da127e013369f10eb50f50a37503
Very easy to ABX. I also tried --vbr-old switch and results were much better.
The second most popular lossy codec in the world, AAC-LC.
Using qaac 2.71 with CoreAudioToolbox 7.10.9.0.
qaac64 -V127 input.wav
foo_abx 2.0.6d report
foobar2000 v1.6
2020-11-14 02:06:13
File A: sample.flac
SHA1: 183a198ef5e7173e51ef8d6f6b125d5ea71376da
File B: qaac_V127.m4a
SHA1: 1a95610573fd1f7dcfb2ced4bc57e0dbe4d88b02
Output:
WASAPI (event) : Sabre (Hifime Sabre Dac), 24-bit
Crossfading: NO
02:06:13 : Test started.
02:06:18 : 01/01
02:06:24 : 02/02
02:06:28 : 03/03
02:06:32 : 04/04
02:06:35 : 05/05
02:06:38 : 06/06
02:06:41 : 07/07
02:06:44 : 08/08
02:06:47 : 09/09
02:06:53 : 10/10
02:06:53 : Test finished.
----------
Total: 10/10
p-value: 0.001 (0.1%)
-- signature --
79cccb128e587ecfe24fc5d8c67b9b68dc572011
I went with the highest quality setting -V127 but the problem is still there.
Drum hit at the beginning sounds different. Easy to ABX.
Opus, the most promising codec at the moment.
Using opus-tools-0.2-opus-1.3.1.zip from https://opus-codec.org/.
opusenc --bitrate 128 input.wav
foo_abx 2.0.6d report
foobar2000 v1.6
2020-11-14 02:34:15
File A: sample.flac
SHA1: 183a198ef5e7173e51ef8d6f6b125d5ea71376da
File B: opus_128.opus
SHA1: 71b62d8d56bbe79b957ce7bb6dbf7a803fe260d9
Output:
DSD : WASAPI (event) : Izlaz (ASUS Xonar DGX Audio Device), 24-bit
Crossfading: NO
02:34:15 : Test started.
02:34:22 : 01/01
02:34:27 : 02/02
02:34:33 : 03/03
02:34:39 : 04/04
02:34:45 : 05/05
02:34:51 : 06/06
02:35:02 : 07/07
02:35:10 : 08/08
02:35:17 : 09/09
02:35:23 : 10/10
02:35:23 : Test finished.
----------
Total: 10/10
p-value: 0.001 (0.1%)
-- signature --
e48cf51d51c3d67b508ae63b2badf08a7a2e23b5
English is not my primary language so I really don't know how to explain the difference that I can hear.
It is right around half a second. I also included the file encoded at 64 kbit/s that is very easy to ABX
and once you hear the difference you will know what exactly you need to listen to.
As you can see, I also had to change my sound card. My USB sound card just skips first ~two seconds on Opus
so I had to use PCIe card.
Everybody is focused on exhale now so let's test it.
Using latest exhale 1.0.8 from RareWares.
exhale 9 input.wav
foo_abx 2.0.6d report
foobar2000 v1.6
2020-11-14 02:42:46
File A: sample.flac
SHA1: 183a198ef5e7173e51ef8d6f6b125d5ea71376da
File B: exhale_9.m4a
SHA1: 473e098e46ea6e87439ad56bb281751c2f61cb36
Output:
DSD : WASAPI (event) : Izlaz (ASUS Xonar DGX Audio Device), 24-bit
Crossfading: NO
02:42:46 : Test started.
02:42:53 : 01/01
02:42:56 : 02/02
02:42:59 : 03/03
02:43:01 : 04/04
02:43:04 : 05/05
02:43:06 : 06/06
02:43:08 : 07/07
02:43:11 : 08/08
02:43:14 : 09/09
02:43:17 : 10/10
02:43:17 : Test finished.
----------
Total: 10/10
p-value: 0.001 (0.1%)
-- signature --
8489456c32d1a552701845ba386d3664133094c9
Lower bitrates were not really good so I tried with higher bitrates. Still terrible. Deaf person can ABX this.
Not many people have xHE-AAC decoder so I also included the decoded file.
I cannot edit the original post so I apologize for double posting.
I just noticed this: DSD : WASAPI (event) : Izlaz (ASUS Xonar DGX Audio Device), 24-bit
I don't have any DSD device so I have probably chosen this by mistake.
Anyway, I didn't want that to affect the results so I redid the test using normal WASAPI.
Still not transparent.
Opus:
foo_abx 2.0.6d report
foobar2000 v1.6
2020-11-14 04:28:28
File A: sample.flac
SHA1: 183a198ef5e7173e51ef8d6f6b125d5ea71376da
File B: opus_128.opus
SHA1: 71b62d8d56bbe79b957ce7bb6dbf7a803fe260d9
Output:
WASAPI (event) : Izlaz (ASUS Xonar DGX Audio Device), 24-bit
Crossfading: NO
04:28:28 : Test started.
04:28:37 : 01/01
04:29:00 : 02/02
04:29:10 : 03/03
04:29:25 : 04/04
04:29:44 : 05/05
04:29:51 : 06/06
04:30:02 : 07/07
04:30:23 : 08/08
04:30:34 : 09/09
04:30:47 : 10/10
04:30:47 : Test finished.
----------
Total: 10/10
p-value: 0.001 (0.1%)
-- signature --
f9aadae163d68b0c8764f8ea1570d040e820fd72
exhale:
foo_abx 2.0.6d report
foobar2000 v1.6
2020-11-14 04:32:00
File A: sample.flac
SHA1: 183a198ef5e7173e51ef8d6f6b125d5ea71376da
File B: exhale_9.m4a
SHA1: 473e098e46ea6e87439ad56bb281751c2f61cb36
Output:
WASAPI (event) : Izlaz (ASUS Xonar DGX Audio Device), 24-bit
Crossfading: NO
04:32:00 : Test started.
04:32:08 : 01/01
04:32:10 : 02/02
04:32:13 : 03/03
04:32:15 : 04/04
04:32:17 : 05/05
04:32:20 : 06/06
04:32:22 : 07/07
04:32:24 : 08/08
04:32:27 : 09/09
04:32:29 : 10/10
04:32:29 : Test finished.
----------
Total: 10/10
p-value: 0.001 (0.1%)
-- signature --
32ed983603ee8f75d14e7d51496931fb79a5d031
This may not be of much help but from the Mega download the V0 version created with lame 3.100 has this really obvious additional noise on the beats in the beginning.
Even at V3 with an old 3.98 version this is way better.
AAC & LAME V0 --vbr new both have horrid pre echo clicks enough i don't need ABX to tell. Yet Opus & Vorbis are transparent at 160kbps. Never seen AAC perform so badly here.
Try alternative Noise shaping mode;
-V0 --vbr-new -f
Or try --allshort V 0 --vbr-new, Had way more gains with samples in the OP.