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Topic: WMPPro encoding settings (Read 6926 times) previous topic - next topic
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WMPPro encoding settings

I have 80gb of flac that i'm converting down after backing up. This is only going to be PC playback so i can use any codec installed and I've abx'd quite a few, WMAPro seems to come out on top with Vorbis aoTuV and HE-AAC at the lower bitrates.

I'm thinking the best settings would be for me a little above transparency for peace of mind, which is about 192VBR 2-pass. but I haven't encoded my whole collection in that format yet, so i'm wondering what some of you guys use. For me it was a bit hard to look past WMA's bad reputation, WMAPro sounds soooo good to my ears.

-Joe

WMPPro encoding settings

Reply #1 –
Hey if it sounds good to you (transparent) and you like it, then by all means go with it.  Just for fun, you could test whether it's a placebo effect by ABX testing a couple of diffent codecs (WMApro, mp3, Nero ACC, Vorbis) at the same bitrate.

Also, keep in mind that you're using the premise that you find WMApro superior to HE-AAC and aoTuV at low bitrates as a rationale for selecting a high-bitrate codec.  These codecs perform quite differently in different bitrate ranges - you might want to look around the forums here for recent listening tests at 48kbps and 128kbps.  At 192kbps, virtually all the modern lossy codecs are going to sound transparent (WMA, Vorbis, MP3, AAC).

You mention that it's only for PC playback, but you might want to consider that there's little (if any?) hardware support for WMApro on portable players at the moment.  So if you do get a DAP in the future, you might have to rencode to those flacs to a different lossy format.

Personally I use Lame 3.97 beta -V 2 (aka preset standard) because I can't distinguish it from the original (i.e., it's transparent to me), I've never had problems with it, and the fact that it has universal hardware/software support (e.g., works on both my iPod and my wife's Zen Micro).

edit: spelling

WMPPro encoding settings

Reply #2 –
The other important thing is gapless playback. If you are going to play Pink Floyd, you might as well forget WMA!! LAME encoded MP3s, Ogg Vorbis, and Musepack (MPC) files do support gapless playback. IIRC, AAC files encoded with Nero's AAC Encoder also support gapless but I am not sure if the gapless function is retained when playing them on iPods.

audiomars
Reason is immortal, all else mortal
- Pythagoras

WMPPro encoding settings

Reply #4 –
Quote from: audiomars on
The other important thing is gapless playback. If you are going to play Pink Floyd, you might as well forget WMA!!


Let's think about WMA, its proprietary and DRM whatever we want, but please let's keep being objectively concerning its features. Gapless playback with the WMA 9 series and above is indeed possible using the correct decoders. For instance, here's an interesting note taken from the Winamp 5.22 changelog, found on http://www.winfuture.de/news,25583.html (German site):

"# Improved: [in_wm] gapless WMA support"

Or this thread on HA itself: http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/lofive...php/t18779.html

One last source from http://shsc.info/foobar2000:

"How do I make foobar play files gaplessly?  Playback will be gapless if gapless playback is possible.  Generally lossless files, ogg, mpc and wma are always gapless."


If even WMA 9 Standard supports gapless playback, the WMA Pro 9 and 10 codecs used by the thread starter do support it more than ever.

WMPPro encoding settings

Reply #5 –
I think WMA Pro can be played gaplessly (the codec installed with WMP10). I have not tested this extensively, but once I encoded the Guruboolez's gapless playback test samples with WMA pro and to much of my surprise they played gaplessly with foobar2000 0.83 and J. River Media Center 11.1. Though, WMP10 playback wasn't gapless if I recall correctly. Also, I coudn't make WMA Standard files play gaplessly with any player.

One thing that is possibly against WMA Pro is the decoder clipping issue on playback, which happens with all lossy file formats with certain type of tracks. For example, foobar2000 can take care of that if the files have replay gain tags and the file format is one of those that are uncompressed internally to floating point before the gain adjustment. I think that with WMA (standard or pro) decoding happens always so that the clipped peaks are lost before the gain can be adjusted (correct me if I am wrong).

Edit: typo

WMPPro encoding settings

Reply #6 –
Quote from: Alex B on
One thing that is possibly against WMA Pro is the decoder clipping issue on playback, which happens with all lossy file formats with certain type of tracks. For example, foobar2000 can take care of that if the files have replay gain tags and the file format is one of those that are uncompressed internally to floating point before the gain adjustment. I think that with WMA (standard or pro) decoding happens always so that the clipped peaks are lost before the gain can be adjusted (correct me if I am wrong).


Does the applications volume affect clipping? I tend to run foobar/wmp at half volume and adjust via the MM keys.

-Joe

WMPPro encoding settings

Reply #7 –
Quote from: Erukian on
Does the applications volume affect clipping? I tend to run foobar/wmp at half volume and adjust via the MM keys.


No, it does not. That kind of decoder clipping happens before the usual volume adjustments. You may want to search HA for more information.

I just tried a couple of WMA Pro files with foobar2000 v. 0.83 replay gain. Obviously it cannot work before the WM codec has decoded the output. The maximum measured track peak was always exactly 1.0 with tracks that produce much higher peaks with other lossy encoders (like 1.3-1.6 ).

EDIT:

I converted the test files to wave using replay gain correction (peak protection enabled), checked the resulting files with a wave editor and indeed, the tracks were clipped.

WMPPro encoding settings

Reply #8 –
Quote from: Alex B on
I just tried a couple of WMA Pro files with foobar2000 v. 0.83 replay gain. Obviously it cannot work before the WM codec has decoded the output. The maximum measured track peak was always exactly 1.0 with tracks that produce much higher peaks with other lossy encoders (like 1.3-1.6 ).

Does fb2k WMA decoder work in floating-point?

WMPPro encoding settings

Reply #9 –
I think all WMA capable player programs use the OS level WM codec for decoding and the programs can receive only fixed point PCM data.

EDIT

Though, this is based only in my experience, not in knowledge. Correct me if you know better.

WMPPro encoding settings

Reply #10 –
Well, then peak cannot go over 1.0.

WMPPro encoding settings

Reply #11 –
With a new WMP beta comes a new WMA10Pro codec.  Try it at Quality 10 (48kbps, but over 54kbps because of that darn .wma overhead), then at Quality 25 if you aren't satisfied
Copy Restriction, Annulment, & Protection = C.R.A.P. -Supacon

WMPPro encoding settings

Reply #12 –
@Junon:
Thanks for the information regarding gapless playback with WMA. I have tried encoding gapless tracks to WMA earlier but on playing back, they had a small gap during the song transitions. That was I why I was sure that WMA does not support gapless. I suppose I did not use the correct decoders (ones that support gapless WMA). It was quite some time back and I think I was using Winamp 2.xx. I never tried it in Foobar either after that, though Foobar is my player of choice now.

Anyways, thatnks again for the information and the links which specify some portable devices also supporitng WMA gaplessly. That is important for me as I have quite a few albums with gapless tracks in my collection.

@Alex B
Same as above. I am going to test guru's gapless samples with WMA now 

Thanks again for all the info, guys.

audiomars
Reason is immortal, all else mortal
- Pythagoras

WMPPro encoding settings

Reply #13 –
Just finished testing guru's gapless samples with WMA Standard and WMA Pro. The files encoded with WMA Pro play perfectly gaplessly in Foobar and Winamp    .

However, the files that were encoded with WMA Standard show inconsistent behaviour. Some of them play gaplessly (or maybe the gap is not discernible) and some of them have a very distinct gap. The result is the same in both Foobar and Winamp.

Surprisingly, Windows Media Player sould not play either set of samples gaplessly 

Looks like my findings validate Alex B's observations

audiomars
Reason is immortal, all else mortal
- Pythagoras