I Need Your Advice!

[the eternal]

(Due to the recent crackdown on computer use at work--as well as my need to focus on said work,

I promised myself only to come on for PMs or IMPORTANT questions

---this is it---

1. Right now, I am contractually obligated to burn a sh&^load of music for someone.

Since I don't have a dual burner, that requires me to upload it all first

2. I'm ALSO considering saving all my music on an external hard drive OR my computer anyway

I HAVE PREMIUM REAL PLAYER

It defaults to 96kbps in mp3 format for uploading music.

Still with me?? Good, you probably know something about saving music that I don't.

I was reading somewhere that I should save at 192kbps to have good quality music.

Real Player lets you go up to 320kbps, BUT

I'm not a complete music nerd,

and this is going on my computer, with crappy speakers and $25 headphones.

That said, I may also borrow CDs and burn them, and don't want the sound to be total garbage

(again though, I'm not uber-picky)

The problem with burning at 192 kbps is, it uses twice the memory.

I DO have plenty of room and I will NEVER save movies to my computer, so I should always have some memory left, BUT

I have NO IDEA

what the proper amount of memory to leave available is, for optimum speeds

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

COMPUTER CAPACITY

26 GB USED

198 GB FREE

___________________

224 GB capacity

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

HOT BUTTON ISSUES FOR ME

1. Good quality of music (not perfection, mind you)

2. Speed of use of my computer

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

MY OPTIONS:

KBPS

64

92 (default)

112

128

160

192

224

Bitrate Variabililty

Constant Bitrate (default) vs Variable Bitrate

FORMATS

AAC (.4ma)

RealAudio 10 (.ra)

RealAudio Lossless (.ra)

MP3 (.mp3) (default)

Wave (.wav)

Windows media Audio (.wma)

WHAT DO YOU SUGGEST???

-----------------------------------------------------------

WHILE YOU'RE AT IT, explain this to me-------

If it uploads in .mp3 format, how is it that I'm still available to "burn it to disk" as a regular 80-minute CD??

Is that only so I can play the CD on my old boom box OR

If I pick "burn as CD" is the quality ANY better than "burn as MP3???"

(Because I also read that MP3 formatted cds delete 90% of the background sounds

to make room for more songs.)

----------------------------------------------------------

Thank you so much!!!!

[predaking]

(Due to the recent crackdown on computer use at work--as well as my need to focus on said work,

I promised myself only to come on for PMs or IMPORTANT questions

---this is it---

1. Right now, I am contractually obligated to burn a sh&^load of music for someone.

Since I don't have a dual burner, that requires me to upload it all first

2. I'm ALSO considering saving all my music on an external hard drive OR my computer anyway

I HAVE PREMIUM REAL PLAYER

It defaults to 96kbps in mp3 format for uploading music.

Still with me?? Good, you probably know something about saving music that I don't.

I was reading somewhere that I should save at 192kbps to have good quality music.

128 is plenty fine its all part of the data compression = smaller the bit rate , smaller the file

Real Player lets you go up to 320kbps, BUT

I'm not a complete music nerd,

and this is going on my computer, with crappy speakers and $25 headphones.

That said, I may also borrow CDs and burn them, and don't want the sound to be total garbage

(again though, I'm not uber-picky)

The problem with burning at 192 kbps is, it uses twice the memory.

I DO have plenty of room and I will NEVER save movies to my computer, so I should always have some meory left, BUT

I have NO IDEA

what the proper amount of memory to leave available is, for optimum speeds

you need spaace equal to the size of what you are burning because your computer was to make a ghost image of the data ex. to burn a 7gig movie you will need 14 gig, 7 for th origin file and 7 for the ghost

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

COMPUTER CAPACITY

26 GB USED

198 GB FREE

___________________

224 GB capacity

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

HOT BUTTON ISSUES FOR ME

1. Good quality of music (not perfection, mind you)

2. Speed of use of my computer

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

MY OPTIONS:

KBPS

64

92 (default)

112

128

160

192

224

Bitrate Variabililty

Constant Bitrate (default) vs Variable Bitrate

FORMATS

AAC (.4ma)

RealAudio 10 (.ra)

RealAudio Lossless (.ra)

MP3 (.mp3) (default)

Wave (.wav)

Windows media Audio (.wma)

WHAT DO YOU SUGGEST???

rip to an MP3 or WMA both work with all burner programs

-----------------------------------------------------------

WHILE YOU'RE AT IT, explain this to me-------

If it uploads in .mp3 format, how is it that I'm still available to burn it to disk as a regular 80-minute CD??

Is that only so I can play the CD on my old boom box OR

Is the quality ANY better than burning in MP3 format which is supposed to delete 90% of the background sounds

to make room for more songs???

the file is decompressed and burned in a cd audio format, the quality doesnt change (IMO) but the ammount of songs you have on a disc does. An MP3 disc is a data disc and can only be used with a MP3 supported player, if you want to use the disc in a regular cd player you have to burn a AUDIO CD. Your burner will give you the option. Your default options should work well for what you want to do

----------------------------------------------------------

Thank you so much!!!!

[odims_sphere]

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

HOT BUTTON ISSUES FOR ME

1. Good quality of music (not perfection, mind you)

2. Speed of use of my computer

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

MY OPTIONS:

KBPS

64

92 (default)

112

128

160

192

224

Bitrate Variabililty

Constant Bitrate (default) vs Variable Bitrate

FORMATS

AAC (.4ma)

RealAudio 10 (.ra)

RealAudio Lossless (.ra)

MP3 (.mp3) (default)

Wave (.wav)

Windows media Audio (.wma)

WHAT DO YOU SUGGEST???

-----------------------------------------------------------

WHILE YOU'RE AT IT, explain this to me-------

If it uploads in .mp3 format, how is it that I'm still available to "burn it to disk" as a regular 80-minute CD??

Is that only so I can play the CD on my old boom box OR

If I pick "burn as CD" is the quality ANY better than "burn as MP3???"

(Because I also read that MP3 formatted cds delete 90% of the background sounds

to make room for more songs.)

----------------------------------------------------------

Thank you so much!!!!

Stay with the MP3 format, it's more flexible in in a variety of players and does the least amount of "damage" to the sound quality. Any thing 128kbps and above you can't really tell the difference unless you're an audiophile and trying to find something. I wouldn't go any lower than that though.

As far as burning to the CD. Most burning software assumes that when you are burning an audio CD you want it playable in a cd player so it converts it back to the CD format unless you tell it not to. The problem is there isn't any way of undoing the damage of when it was first converted to MP3 so you're still getting MP3 quality even though it's being read in CD format.

The only way to maintain CD quality would be to convert it to .wav but that takes up a LOT of space.

[the eternal]

2 votes for MP3 format and 128 kbps, great!

Thanks.

If anyone else wants to agree or add something (or even disagree)

please do!

BTW, this is where I got some of my info on sound quality.

(A couple other articles too)

They say AAC is better than MP3, but of course, you guys make a good point about versatility.

Edited to add that when Radiohead released In Rainbows in 160 kbps,

audiophiles acted like someone assassinated their thousand dollar Klipsch speakers with a sledgehammer.

Of course, I own two shitty boom boxes, and itunes has had no problem selling their stuff at 128 kbps, but I was interested to know what the "geeks" here think.

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

ACC is better, but not everything will play it. MP3 has become the standard.

[Msterbeau]

Roughly how many songs are we talking about? I have almost 4000 in my iTunes library and it takes up 23GB at 192 kbps MP3's. Just to give you an idea of how much space things take up. If you kept the sample rate at 128 kbps but saved as AAC you would probably take up more space but have a better quality "master" in digital format. If you burn a CD from those in native audio Cd format, they'll be nice quality, I would think. And You can always make lower quality MP3's from them for other needs. Just a suggestion. I'm no expert.

[Shade Everdark]

I know it wasn't listed, but you might try using the FLAC file format. I've not ripped anything to FLAC yet myself, but it's touted as a totally lossless audio format.

[the eternal]

So, I'm staying at MP3 format with constant bit rate selected.

I probably will only be uploading 3000 or 4000 songs, so the memory shouldn't be TOO eaten up.

Anyone else want to weigh in on the benefit of 192 kbps VS 128 kbps????

[odims_sphere]

So, I'm staying at MP3 format with constant bit rate selected.

I probably will only be uploading 3000 or 4000 songs, so the memory shouldn't be TOO eaten up.

Anyone else want to weigh in on the benefit of 192 kbps VS 128 kbps????

you'll have a tiny bit crisper High end and the compression will be less noticable.

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

I have also heard that FLAC was a damn good format... if you an find a player

[Der Nister]

My 2 cents - 128kbps.

[Darus313]

FLAC

http://flac.sourceforge.net/

hands down

even recording flac at 128bit sounds way better than mp3 format.

Most new mp3 players / winamp / window media player / etc are becoming flac compatable.

mp3 quality - 128 or 192.... 192 at constant rate..... but if you use vbr... forget about the sound quality is hit and miss..

you will notice sound quality difference when your play music loud on a good sound system...or a good pair of headphones..

D

[the eternal]

I'm surprised to see 128 kbps the winner, but it's good for my computers memory.

I worry about the compatability of FLAC, though

[Darus313]

FLAC should be not a problem....

Try flac now...

and see how affects your settings now on your computer.

D

[the eternal]

You were so helpful last time...

TWO NEW PREMIUM CD BURNING FEATURES

Audio Filters

(If checked) It will make volume equal across all tracks

Transitions

(If checked) It will crossfade tracks into one another by three seconds.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I'm not even 100% sure what crossfading is.

Would you check these two boxes??

Or leave well enough alone

[odims_sphere]

You were so helpful last time...

TWO NEW PREMIUM CD BURNING FEATURES

Audio Filters

(If checked) It will make volume equal across all tracks

Transitions

(If checked) It will crossfade tracks into one another by three seconds.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I'm not even 100% sure what crossfading is.

Would you check these two boxes??

Or leave well enough alone

You may notice "squashing" of the music if there is huge differences in the overall volume of the different tracks.

Crossfading is a preference thing. It'll "mix" one track into the next kinda like you hear at a club from the end of one track going in to the beginning of the next.

If there really isn't any noticeable difference in the loudness of the tracks I wouldn't turn on the filter as it squashes the dynamic range even more than it's already been squashed.

[Darus313]

Leave them alone.......

unless you want all your songs on the cd to mix into other songs...and the same sound level to be equal across the cd.(usually the song level is recorded low)

Go for it...

But my 2 cents uncheck it..

D

[the eternal]

Good to know, thanks!