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High-quality MP3s not comparable to CD WAVs ??

Hi,
Though I have read a numerous articles stating that
high-quality MP3s were "indistinguishable" from CDs,
I have been unable to create such an MP3 from a ripped WAV
(I can EASILY tell the difference).
So I am wondering if I'm doing something wrong.
I'm using LAME with the highest-quality settings
("lame -q 0 -m s --cbr -b 320 {wav} {mp3}"),
and I have also tried a few other popular encoders.
Any thoughts/suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Mark
captainbeyond
witchdoctor
4 posts
 
I believe you are all leaving out the most important link in the chain. The MP3 files must go through a sound card.
I have had excellent results using the digital out on the M-Audio soundcard to a GW Labs Upsampler then to a modded
ART Di/O DAC.
If you play music straight from the soundcard you will probably not get CDP sound.
weisera
4 posts
 
I agree,MP3s don't even rival LPs and Cds but I'd have to say that they are better than "crap" like some say. Maybe if you try ripping directly from Cds rather than converting waves you'll have better results - thats what I do. You can download a free demo of the program to see if its anygood at

http://www.mp3-ripper.net/download.htm
cwlondon
1,210 posts
 
Sailor and others

I have beating my head against a wall since Xmas, trying to get my Apple iPod to navigate wav files. Despite the claims that all the iPOd hardware and software "supports" WAV files, they lack the MP-3 codes which is what makes the iPod special and worth the premium price in the first place.

All I wanted to do was have 30 uncompressed CDs for running and working out, but it really doesnt work.

I am using exact audio copy and LAME as well, achieving only mediocre sound with MP-3.

If anyone has any suggestions for achieveing decent MP-3 quality or getting an iPod to navigate WAV files, I too would love to hear your ideas.
fchurtic
25 posts
 
The answer to all these quality issues is to find a lossless compression method as Matt8268 correctly pointed out. I did not know Windows Media Player 9 includes this feature. Matt 8268, what type of encoding speeds are you getting?

CWlondon, I experienced exactly the same with IPOD, but I got the tags working...
willmeyer
2 posts
 
As far as a lossless solution to this problem... The format you want is FLAC. http://flac.sourceforge.net. Hardware is starting to support this natively now, and software tools have been around for a while.

I'm going to start being the FLAC evangelist around here, there are so many advantages to using a computer-based interface to access your music, and with a lossless scheme and the right ripper/soundcard/dac you can do no wrong.
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