Best Bit Rate to Rip or Encode CDs or DVDs

According to Tech Guy Labs….

“Apple’s AAC is better than MP3, [but comes down to personal preference.]

Start at 128kbps. But go at least 160kbps, even with AAC. Makes a significant difference, but only takes up 25% more space. Patrick Norton [of Revision3] says that 320kbps is the max you can encode and hear a difference, . Leo says you can’t really hear any difference above 192. But Leo is older than Patrick.

Use Variable Bit Rate encoding (VBR) will waste less space and is an option in iTunes.”

Best Bit Rate for Ripping/Encoding CDs or DVDs

According to Tech Guy Labs….

“Apple’s AAC is better than MP3, [but comes down to personal preference.]

Start at 128kbps. But go at least 160kbps, even with AAC. Makes a significant difference, but only takes up 25% more space. Patrick Norton [of Revision3] says that 320kbps is the max you can encode and hear a difference, . Leo says you can’t really hear any difference above 192. But Leo is older than Patrick.

Use Variable Bit Rate encoding (VBR) will waste less space and is an option in iTunes.

MP3Pro

MP3Pro is the successor to MP3. It was created by Thompson RCA. The problem is the format isn’t universal. So you have to be sure your player can recognize it and play it. The Zen can play it. The format is higher quality then MP3 at better bitrate. Since the format isn’t universally used, you may end up needing to re-encode the files to have them work in the future.

According to Wikipedia, “mp3PRO is an audio compression algorithm (or codec) that combines the MP3 audio format with spectral band replication compression methods. It claims to achieve transparency at lower bitrates than MP3, resulting in a file nearly half the size of standard MP3. RCA was the only company to offer portable players compatible with mp3PRO, but they have dropped support for the format.”

For now, stick with MP3 and encode it at 160KB VBR or more. MP3 is the format that will be around for years to come. There are other formats you can encode the audio files in, such as FLAK or other lossless formats. It comes down to personal preference of how the audio sounds to you, and which players you prefer to listen on.

Lossless MP3s and which digital music players support them

The short answer is that MP3’s are inherently lossy even at higher bit rates. You’ll need to migrate over to Apple’s AAC lossless, WMA lossless, FLAC, or APE to reproduce music in a lossless format. To that the the players would be Apple’s iPod for AAC, MS’s Zune for WMA and Cowon’s iAUDIOX5 for FLAC.

Source: http://revision3.com/tekzilla/

Convert mp3 to aac

1.      Open iTunes, select Preferences and click on Importing.

2.      Change the Import using drop down menu to AAC encoder. Select the bit rate you fancy, have it as high as the highest bitrate MP3 file you want to convert so you a losing as little quality as possible.

3. Then in your iTunes Library window select the tracks you want to convert, press Apple+A or Control+A on your keyboard to select all or click the iTunes Kind column header to sort by type.

4.When you have them selected press the Advanced menu, choose Convert Selection to AAC and, well, that’s it. Ta Da.This won’t delete your MP3 files, you will get AAC files alongside your existing MP3 files. Later, if you are happy, you can delete your MP3 files and save some diskspace.

5. If you want to remove all your MP3s after converting to AAC:

6.Firstly make sure you really want to do this, it will save space on your hard disk but personally I would reccomend that you burn all your MP3s to CD/DVD before deleting them.

7. Open iTunes, select Library

8.      Right click on a column name (Bit Rate or Name for example)

9.  Make sure Kind is ticked as this shows you the file types

10.  Click on the Kind column title to sort the file types

11.  Left click your first MP3, hold down shift, left click the last MP3 in the list

12.  Press deletesource: creationrobot.com

Convert WMA to MP3

A free program called dbpowerAMP Music Converter, lets you take one audio format and convert it to another. If you want to convert a protected file (from the new Napster, for example), you’re going to have to burn a CD and then rip the tracks to MP3.