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MP3 players: MP3 or WMA ?
MP3 or WMA ?
by rodp - 4/5/05 10:41 AMI just got a new car with an MP3 capable cd deck. I want to burn some cd's to take advantage of this capability. I especially like the fact that I can fit a large number of songs on the cd.
The cd player documentation states that MP3 and WMA files are supported. In order to choose the best format my criteria is that I want the best sound quality and the most songs on a cd.
Any advice as to which format to choose in order to satisfy my criteria?
Thanks in advance for your advice/comments!
- Rod
Overanalysis.
by R. Proffitt
- 4/5/05 11:12 AM
In reply to: MP3 or WMA ? by rodp
My neighbor has such and put 14-15 CDs onto one CDR and can't tell the difference in the car from the originals. He used
1. CDEX (free, painless to use.)
2. CDBurnerXP (free, nearly painless to use.)
Bob
mp3 vs wma
by mp3knol - 2/17/08 7:34 AM In reply to: Overanalysis. by R. Proffitt
MP3 uses a lossy compression algorithm that is designed to greatly reduce the amount of data required to represent audio recordings, yet still sound like faithful reproductions of the original uncompressed audio to most listeners. An ex. http://mp3knol.com digital file created using the mid-range bitrate setting of 128 kbit/s results in a file that is typically about 1/10th the size of the CD file created from the same audio source.
I wondered the same thing
by Jonny K - 4/5/05 12:09 PM In reply to: MP3 or WMA ? by rodpI wondered the exact same thing and I did a lot of research so I could tell which one is better.
What I found was that the WMA are about twice as good as MP3’s. So you could either burn WMA with twice the sound quality or twice as many WMA files.
One thing to keep in mind is that there are different quality settings, and they are called bit rates. The most common is 128kbs for MP3 and 64kbs for WMA.
I use 192kbs for all of my MP3 files. Now you're probably wondering why I went with MP3 instead of WMA? The reason is because my Sony Cd MP3 player won’t play WMA’s.
If you want to get the songs off of your cds (called ripping) I would recommend using Windows media player for WMA's and what the other guy (Bob) recommended for MP3s.
I hope this helps alot,
Jonathan
MP3 or WMA ?
by rodp - 4/5/05 1:56 PM In reply to: I wondered the same thing by Jonny KThanks Jonathan and Bob - very helpful!
- Rod
Actually...
by - 4/5/05 9:35 PM In reply to: I wondered the same thing by Jonny KAbove 128kbps, MP3 is better than WMA, not vice-versa.
MP3 vs. WMA
by chillyxpress - 4/6/05 1:58 AM In reply to: Actually... byNRen2K5 is right. Above 128kb Mp3 is a better quality codec than WMA. I'd say a 96kb WMA is about the same quality as a 128kb Mp3. Anything above 128kb it's best to use Mp3.
MP3 or WMA ?
by rodp - 4/6/05 8:05 AM In reply to: MP3 vs. WMA by chillyxpressThanks for the additional info.
Looks like Microsoft's position that WMA is "better than MP3" is a bit overstated.
- Rod
MP3 may be better sounding @160kb+ but
by JoMer - 4/8/05 2:55 AM In reply to: MP3 or WMA ? by rodpthe file will be much bigger. if you are more concerned with the number of songs you can fit into a CD (or MP3/WMA player) rather than the quality of sound, i would vote for WMA instead of MP3. WMA sounds almost the same as MP3 enoded @128kb. remember that 128kbps is "Near-CD" quality so it should be good enough.
Quality Aside
by benoddo - 4/8/05 10:20 AM In reply to: MP3 may be better sounding @160kb+ but by JoMerMost differences in audio quality become apparent to the listener who uses high-end audio equipment in a quiet, almost studio-like environment. Most people who use portable music players or PC apps of any flavor can't really discern the audio differences between WMA and MP3 @128Mb and other formats.
So quality aside, my preference is MP3, simply for the fact that we don't need Microsoft to set a standard, which will be used to choke every other standard out of existence.
RE: Quality Aside
by Helvidius - 4/12/05 5:04 PM In reply to: Quality Aside by benoddoFor the ABSOLUTE best quality, use WMA Lossless. Your recording will sound EXACTLY like the original--guaranteed. However, 1 CDR will only be able to hold about 2 albums AND, some players that can play wma's cannot play wma lossless. My DVD player plays everything--it is even DivX certified, but it will not play lossless wmas. I think it doesn't like the variable bitrate. It can handle wma up to 192kbps without any problem, and mp3s up to 320kbps. It will play an mp3 variable bitrate, but not a wma variable.
My 2¢ worth.
WMA vs MP3
by BeachBum6 - 4/8/05 10:22 AM In reply to: MP3 may be better sounding @160kb+ but by JoMerGood point.
If you intend to rip all your CDs, go all digital, and rid yourself of the whole CD thing, at some point you need to make a bit rate decision. When MP3 was the only choice, 128 being slightly above CD quality, was the compromise bit rate most folks finally went with; I did. So, having made the decision that 128 for MP3 is what you would go with if there were only MP3, lets move on NOW with our decision on which wins our favor… MP3 or WMA.
WMA only needs 96 bit rate for comparable sound quality of a 128 bit MP3. So, based on this fact, if you choose to go with WMA 96 for all your files, you will save around half the disk space compared to the MP3 files at 128 that you would need to have comparable quality.
In this case, WMA wins hands down. Of course there are 49 dozen other scenarios that may tilt the decision to either side.
Re: WMA vs MP3
by - 4/9/05 4:23 AM In reply to: WMA vs MP3 by BeachBum6You're wrong on a couple of critical points there, BeachBum.
1) Bitrate is not measured in bits, but in kilobits per second (a kilobit here is 1000 bits rather than the usual 1024).
2) 96kbps is not half of 128kbps, it's ¾.
I could also argue that WMA @ 96kbps is not as good as MP3 @ 128kbps, let alone better... but that's not entirely objective.
Actually
by druter - 9/3/06 9:24 AM In reply to: Re: WMA vs MP3 byWMA 96 is equal to mp3 at 128 in sound quality, and is smaller in file size. WMA at 192 sounds as good as MP3 at 256. In ever test I have done wma has outpreformed mp3 the one advantage mp3 has is it's universal. but really above encoding rates of 192 it's damn hard to tell the difference (sometimes I have to watch the spectrum analyser to see the range of freq being reproduced) so mp3 and wma are pretty much the same (and for all those people who scream DRM, you dont have to encode with drm use the winamp encoder nstead of WMP). Plus with the huge hard drives hsipping with most computers space (except if you go lossless like FLAC or WMA lossless) isnt really an issue.
mp3
by Dennis Reed - 4/8/05 6:24 PM In reply to: I wondered the same thing by Jonny KEverybody will probably say I'm crazy but I usually encode my CDs at 64kbps. Even though it says FM quality it sounds as good as the CD. I think on one CD I have around 24 hours of music. With the price of CDs so cheap and the time for burning a CD so short, it might be good to experiment to see what your own ears hear.
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