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mislabeledstar

macrumors regular
Original poster
May 12, 2003
140
0
Los Angeles
does anyone know a good site that explains the differences between these two formats. all i know is aac is a better compression and saves it to a smaller size, but i'd like to understand a lil more and kind of see a comparison. thanks
 
thanks for the info......

another question for anyone who's been encoding in aac....

i've read that 128 is near cd quality, so is there much of a boost in goin up the next level which is 160 or even goin up to 192?
 
personnaly i can t make a difference anymore between 128 and 160 kbit aac files.
thought perhaps there is a user on the boads who has got a tool to examine the tracks, and show the delta (difference) to see, if there is a big difference or not.
 
thanks, thats kinda what i felt after listening to the two

i figured that if 128 is "near cd quality", how much closer could it really get.
 
What I use

I use 160 kbit AAC encoding. It sounds a little better (when you listen to it on a quality sytem). Here is how I have it set up...
 

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i prefer the 128 bit because of size.
i am in the process of putting a huge collection of cds on my comp, which will then go on my ipod (when i get it). if i were to use 160 i would not have enough space.
i happily find no negative aspects in the quality.
 
i find nothing wrong listening to the 128's on my pod and through my mediocre computer speakers, so that's what i use. i "only" have 5gb on my pod, and can use all the space i can get... if going to 128 aac gets me a gig or so, i'd be thrilled..
 
i went with 160kbs aac because i noticed a slight difference in quality and the file size increase was not that much. i use to strictly use 192kbs mp3. i have cambridge soundworks speakers connected to my imac and i use my ipod through my car speakers and feel that the 160 is a perfect sound quality, 128 is good too and honestly the only time i can tell the difference is when i sit and really think about it. as far as quality, i felt that anything higher then 160 aac would be just using up space on my drive, i would have 100 albums at good quality to excellent rather then 50 at excellent to superb... if i want cd sound then i play my cds on my sound system.
 
Since I'd previously been importing all my cds as 160kbs mp3s, 128kbs aacs are awesome. My 1440 song, 3.6 day collection of music shrunk more that a gig. I saved an average of 10 megs per cd. More than worth the hassle of reimporting. I haven't detected any loss in quality.
 
Personally...

I can tell the difference between a 128 kbps and 320 kbps AAC file without problem, but I'm a bit obsessive over sound quality. While for most people 128 kbps AAC files will be okay, I would never rip below 320, and will never rip mp3's again.
 
AAC encoding on 128kps is going to save you a lot of disk space if you have encoded any higher.
AAC 128kps is no smaller than an ordinary MP3 128kps track (if they are the same) it just has a better encoder which can encode lower without comprimising sound quality.
 
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