Foobar is the superior audio player.

[Implode]

Foobar already rips losslessly, I want to burn losslessly. Does that program do that?

If you must convert to mp3, be sure that you convert it to no less than 320 kbps.

I prefer to use to VBR0 setting. It's much more efficient.

[XJDenton]

I use V2 because I cant hear the difference between it and V0, and I prefer to save space.

[JayOctavarium]

I used WMP till i got my ipod... then switched to iTunes...

a few months ago, tried winamp. didnt like it. Next time i feel adventurous, or when I get a desktop (i hate listening to music on my laptop... the speakers suck monkey nuts) I will try foobar

[Martinman300]

I am on an audio engineering course at uni, and we did a load of blind tests and no one can tell the difference between an uncompressed wav and a 190kbps mp3.

[Jamesman42]

I am on an audio engineering course at uni, and we did a load of blind tests and no one can tell the difference between an uncompressed wav and a 190kbps mp3.

I dunno, I can hear a bit of difference between 192 and 320. Do you think it's a mental thing?

[dongringo]

I am on an audio engineering course at uni, and we did a load of blind tests and no one can tell the difference between an uncompressed wav and a 190kbps mp3.

What was your source?

[Implode]

I am on an audio engineering course at uni, and we did a load of blind tests and no one can tell the difference between an uncompressed wav and a 190kbps mp3.

What was your source?

Yeah. It depends on what you played the music through. If it's a small mp3 player, it doesn't have the processor to make a difference anyway.

[Calvin6s]

Long time foobar user, so I'll post this in this thread.

I need to do some serious clean up on my song tags (mp3, FLAC, etc).  Foobar is easy to edit the tags, but if you see one song mislabeled, you have to highlight it, Alt+Enter, tab to the field, change it, click ok.  That's fine for minor tag clean up, but kind of tedious if you want to start customizing genres, etc.

I'm not really looking for auto tagging (although my foobar seems to have been messed up as it now finds no tags automatically).  Anybody know of a great song tagging program.  The ultimate to me is working in a spreadsheet type format.  Sort by row, copy one field (like Artist Name) and paste one time in many other fields (to standardize the artist name variations).  And most importantly, it actually saves it in the file so it will show up if you reinstall or just change audio players without having to start from scratch.

Also, including a 1 to 5 star rating in the tag for playlist generation would be nice.  Kind of like Windows Media Player.

I'll be looking on the web and trying programs myself, but any help for those that have already gone through this process would be much appreciated.  Especially when trying out things at random can sometimes cause more harm than good.

Thanks.

[dparrott]

Mp3tag is a good tag editor.

[Calvin6s]

Mp3tag is a good tag editor.

Thanks for the recommendation.  I'll mess around with that first.

[JayOctavarium]

Oh god... this thread again.

[ishak540m]

Breakaway is the best.

[carl320]

I edit my tags in Winamp

[JayOctavarium]

Breakaway is the best.

I love Kelly Clarkson!

[rumborak]

I am on an audio engineering course at uni, and we did a load of blind tests and no one can tell the difference between an uncompressed wav and a 190kbps mp3.

The key part is "blind". 99% of people claiming they can distinguish the two know upfront which is which. When doing a blind test they usually fail like everybody else.

[hefdaddy42]

I edit my tags in Winamp

I thought I was the only one

[Sacul]

I am on an audio engineering course at uni, and we did a load of blind tests and no one can tell the difference between an uncompressed wav and a 190kbps mp3.

The key part is "blind". 99% of people claiming they can distinguish the two know upfront which is which. When doing a blind test they usually fail like everybody else.

I think you can tell the difference if you're using high-end headphones and an audiophile player. But otherwise, it's almost impossible - the differences are too subtle.

[Prog Snob]

As a Linux user,  I use Banshee.   It's just as good as Media Monkey, Music Bee, and Foobar.  I edit my tags in the program too because I'm OCD like that. 

[Calvin6s]

mp3tag works well so far.

The only problem I've encountered is getting used to hitting "save" after an edit.  But I don't think I'd change that feature because I have screwed up a whole album by editing the year and accidentally changing something else like track names and wishing I could just undo it.  So the save feature takes getting used to, but is worth being there.

How do you guys deal with separating studio "all" lists from live, demo, etc songs?  My favorite thing to do is just to have the entire library play on random.  I take to long trying to decide on what I want to listen to otherwise.  And it also reminds me of songs I haven't heard in forever when they just pop up.

But the massive DT bootlegs, demos and other less than quality sounding recordings coming up ruins the flow.  And there are more misc. songs than studio songs for DT, so odds of hearing a studio DT track drop.

I've been toying with the idea of taking the non-studio tracks out of my library folder so they aren't automatically added, but that also means I have to manually add them to listen to them when in the mood.  So putting them in a folder outside the Music folder and just making a manual playlist out of them that I have to remember to update since it won't be on auto update separately?  How do you guys handle that?

 

[jammindude]

I am on an audio engineering course at uni, and we did a load of blind tests and no one can tell the difference between an uncompressed wav and a 190kbps mp3.

The key part is "blind". 99% of people claiming they can distinguish the two know upfront which is which. When doing a blind test they usually fail like everybody else.

I've played both from a disc in my car, and I've noticed that at normal volume, I can't tell the difference.     But if I crank it...the weakness of the MP3 becomes quite noticable.    There is a definite distortion at higher volume with MP3 that isn't distinguishable on WAV.     To me, anyway.

[Implode]

The difference between say 190kbps and 1440kbps is obvious. But I'm not sure how successful I'd be in a blind test between 1440kbps and 2000kbps+.

[Calvin6s]

You hear the mp3 compression in the cymbals and harmonics.

Now if you were to play me two totally different songs one FLAC and one low rate mp3, you don't know if the compression happened with the mp3 or at during the recording process (see loudness war debates).  But if you took a master tape v. master tape compressed with mp3, you could most likely hear the difference, especially as you turn up the volume.

[Calvin6s]

So I've really been taking about 30 min a day and fixing all the tags (thanks for mp3tag - helps).

So I'm cleaning up the Genre tags because it is cool to be able to random play all your Electronic Music (Dubstep, Synth heavy, etc) when you are in the mood.

Trying to keep the Genres somewhat generic and under 30 so they don't lose meaning or have massive crossover.  Metal/Rock is the hardest.  I kind of think of it in waves such as:
Classic Rock (Zep, etc) > Glam Rock (80s) > Metal (Thrash) > Alt Rock (Seattle influence which is varied) > Nu Metal
on a separate branch
Prog Rock (Genesis) > Prog Metal (Dream Theater)

Nu Metal started around late 90s and covers a lot of ground.  After that, I'm having a hard time coming up with a generalized classification for metal from about 2005 to today that covers a lot of ground but at the same time doesn't fall into the other genres.  Anybody come up with a classification for that yet?  I'm thinking "Modern Metal" with the idea it will be changed when a more proper term is coined to envelope the current metal era.

Second, I asked early about what you guys have done so you don't hear crappy quality demos or live bootlegs mixed in with studio albums in the middle of random play.  I've been thinking about using Live and Demo in the genre field.  Of course I lose the difference between a live metal and live jazz album, but most of my live and demo stuff is for my all time favorite bands only.  Anybody doing this?  Any other downside I'm not considering?