MP3 codec retired, licensing program ends

[TooNice]

I have encoded CD tracks in both hi data rate mp3 and FLAC and while I can convince myself that I can hear a difference in a quiet room, that may be confirmation bias!

There is an easy way to test that. Foobar (and probably other programs) allows you to conduct a double blind test with two files of your choosing. Pick a song that you like and knows really well and don't mind listening (parts of it), many, many times, and see if you can reliably tell them apart using your best setup. Do take rests if you want to go for a long streak as there is a fair chance that even if you can hear the difference, it will be so subtle that you will have to really, really concentrate on it.

To tell the truth, I a modern PC can transcode a huge collection of FLAC to a lossy format super fast nowadays (I also like to see all my core/thread get a good workout) so while a minute space saving is negligeable, so is the cost of doing a transcode to a more efficient format. As I said earlier, I am more concerned with the impact on battery life those more space efficient format might have. There are more efficient than FLAC when it comes to lossless, but last time I checked, they are far more demanding when it comes to decoding, so I wonder about those more efficient lossy format too (while not always the case, I tend to associate better compression with more expensive decoding).

[ik9000]

The beauty of FLAC is in the future when there's another shift from MP3 / AAC to something better I can transcode to lossy again without having to insert every flipping CD all over again.

[Dashers]

I can't tell the difference between FLAC and high bit-rate MP3 - BUT as I said in my other post, I couldn't tell the difference between CD and 56kbps 22KHz MP3s either at one point.

The limiting factor when getting to high bit-rates is going to be the audio equipment and the acoustics of your room.

If you can tell a difference in a blind test then you really ought to go with the better quality. Don't pay attention to what people on £10 earphones on their tablet can tell between.

[outwar6010]

I've never had a problem playing aacs on anything.....

[Ttaskmaster]

This isn't going to kill mp3 at all, and I'd suggest for portable devices it is fine - few people would notice the difference between an mp3 and an uncompressed format listening on a pair of earbuds on a noisy train.

^ This, pretty much.
Too many portable players and car stereos (I'm just looking at getting one such) geared around MP3, as well as so many albums and tracks only offered in that format - No sane person would sit there converting all their music files... and if they tried, they'd probably not be sane by the end of it!!

[maxp779]

Makes sense to use other, more efficient codecs. Saying that 99% of my music and what I download from bandcamp is mp3 320. Is ACC as universal and as well supported on devices?

Its the stupidest thing in the world actually.

MP3 is now a free and open codec and still works as well as it always has, the others like AAC are still patent encumbered. They want people to move to them so they can continue to charge licensing fees which they cannot do anymore for MP3

[peterb]

Its the stupidest thing in the world actually.

What is?

MP3 is now a free and open codec and still works as well as it always has, the others like AAC are still patent encumbered. They want people to move to them so they can continue to charge licensing fees which they cannot do anymore for MP3

Fraunhofer IIS aren't the patent holder for the other codecs, so they won't make any money from the Intellectual effort developing other encoders.

But encoders for wav, FLAC and Ogg Vobis are freely available under GPL licence conditions.

[TooNice]

No sane person would sit there converting all their music files... and if they tried, they'd probably not be sane by the end of it!!

Ripping my entire CD collection with EAC (accurate but slow) into FLAC while making sure everything was tagged properly was admittedly rather damaging to my sanity.

But transcoding said monstrous FLAC collection into MP3 so that I can fit everything into a microSD card or portable player was just a matter of selecting the collection, select transcode, pick a an encoder (e,g. LAME), select a preset, run it, grab some lunch and it would be done by the time you get back. Seriously, I was surprised how quickly the thing was done on a now pretty dated Sandy Bridge mobile processor. That's to say that if there is a new codec that is definitely better than LAME in every possible way and compatible with my mobile player, it wouldn't take much effort for me to replace my existing MP3 collection. Even if it took much longer to encode, I could just leave it running overnight.

(Though of course, if the album was originally acquired in MP3 format then you wouldn't bother to transcode it again as you would only further degrade it unless you go lossless, in which case you'd end up with the exact same thing but with a much bigger file)

[ik9000]

(Though of course, if the album was originally acquired in MP3 format then you wouldn't bother to transcode it again as you would only further degrade it unless you go lossless, in which case you'd end up with the exact same thing but with a much bigger file)

which is why I prefer to buy CD and rip to FLAC and MP3/AAC (depending on the device). I get the benefit of the CD for my hifi, and the compressed file for my phone/ipod, and I'm not stuck with an obsolete format, quality or whatever if tech moves on.

[maxp779]

What is?

Switching to another codec simply because the licence expired on mp3.

Fraunhofer IIS aren't the patent holder for the other codecs, so they won't make any money from the Intellectual effort developing other encoders.

But encoders for wav, FLAC and Ogg Vobis are freely available under GPL licence conditions.

Fair enough but none of the other formats are as widespread or have the support that mp3 does. And its now licence free.

[peterb]

Switching to another codec simply because the licence expired on mp3.

Thank you, it wasn't clear from your post.

Fair enough but none of the other formats are as widespread or have the support that mp3 does. And its now licence free.

I agree, the fact that the license has expired doesn't mean the format won't be supported, or that it isn't fit for purpose - as you say, being licence free is likely to increase its useage.

However, that doesn't alter the fact that other, better, codecs have been developed since MP3 was designed.

[geogan]

I recently had to re-rip all my hundreds of CDs collection and it was a very slow and painful operation - especially the tagging and cover adding process. But for some reason I actually just used 256kbps MP3 format to do it again. Thinking about it now I really should have used a lossless, but I was only thinking of being compatible with my iPhone and the Pioneer car system which connect to play the iTunes library. And those MP3s alone are still 46Gb so I'd imagine the space for say FLAC would be much more and then the space for the MP3 transcodes on top of this.