Is there any reason not to use VBR with MP3's?

[piku]

I was just about to get started going through and making all my CD's MP3's for college, when I wondered if I should switch to VBR. Right now I have a few CD's copies at 320, but that has to be rather wasteful with space. I don't need the greatest quality ever (since the speakers i'll have aren't super impressive), so is there any reason for me not to use VBR?

 

[DaveSimmons]

VBR is not quite as standardized as CBR, so some encoder's VBR won't work in all players. If you think you might be buying a portable player you might find it can't handle the files, for example my brother's Rio CD player can't handle the "joint stereo" flavor of VBR.

There might be an AT FAQ on safe use of VBR, and there's also www.hydrogenaudio.org

 

[hoihtah]

Originally posted by: DaveSimmons
VBR is not quite as standardized as CBR, so some encoder's VBR won't work in all players. If you think you might be buying a portable player you might find it can't handle the files, for example my brother's Rio CD player can't handle the "joint stereo" flavor of VBR.

There might be an AT FAQ on safe use of VBR, and there's also www.hydrogenaudio.org

you sure there's no rio cd firmware that'll allow vbr mp3s?

 

[abaez]

you shouldn't be using joint stereo anyway

 

[PliotronX]

Originally posted by: abaez
you shouldn't be using joint stereo anyway

Incorrect

Piku, using LAME with the --alt-preset switches can be very flexible. For example, say you have a portable MP3 player that can't play 320Kbps frames. This would make tracks skip or not even play at all if you use VBR files that don't have a bitrate ceiling below 320Kbps. It can be alleviated by using an --alt-preset switch with -B 256 (the B is case sensitive, -b specifies a minimum bitrate which I believe is 128Kbps by default in the --alt-preset VBR switches). For the best space/quality ratio, use --alt-preset standard. I wouldn't worry about VBR incompatibilities because most, if not all modern MP3 players can handle VBR files. But if you happen to have a finicky player, I suggest using --alt-preset cbr 192 or 256 if you can handle the added space requirements. If you don't care much about quality, 192 should be just fine. Good luck.

 

[randypj]

Whoa....looks like I've got a whole lot more readin' to do.

Thanks.
--Randy

 

[mk]

Originally posted by: randypj
Whoa....looks like I've got a whole lot more readin' to do.

Yes, Hydrogen Audio is the best resource of information on psychacoustic audio compression.

 

[randypj]

Concerning the VBR vs. CBR......

I had planned on just doing CBR @ 256, then, I just read a letter in Maximum PC July, in which a guy mentioned that even @ 256 CBR you might be getting less than optimum encoding on a few passages, that 192 VBR might take up to 320.

Is true?

Heck, I dunno if I even splained it good. Oh, well.....made sense at the time.
--Randy

 

[mk]

Originally posted by: randypj
Is true?

Yes. It's true.