Peculiar MP3 player issue

[Muse]

I used Windows Media Player to automatically rip a CD to MP3 files. It's Glenn Gould's Complete Goldberg Variations, album title "A State of Wonder: The Complete Goldberg Variations, 1955 & 1981 Disc 2"

The CD plays fine, AFAIK. I can play the MP3s without issue from my computer. However, when I copy the folder to either of my two MP3 players, most of the 32 tracks end with a stark (variable!) very harsh scratchy sounding click! I don't know what to make of this. Sometimes the click is pretty quiet and innocuous, at other times it's quite shockingly loud and offensive.

My MP3 players are:

Sandisk Sansa M250 2GB capacity MP3 player, version 4.x firmware
Nokia 520 Windows 8.1 smartphone, played off of the 64GB microSD card

I thought maybe ripping with added time at the end of the track would help but I don't see an option to do this in Windows Media Player.

Any idea what's up with this?

 

[Muse]

So, to troubleshoot this further I copy the folder to my other MP3 player:

Sandisk Sansa M250, with version 2.x firmware

The other one I have is version 4 firmware and the hardware is such that the firmware versions work with the respective players, I can't put version 2.x firmware on the device that has version 4.x firmware, and vice versa.

Using the version 2.x firmware Sansa M250 I don't get those shocking pulses I hear on the other two devices. Hmm. I heard the tiniest one maybe at the end of one of the variations, that's it and if I weren't paying attention I wouldn't have heard that.

Maybe I should re-rip the CD using another application.

 

[sdifox]

Eac + lame.

 

[Muse]

Eac + lame.

Yo, I'll give that a try and see if it makes a difference. Wonderful CD, would be nice if the MP3 rips would play OK in my players.

 

[sdifox]

Yo, I'll give that a try and see if it makes a difference. Wonderful CD, would be nice if the MP3 rips would play OK in my players.

Sony re-mastered the entire Glenn Gould catalogue in 2015 in a giant boxset.


http://www.amazon.com/Glenn-Gould-C...ywords=sony+glenn+gould+remastered+collection

 

[Muse]

Sony re-mastered the entire Glenn Gould catalogue in 2015 in a giant boxset.


http://www.amazon.com/Glenn-Gould-C...ywords=sony+glenn+gould+remastered+collection

81 CDs! That's very enticing! :thumbsup:

 

[Muse]

Sony re-mastered the entire Glenn Gould catalogue in 2015 in a giant boxset.


http://www.amazon.com/Glenn-Gould-C...ywords=sony+glenn+gould+remastered+collection

Snagged it! Best price I could find is $139.99 at Pop Market (got tip at a forum).

 

[sdifox]

Dp...

 

[sdifox]

Snagged it! Best price I could find is $139.99 at Pop Market (got tip at a forum).

Does your mp3 player handle flac? :awe:

 

[MongGrel]

The Sansa probably does no idea about the other.

I even have a $40 MP3 that will do FLAC and has 8 Gb with a small card, its seems to me he's trying too hard on the MP3.

I'll still not pay many hundreds of dollars for a phone personally these days.

 

[sdifox]

The Sansa probably does no idea about the other.

I even have a $40 MP3 that will do FLAC and has 8 Gb with a small card, its seems to me he's trying too hard on the MP3.

I'll still not pay many hundreds of dollars for a phone personally these days.

Err I got the Lumia 521 for 65, with car charger and a stupid speaker pouch thrown in at new egg a while back. 521 is the T-Mobile version of the 520 with AWS.

 

[Deders]

What settings are you using to encode?

 

[Muse]

Does your mp3 player handle flac? :awe:

I doubt my Sansa M250's handle flac. Maybe the Nokia 520 smartphone, that's the one I use the most anyway. I have to look into that. I really want to get into FLAC. It will allow me to back up my music collection off site. I'm at risk of losing all my recorded music that's not in digital form in case of fire, earthquake, theft, whatever.

What's "Dp..."

 

[Muse]

What settings are you using to encode?

It was the default settings in Windows Media Player, which are minimal fidelity. There's a slider, I can boost it way up there. I think the minimal is probably 128kbps, 44khz sampling rate. That's what I use when I record off of FM, which I do a ton! Oh, and when I record FM it's always constant bitrate, I'm not sure that WMP is doing that, I have to check.

 

[sdifox]

I doubt my Sansa M250's handle flac. Maybe the Nokia 520 smartphone, that's the one I use the most anyway. I have to look into that. I really want to get into FLAC. It will allow me to back up my music collection off site. I'm at risk of losing all my recorded music that's not in digital form in case of fire, earthquake, theft, whatever.

What's "Dp..."

Double post.
Playing flac on phone is a waste of time, thus the :awe:

But archiving on hdd is a different matter.
You can also go with wma lossless.

 

[Muse]

Double post.
Playing flac on phone is a waste of time, thus the :awe:

But archiving on hdd is a different matter.
You can also go with wma lossless.

I looked up today, my M250s support WMA. Lossless WMA? Don't know, I thought that was a compressed format.

I ripped the CD using EAC+ 3.98.2 (IIRC) Lame, took a while to set up EAC, it's a complicated process to install if you aren't used to it, it's been a while.

My version 4 M250 still has problems with the MP3s. The version 2 seems pretty fine indeed. My Nokia 520 has issues. Dunno what's up with this stuff. maybe I can configure EAC to have longer space between the variations would help. Another issue with the version 4 M250 is that some variations play at much different volume. To combat this I ran MP3Gain against them all to equalize the basic levels. That's always worked in the past for me but with this particular M250 it didn't work all the time. It's nutty. No issues playing with computer or version 2 M250.

 

[sdifox]

I looked up today, my M250s support WMA. Lossless WMA? Don't know, I thought that was a compressed format.

I ripped the CD using EAC+ 3.98.2 (IIRC) Lame, took a while to set up EAC, it's a complicated process to install if you aren't used to it, it's been a while.

My version 4 M250 still has problems with the MP3s. The version 2 seems pretty fine indeed. My Nokia 520 has issues. Dunno what's up with this stuff. maybe I can configure EAC to have longer space between the variations would help. Another issue with the version 4 M250 is that some variations play at much different volume. To combat this I ran MP3Gain against them all to equalize the basic levels. That's always worked in the past for me but with this particular M250 it didn't work all the time. It's nutty. No issues playing with computer or version 2 M250.

Flac is lossless, so is the lossless wma variant. They are both compression algorithms. What bitrate are you using? Try 265 cbr.

Are you using the built in memory or microsd card on sensa? Have you tried a different usb cable?

What do you mean space? They are individual tracks right?

 

[Muse]

Flac is lossless, so is the lossless wma variant. They are both compression algorithms. What bitrate are you using? Try 265 cbr.

Are you using the built in memory or microsd card on sensa? Have you tried a different usb cable?

What do you mean space? They are individual tracks right?

The Sansa M250's have no slot, just 2GB internal memory.

By space I just mean having 1/2 second or more silence between tracks. Sometimes the tracks seem to butt up against each other. I'm wondering if this causes the anomalous loud clicks between variations (which are separate MP3s).

The bitrate is 128kbps.

 

[sdifox]

The Sansa M250's have no slot, just 2GB internal memory.

By space I just mean having 1/2 second or more silence between tracks. Sometimes the tracks seem to butt up against each other. I'm wondering if this causes the anomalous loud clicks between variations (which are separate MP3s).

The bitrate is 128kbps.

err, 128 suck anyway you cut it, try 265cbr. they do turn into individual mp3s right?

128 is like 90s MP3.

 

[Muse]

err, 128 suck anyway you cut it, try 265cbr. they do turn into individual mp3s right?

128 is like 90s MP3.

I've never had a quarrel with 128kbps MP3's. I use that to rip FM radio. AFAIK the fidelity of FM radio isn't particularly better than that anyway. My hearing is not so good. Normal to 2-3k and attenuated 50% or so above that. Left ear a lot better than right, but neither is great. I'm just not an audiophile, not these days. Good enough is just that and when I listen to 128 kbps MP3s I don't say to myself, that's not CD quality.

Anyway, yes they do become individual MP3s. It's a goofy problem, I've never noticed anything like it using these players, but I usually listen to 1-3 hour long MP3s, FM radio rips. I work at a college radio station and always listen to my ~3 hour shows recorded to MP3 and I record alot of other shows from our station off my FM receiver, 30 minutes to 3 hours long. The 32 tracks on the CD whose rips are giving me this problem are ~40 seconds to around 5 minutes long. I don't hear it all the time, but not infrequently, and at its worst it pretty much destroys the mood. It's like someone giving you a dope slap.

 

[sdifox]

I've never had a quarrel with 128kbps MP3's. I use that to rip FM radio. AFAIK the fidelity of FM radio isn't particularly better than that anyway. My hearing is not so good. Normal to 2-3k and attenuated 50% or so above that. Left ear a lot better than right, but neither is great. I'm just not an audiophile, not these days. Good enough is just that and when I listen to 128 kbps MP3s I don't say to myself, that's not CD quality.

Anyway, yes they do become individual MP3s. It's a goofy problem, I've never noticed anything like it using these players, but I usually listen to 1-3 hour long MP3s, FM radio rips. I work at a college radio station and always listen to my ~3 hour shows recorded to MP3 and I record alot of other shows from our station off my FM receiver, 30 minutes to 3 hours long. The 32 tracks on the CD whose rips are giving me this problem are ~40 seconds to around 5 minutes long. I don't hear it all the time, but not infrequently, and at its worst it pretty much destroys the mood. It's like someone giving you a dope slap.

128 is fine for fm since the source is lower resolution to start with, not so with CDs.

Have you tried to just play the wave files on the sensa?

 

[sdifox]

I've never had a quarrel with 128kbps MP3's. I use that to rip FM radio. AFAIK the fidelity of FM radio isn't particularly better than that anyway. My hearing is not so good. Normal to 2-3k and attenuated 50% or so above that. Left ear a lot better than right, but neither is great. I'm just not an audiophile, not these days. Good enough is just that and when I listen to 128 kbps MP3s I don't say to myself, that's not CD quality.

Anyway, yes they do become individual MP3s. It's a goofy problem, I've never noticed anything like it using these players, but I usually listen to 1-3 hour long MP3s, FM radio rips. I work at a college radio station and always listen to my ~3 hour shows recorded to MP3 and I record alot of other shows from our station off my FM receiver, 30 minutes to 3 hours long. The 32 tracks on the CD whose rips are giving me this problem are ~40 seconds to around 5 minutes long. I don't hear it all the time, but not infrequently, and at its worst it pretty much destroys the mood. It's like someone giving you a dope slap.

128 is fine for fm since the source is lower resolution to start with, not so with CDs.

Have you tried to just play the wave files on the sensa?
Also you could rip it to cue and bin and that will give you one wave file, you then compress that wave into one mp3 through lame.

 

[Muse]

128 is fine for fm since the source is lower resolution to start with, not so with CDs.

Have you tried to just play the wave files on the sensa?

The sansa M250's don't support WAV. Supports MP3, WMA, secure WMA and Audible audio file formats. I suppose this rules out WAVs.

Edit: At Wikipedia is says

MP3, WMA, WAV, and Audible (.aa) audio file formats.

So maybe will play WAVs. Of course, that's a lot of file space, but I could try and see what happens as an experiment.

A single WAV is an idea, and as said, could be ripped to an MP3, for continuous play of course.

 

[lxskllr]

128k is fine for 2gb, non-expandable player. Anything larger, and there wouldn't be enough room for music. If it were me, I'd get an old Android with expandable storage, and use vlc to play flac or high bitrate vorbis. A phone can be acquired more cheaply than a Rockboxable mp3 player, and it does more on top of playing music.

 

[Deders]

128k is fine for 2gb, non-expandable player. Anything larger, and there wouldn't be enough room for music. If it were me, I'd get an old Android with expandable storage, and use vlc to play flac or high bitrate vorbis. A phone can be acquired more cheaply than a Rockboxable mp3 player, and it does more on top of playing music.

But then you have to balance battery life with everything else you want to use it for. And a decent MP3 player can sound a lot better than a phone, if you have good enough headphones to warrant it.

That being said at 128k my last point would be moot.