Poll: What's the best low-bitrate audio codec?

[yukichigai]

I've been doing some stuff with the Matroska file wrapper. So far I'm rather happy with it, especially the audio codec support. For commentary tracks and the like you don't need a lot of quality, at least in 1-CD encodes, so I've been looking to find an efficient low-bitrate codec to use for commentary tracks. Unfortunately I've never really been up-and-up on ultra-low-bitrate stuff, so I have almost no clue. Right now I've been using RealMedia, but I'm wondering if there's something better out there. (EDITx2: I'm using RealMedia for the commentary tracks, not main audio. I use 4.0~5.0 quality Ogg Vorbis for main audio)

While Matroska supports a number of codecs, it doesn't have a ton. However, the specifications are still being designed; if you can think of one that's just amazing there's still time to add it in.

EDIT: If it's not on the poll, it's not supported by Matroska at the moment, or it's not a low-bitrate codec. (e.g. FLAC, WAV-PCM)

 

[yukichigai]

Bump for the morning crew.

 

[Bateluer]

I'd probably say Vorbis. Even though I usually encode at 320-350, those 350bit songs are about the same size as a 192bit mp3.

 

[AnyMal]

where's WMA in the poll? WMA is the best size/quality codec of them all.

 

[yukichigai]

Originally posted by: AnyMal
where's WMA in the poll? WMA is the best size/quality codec of them all.

As far as I know, WMA isn't supported by Matroska. But that could change. Like I said, it's in development.

Bateluer: That being said, do you know how to get the bitrates down to where I want them? At .001 quality the average bitrate is 64.2kbps.

 

[BW86]

vorbis

 

[torpid]

If WMA is not supported, then I guess AAC. OGG takes up a lot more cpu time, last i checked.