Vorbis - Jan 2001 - Question on the nature of b3/b4 changes

I have a number of .ogg files encoded with b2, and some with b3. Is the
psychoacoustic model in the forthcoming b4 significantly improved over these
builds, such that re-encoding these files would give me either noticeably
better sound, or smaller files? Also, just out of curiousity, will
b4-encoded files be playable with older WinAmp plugins?

Incidentally, I did some tests with b2 a while back in which I encoded the
same file (a digitally-extracted track from a well-mastered CD) in all of
oggenc's modes, and also in MP3 at a variety of bit rates. I was quite
impressed with Vorbis's ability to retain audio quality. The difference
between oggenc modes 2 and 6 was much more subtle than the difference
between, say, MP3 encodings at 192 and 128 kb/sec. (So much for the myth
that 128k MP3 is "CD quality"...)

Thanks,

Craig


__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Talk to your friends online with Yahoo! Messenger.
http://im.yahoo.com

--- >8 ----
List archives:  http://www.xiph.org/archives/
Ogg project homepage: http://www.xiph.org/ogg/
To unsubscribe from this list, send a message to
'vorbis-request@xiph.org'
containing only the word 'unsubscribe' in the body.  No subject is
needed.
Unsubscribe messages sent to the list will be ignored/filtered.

"Craig Dickson" <crdic@yahoo.com> wrote:
> I have a number of .ogg files encoded with b2, and some with b3. Is the
> psychoacoustic model in the forthcoming b4 significantly improved over
> these builds, such that re-encoding these files would give me either
> noticeably better sound, or smaller files?
Monty said that b4 should be pretty improved over b3 and b2, but
exactly how much that is - we will just have to wait for the b4 release
and test ourselves. Also if you are currently happy with how your
b2 & b3 ogg files sound now, hold on and re-encode them when the
official 1.0 version comes out, that's my advice. (I hope that you are
not thinking of decoding b2 and b3 ogg files and then re-encoding
them with b4 because you will only lose quality.)
> Also, just out of curiousity, will
> b4-encoded files be playable with older WinAmp plugins?
I don't think so. But that doesn't mean that the compatibility has been
broken, it's just that older decoders do not support some new features
introduced in newer versions (like joint-stereo).

Greetings,
Aleksandar

--- >8 ----
List archives:  http://www.xiph.org/archives/
Ogg project homepage: http://www.xiph.org/ogg/
To unsubscribe from this list, send a message to
'vorbis-request@xiph.org'
containing only the word 'unsubscribe' in the body.  No subject is
needed.
Unsubscribe messages sent to the list will be ignored/filtered.