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Topic: Two different encoders showing very different file sizes. (Read 5966 times) previous topic - next topic
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Two different encoders showing very different file sizes.

Hi.

I ripped my entire FLAC library in Ubuntu using Sound Converter at the highest setting.  So I have just installed Windows 7 onto my machine again because I wanted to root a few phones with Odin and I thought I would try Dbpoweramp to see what sort of AAC files I would get with the FDK converter.

Here is the info for both files.



The one on the left is Ubuntu Sound Converter and the right one is Dbpoweramp.

Now the Sound Converter file is a lot smaller and it says the bit-rate is much higher.  Is this a bug with Sound Converter i.e. possibly showing the wrong value?

I also noticed that the compression ratio is a lot higher with Sound Converter.

I've been using these AAC files on a Nexus S with an old single core cpu.  Could these high compression files have an impact on battery life or playback performance? 

The reason I ask it because I was trialing Neutron player and Poweramp player on my Nexus S and I was getting hard lockups when I was playing music and I had to pull the battery.

My final aim for all this is I want to use turn Galaxy S into a DAP because is uses the same Nexus S Wolfson DAC and has a SD Card slot (something which the Nexus S doesn't have). I also want to buy Neutron Player to use on the Galaxy S and would rather not have any lockups when using it.

So what ripper should I go with for the Galaxy S?

Cheers

Two different encoders showing very different file sizes.

Reply #1 –
Quote from: UK_DUDE on
Now the Sound Converter file is a lot smaller and it says the bit-rate is much higher.  Is this a bug with Sound Converter i.e. possibly showing the wrong value?

More like, a bug within dbpoweramp? Since that's what you're using to display the info.

Quote
I also noticed that the compression ratio is a lot higher with Sound Converter.

Which probably means it used a lower bitrate.

Quote
I've been using these AAC files on a Nexus S with an old single core cpu.  Could these high compression files have an impact on battery life or playback performance?

I doubt it. The way lossy codecs "compress" is by throwing away data you supposedly can't hear anyway. So unlike lossless codecs, higher "compression" doesn't affect performance.
The choice of the codec is important nonetheless. For example, if your SoC has a hardware decoder for a codec, it will probably result in lower energy consumption.

Different formats also have different complexities, but you'd have to compare them to be sure there is any impact at all. For example, I've tested various formats on a Sansa Clip+ running rockbox, and Musepak performed considerably better than other formats (click). A very rough estimate would be to get some CPU monitoring app and see how much % of CPU each format uses.

Quote
The reason I ask it because I was trialing Neutron player and Poweramp player on my Nexus S and I was getting hard lockups when I was playing music and I had to pull the battery.

That sounds like hardware/RAM problem. I'm sometimes getting hard lockups when using too much RAM. I can't imagine a codec causing that.

Quote
So what ripper should I go with for the Galaxy S?

Personally, I'm using Sony's Walkman app and vorbis on my old Xperia Arc. I'd use opus, but it's currently only supported within .mka and tags are a problem, apparently.

Two different encoders showing very different file sizes.

Reply #2 –
Quote from: UK_DUDE on
Hi.

I ripped my entire FLAC library in Ubuntu using Sound Converter at the highest setting.  So I have just installed Windows 7 onto my machine again because I wanted to root a few phones with Odin and I thought I would try Dbpoweramp to see what sort of AAC files I would get with the FDK converter.


Sound Converter is a frontend that uses GStreamer Plugins under the hood, which means your AAC files are most likely encoded with the FAAC encoder -- widely regarded as one of the worst available - frequently sounding worse than MP3 in listening tests that can be found on this forum.

If you wish to encode AAC files with Linux, the best method at present is to use the FDK-AAC encoder... useful / helpful info / links can be found in this HA thread..

At least then you'll be comparing FDK-AAC files created on Linux with FDK-AAC files created on Windows. I wouldn't necessarily expect them to be identical, but at least the quality and size should be similar.

Two different encoders showing very different file sizes.

Reply #3 –
For m4a dBpoweramp reads the bitrate from the header, a program can put what it likes in there.

Going off the filesize, the one on the left is around 145kbps, dBpoweramp encoded one is shown correctly.

Two different encoders showing very different file sizes.

Reply #4 –
Quote from: lozenge on
Quote from: UK_DUDE on
Hi.

I ripped my entire FLAC library in Ubuntu using Sound Converter at the highest setting.  So I have just installed Windows 7 onto my machine again because I wanted to root a few phones with Odin and I thought I would try Dbpoweramp to see what sort of AAC files I would get with the FDK converter.


Sound Converter is a frontend that uses GStreamer Plugins under the hood, which means your AAC files are most likely encoded with the FAAC encoder -- widely regarded as one of the worst available - frequently sounding worse than MP3 in listening tests that can be found on this forum.

If you wish to encode AAC files with Linux, the best method at present is to use the FDK-AAC encoder... useful / helpful info / links can be found in this HA thread..

At least then you'll be comparing FDK-AAC files created on Linux with FDK-AAC files created on Windows. I wouldn't necessarily expect them to be identical, but at least the quality and size should be similar.


That's interesting and what I wanted to know.  So while I have Windows running I am going to re-rip my library using FDK and dbpoweramp.  For a DAP do you think 400kbps (CBR) is excessive or should I use VBR instead?

Cheers.

Two different encoders showing very different file sizes.

Reply #5 –
Use VBR, and 400kbps is amazing overkill.

I just got done transcoding my library to 96kbps Opus for my phone.

Two different encoders showing very different file sizes.

Reply #6 –
Quote from: UK_DUDE on
So while I have Windows running I am going to re-rip my library using FDK and dbpoweramp.  For a DAP do you think 400kbps (CBR) is excessive or should I use VBR instead?

Cheers.
Is there any particular reason why you want to stick with aac? As yourlord said, there are more efficient options available. 400kbps is usually overkill for anything.
You should find your transparency setting using foobar's ABX plugin for example, and stick with that.

Two different encoders showing very different file sizes.

Reply #7 –
Quote from: ChronoSphere on
Quote from: UK_DUDE on
So while I have Windows running I am going to re-rip my library using FDK and dbpoweramp.  For a DAP do you think 400kbps (CBR) is excessive or should I use VBR instead?

Cheers.
Is there any particular reason why you want to stick with aac? As yourlord said, there are more efficient options available. 400kbps is usually overkill for anything.
You should find your transparency setting using foobar's ABX plugin for example, and stick with that.


Well i am using the files on my phone.  I've found a new galaxy s and I am turning it into a DAP.  I thought well its either AAC or MP3 and AAC seems to have the edge.  Are there any other formats I should consider?

Two different encoders showing very different file sizes.

Reply #8 –
I'd say opus (good quality at low bitrate), ogg vorbis (less cpu load than mp3) and mpc (very power efficient).

Since you are planning to use Neutron player/Poweramp, mpc should be worth checking out as it's not natively supported by android otherwise.
I was using it @Q5 VBR  and couldn't tell it apart from lossless in most cases. Certainly not while listening in typical outdoor conditions.

Opus was listenable starting with as low as 96kbps, which is really impressive compared to how other codecs perform at that bitrate, and it got quite hard to tell it apart from lossless at 128kbps and up.

Vorbis is good if you just want native support and less cpu load while decoding. It still uses more than mpc from my experience.

Those are bitrates that I found to be transparent for myself, so as I said before, it would be better to find your own transparent settings. I'm pretty sure 400kbps is way too overkill, though.

Two different encoders showing very different file sizes.

Reply #9 –
Opus is the best lossy codec out there currently but device support is a little spotty still. OGG Vorbis is near AAC quality level at any given bitrate, is fully open, well supported by almost everything that isn't an apple or microsoft prison (native in android, hell even my Onkyo and Pioneer AVR's support it natively), and any reasonably modern encoder will yield great results with essentially no twiddling needed. As you've found, AAC can be a minefield of wonky encoders, incompatible profiles, is patent encumbered, etc, but it's probably the second most supported format behind mp3. When encoded well it has the second best quality in general, slightly edging out Vorbis and slightly behind Opus. Everything we've mentioned outperforms mp3 in quality, but none of them match mp3 for sheer compatibility since it's been around for nearly 25 years.

Two different encoders showing very different file sizes.

Reply #10 –
Awesome thanks for all this neat info.

I actually ripped all my FLAC library last night to AAC VBR 220 using FDK/dbpoweramp. I think that will do me but I am intrigued by Opus.

I have just downloaded the codec for dbpoweramp and ripped a few songs.  I am tempted to rip my entire library for a laugh and compare both.  Do you think its worth it or just a waste of time?  My initial rips using Opus were at 220 and the files we about 15% smaller that my VBR AAC files I ripped last night. 

What is a good bitrate for Opus? 

Also, what would be more battery efficient for my old Galaxy S?  Playing AAC or Opus?  I will be using Neutron as my music player.

If I was going to move to Opus how could I rip to it using Ubuntu?

Two different encoders showing very different file sizes.

Reply #11 –
Quote from: UK_DUDE on
Also, what would be more battery efficient for my old Galaxy S?  Playing AAC or Opus?  I will be using Neutron as my music player.

If I was going to move to Opus how could I rip to it using Ubuntu?


Not sure about the difference in battery usage between them.

If your ubuntu is reasonably up-to-date and the "Universe" repository is listed
in /etc/aot/sources.list  you should be able to just run:

sudo apt-get install opus-tools libopus0

to install it.

Alternatively it's supported by recent builds of ffmpeg (nice for scripting bulk
conversions as it handles metadata properly).

If you install the opus-tools package, I imagine you could point "Sound Converter"
to use it, if you prefer the GUI it offers.

Two different encoders showing very different file sizes.

Reply #12 –
I transcode from FLAC to opus using Soundcoverter or soundKonverter.

Good bitrate depends on what you can tolerate quality wise For me, 96kbps is great. Others here would say 128kbps is the best mix of quality vs bitrate. Others would say higher bitrates still but the bst answer is for you to transcode a selection of music to various bitrates and ABX them yourself to find the bitrate that you find to be transparent.

Two different encoders showing very different file sizes.

Reply #13 –
It looks like we've made similar software and hardware choices, UK_DUDE.  I too run Ubuntu and occasionally boot into Windows 7.  And two years ago, I bought a Samsung Galaxy S on eBay, which I use solely as a digital audio player.  I still use my main phone to listen on-the-go but the Galaxy S has completely retired the Sansa Clip.

I grew tired of having to boot into Windows to root and flash my phones using Odin; if you're the same then take a look at Heimdall (http://glassechidna.com.au/heimdall/).  I use the command line version for Ubuntu 13.04 which works fine on my Ubuntu 14.04 system.  If you favour a GUI, download the debian7 frontend - no more need for Odin.

And if you haven't done so already, do yourself a favour – root your Galaxy S and flash a Voodoo Sound-compatible kernel.  Do it now.  It really unleashes the potential of the Wolfson WM8994.  I settled on the Semaphore kernel to use with a CyanogenMod ROM; grab both from the xda-developer forums.

Now get the free Voodoo Sound app (http://project-voodoo.org/android-apps#VoodooSound).  Install and tick the boxes for Anti-jitter, Hi-fi play and DAC direct.  Set the slider for Headphone amplifier to -1 dB and Volume limit to +5 dB.  I personally favour a 'Standard' Bass Boost, with +6 dB gain ideal for flat studio monitor headphones.

As for your choice of codec, there's not a great deal to add to the fine advice of Chronosphere and yourlord.  Whichever codec you choose, have a go at testing which bitrate will be suitable.  Again, I grew tired of booting Windows so use Python-ABX (https://code.google.com/p/python-abx/) to compare tracks in Ubuntu.  Unzip and run the abx.py file from a terminal.

Enjoy your device!

Two different encoders showing very different file sizes.

Reply #14 –
Quote from: lothario15 on
It looks like we've made similar software and hardware choices, UK_DUDE.  I too run Ubuntu and occasionally boot into Windows 7.  And two years ago, I bought a Samsung Galaxy S on eBay, which I use solely as a digital audio player.  I still use my main phone to listen on-the-go but the Galaxy S has completely retired the Sansa Clip.

Hi.

Great minds think alike hey!

Quote from: lothario15 on
I grew tired of having to boot into Windows to root and flash my phones using Odin; if you're the same then take a look at Heimdall (http://glassechidna.com.au/heimdall/).  I use the command line version for Ubuntu 13.04 which works fine on my Ubuntu 14.04 system.  If you favour a GUI, download the debian7 frontend - no more need for Odin.


I used Heimdall a few months ago on Ubuntu to root and flash a custom recovery on an Samsung S3.  I bought the Samsung S3 because it too contained a Wolfson DAC (WM1811).  I installed all sorts of mods (Boeffla kernel, viper) but it was just too bright and hard (very modern sounding).  It hurt my ears.  Anyway I couldn't get Heimdall to run at first until I saw a post to install extra files via Synaptic.  It worked (I flashed my phone) but I could not update Ubuntu anymore so I had to reinstall it so that has put me off Heimdall. 

Any tips you can share to run it properly on Ubuntu 14.04??

Quote from: lothario15 on
And if you haven't done so already, do yourself a favour – root your Galaxy S and flash a Voodoo Sound-compatible kernel.  Do it now.  It really unleashes the potential of the Wolfson WM8994.  I settled on the Semaphore kernel to use with a CyanogenMod ROM; grab both from the xda-developer forums.

Now get the free Voodoo Sound app (http://project-voodoo.org/android-apps#VoodooSound).  Install and tick the boxes for Anti-jitter, Hi-fi play and DAC direct.  Set the slider for Headphone amplifier to -1 dB and Volume limit to +5 dB.  I personally favour a 'Standard' Bass Boost, with +6 dB gain ideal for flat studio monitor headphones.


All done mate.  I was actually using the Nexus S with Supercurio's Voodoo since 2012 as a phone/DAP, which as you probably know is basically an S1 with a different design and a NFC chip.  The Nexus S was showing its age badly and I needed (ideally) a phone and a DAP all in a single device, that's why I bought the S3.  Sadly it didn't work out.  I also hated the S3's design (I couldn't stand 'home' hardware button) and it was a little big and slippy in my hand.  So I plumped for an S1 and a 2013 Moto X.  Now I can use the codec of my choice with the S1 because I have a sd card slot now and don't have to rely on Google Music MP3 streams.

Did you know that Supercurio has been working for Cyanogenmod now?  The Voodoo app is now built into versions of CM11 onwards.

I've also been spooked by Googles complete intrusiveness while using their apps.  That was the main reason why the Nexus S had no sd card - to hook you into using their streaming services.  I'd like to move totally away from Google if possible and the S1 is one stepping stone to achieving that.  That is also why I went Ubuntu because I did not like the Microsoft and NSA backdoor stories.  I bought an ZTE Firefox phone, which I really like, but the screen is shocking quality so that was a real shame because it did everything I needed in a phone (emails, streaming 3g radio).  ZTE are releasing an update this month called the Open L, but I am not holding my breath that the screen will be decent. 

Quote from: lothario15 on
As for your choice of codec, there's not a great deal to add to the fine advice of Chronosphere and yourlord.  Whichever codec you choose, have a go at testing which bitrate will be suitable.  Again, I grew tired of booting Windows so use Python-ABX (https://code.google.com/p/python-abx/) to compare tracks in Ubuntu.  Unzip and run the abx.py file from a terminal.


Thanks for the tip.  I'll check out Python-ABX

Quote from: lothario15 on
Enjoy your device!


Thanks!

Two different encoders showing very different file sizes.

Reply #15 –
Quote from: lothario15 on
Now get the free Voodoo Sound app (http://project-voodoo.org/android-apps#VoodooSound).  Install and tick the boxes for Anti-jitter, Hi-fi play and DAC direct.


FWIW, this is mostly nonsense.  In general, anyone who thinks toying with PLL settings is going to improve audio quality should probably be ignored.  Its not something that you're going to improve, but in this case, it looks particularly questionable since all that setting does is set a register labeled as not connected to be 5.  Its possible some variant of the chip exposed that setting, but I see versions of this patch floating around for many years, its pretty questionable that it works on your particular device (or that the setting even makes sense).

Two different encoders showing very different file sizes.

Reply #16 –
Quote
Any tips you can share to run it properly on Ubuntu 14.04??


That's odd.  My brother recently obliterated his old S4 and got a new one through insurance.  I rooted and flashed it just the other day using the version of Heimdall in the repositories; the whole process was entirely problem-free on Ubuntu 14.04.  No special sauce required.  I did it all using the command-line rather than the GUI but that shouldn't make any difference.  I'm stumped.

Quote
All done mate.  I was actually using the Nexus S with Supercurio's Voodoo since 2012 as a phone/DAP, which as you probably know is basically an S1 with a different design and a NFC chip.  The Nexus S was showing its age badly and I needed (ideally) a phone and a DAP all in a single device, that's why I bought the S3.  Sadly it didn't work out.  I also hated the S3's design (I couldn't stand 'home' hardware button) and it was a little big and slippy in my hand.  So I plumped for an S1 and a 2013 Moto X.  Now I can use the codec of my choice with the S1 because I have a sd card slot now and don't have to rely on Google Music MP3 streams.


Yeah, I can understand why you'd initially go for the S3, having come from a Nexus S.  I use VLC in 'directory' mode on the S1, partly because it negates the need for a media library.  The old Hummingbird processor really does show its age at times!

Quote
I've also been spooked by Googles complete intrusiveness while using their apps.  That was the main reason why the Nexus S had no sd card - to hook you into using their streaming services.  I'd like to move totally away from Google if possible and the S1 is one stepping stone to achieving that.  That is also why I went Ubuntu because I did not like the Microsoft and NSA backdoor stories.  I bought an ZTE Firefox phone, which I really like, but the screen is shocking quality so that was a real shame because it did everything I needed in a phone (emails, streaming 3g radio).  ZTE are releasing an update this month called the Open L, but I am not holding my breath that the screen will be decent.


I just bought a new primary phone and though I went with Android, I'll be considering a Firefox or Ubuntu phone if I choose to buy a new one in 3 or 4 years time.  Besides calls and texts, all I really need is a browser and music player in my day-to-day usage so we'll see how far they've matured.

I also understand your desire to move away from Google.  Since I only really use a handful of apps regularly, I went Google-free on my primary phone and I can honestly report that I haven't missed it.  F-Droid is an able deputy and it really is staggering how much battery life improves without Google Play Services face-hugging the device like those creatures in the Alien films.  If you ever give it a try, this tool might help ease the transition: http://www.webupd8.org/2014/10/download-ap...ay-to-your.html

Cheers!

Two different encoders showing very different file sizes.

Reply #17 –
Quote
FWIW, this is mostly nonsense.  In general, anyone who thinks toying with PLL settings is going to improve audio quality should probably be ignored.  Its not something that you're going to improve, but in this case, it looks particularly questionable since all that setting does is set a register labeled as not connected to be 5.  Its possible some variant of the chip exposed that setting, but I see versions of this patch floating around for many years, its pretty questionable that it works on your particular device (or that the setting even makes sense).


Thanks for the info; it'd be interesting to hear the justification for its inclusion.  Regardless of that particular setting, the app results in great output and I suppose that's all that really matters.