What MP3 encoder you using?

[ahfung]

Tell me which one and the reason(s).

 

[Workin']

I use LAME to encode mp3's. And so should you. It has been proven to provide the highest sound quality of any encoder. PROVEN. Not just opinion or speculation.

<< I hate my boss, what should I do? >>

Look for a new job, maybe?

 

[FOBSIDE]

<< I hate my boss, what should I do? >>



Climb to the top of the roof of your office building...and then tell him you hate him. That'll solve all your problems.

 

[esung]

I'm currently using Audiocatalyst 2.1, which is faily good, and it supports VBR (back then it's the only one that I can buy that has VBR support).. and I'm currently thinking switching.. The reason that I use audiocatalyst is that it has a good DAE engine, and it supports CDDB, ID3 Tag, and VBR. but now that ID3v2 came along, and Xing/Real has no intention of updating it...

 

[ahfung]

I tried LAME but this damn thing didn't allow batch encoding on my Windows 2000. Last night I have 2 soundtracks over 45 songs to encode, no way in the hell for me to click the stupid buttons 100 times for making MP3! Its even too resource hogging for my P3-860 256MB RAM! I almost couldn't do anything else while having it working on background.

These made me mad and decided to try something else. :|

How fast Audiocatalyst 2.1 rips plus encode? LAME takes about 1 minutes for a 4 minute wave.

Climb to the top of the roof of your office building...and then tell him you hate him. That'll solve all your problems.

Thanks for sharing your experience.

 

[crapito]

I use LAME as well, with RazorLame as the user friendly front end. I use EAC to rip the wav files, btw.

LAME
RazorLame
EAC

 

[potz]

i'm using nero. when i rip songs off cds it's saves me a step. and it can put the id3 info in the mp3's correctly... sometimes

 

[BlackSoul]

I use LAME for encoding, with RazorLame front-end and EAC for ripping, which in my opinion and quite a few other's opinion, by far THE best combo for mp3's. The Truth Is In Here<-- Very informative site.

 

[esung]

The speed is about the same on the audiocatalyst, although my Toshiba SCSI CDROM's ripping speed is horrible. that's why I use the option intermittenwave file in Audiocatalyst.

 

[PliotronX]

LAME and EAC are unbeatable IMO

 

[SendTrash]

I use to use blade encoder.. but I will try the lame encoder...
btw EAC is the freakin BEST!!!

 

[Delusion2001]

Audio catalyst

 

[IamDavid]

I know people don't like it here but I use MUSIC MATCH... Its the best and easiest IMHO..

 

[Workin']

For all those using Xing/Audio Catalyst - that is the worst mp3 encoder on the market! It's fast but that's because it does a horrible job.

Personally, I don't care if you use it, but please don't think you are getting quality results.

ahfung - I can batch encode in Win2k with no problems. What front end are you using? I use CDEX w/LAME .dll's and have no problems at all.

 

[JayPatel]

im for LAME as well...ive ripped and encoded two cds using the Lame Codec and the Xing Codecs.....not even close in terms of quality....Lame blows away all other codecs....as for ripping i use EAC as well.

 

[ahfung]

Oops, now I realize LAME is an codec only.

Sorry for the mixup, the frontend is ALFlite. I'll try CDEX tonight.

Now I'm using MP3 Compressor v0.9f by MP3hC. It was released in 1997 but still works with win2000, a little surprised.

 

[Byrd2a]

I recently switched from Audio Catalyst to Sonic Burn. Sonic Burn is head and shoulders above all others I have used. Try the free demo at
www.mynetmedia.com

 

[airfoil]

Music Match 6.x and Audio Catalyst. Music match is my favorite coz it supports all sorts of stuff.

 

[pigmode]

What does RazorLame do that EAC can't, and vice-versa?

pig

 

[DeeK]

Lame, of course. It simply blows everything else away in terms of quality. I know that Xing-based programs (Real, Audiocatalyst) are fast, but jeez, they sound like crap.

For those who haven't tried LAME, you can get the best-sounding binaries for Win32 here. This executable contains alternate code that produces better-sounding MP3s as well as a fix for a VBR/ID3V2 tag bug that appeared earlier.

 

[DeeK]

RazorLame is basically a batch frontend to LAME for encoding multiple files in a row. EAC is a CD ripper that can also automatically encode rips to MP3 using an external encoder like LAME.

 

[Quickfingerz]

I remember seeing on seeing at arstechnica.com that the fraunhauffer was the best encoder. LAME finished third. I can't recall who finished second.

go to the site and search for the article I can't recall what it was.

 

[FrontlineWarrior]

quickfingerz,

that test was done a very long time ago when lame was still fairly unpolished.

 

[Workin']

yeah, now Fraunhofer trails LAME badly....

I just finished ripping some new CD's with CDEX and LAME and I am really amazed at how good the mp3's sound, using LAME's VBR encoding for a typical average bit rate of about 160-190 kbps. I can't tell them apart from the original CD, even using my $6000 stereo. Pretty damn cool.

Plus LAME is FREE. Fraunhofer is not.

 

[bertrandom]

I use LAME w/ Audiograbber and that seems to work quickly with very good sound quality. I wouldn't recommend using Audiocatalyst with the Xing codecs because Xing is really bad quality. I've ripped with it before and its just horrible.