Format War: Your Favorite Lossless Format

Question then: If there are people who think that even at 'perfect MP3 quality' (as in, 320 kbps) MP3 can be rubbish, why do we have 90% of proper quality VGM albums, plus game rips, only in MP3 format and not in a better lossy or lossless format?

It baffles me that a smart community that purports to care about game audio and quality thereof doesn't really give a shit whether they have a file in 128 kbps Mp3 or FLAC or high quality OGG or whatever. There are differences, it's been proven time and time again, just go to Hydrogen Audio.

Of course, if you own a Sound Blaster card, then get 64 kbps Mp3 files and who cares. (Kidding.)

Regards,
- Spike

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Well, I know that. VBR MP3 to most people isn't a big deal. But my point is, although we're starting to get VBR rips, most simply AREN'T- they're 128, 160 or 192. Which to me is not great.

So it's kind of unfair to say, most people don't care if it's VBR, because the fact is most rips are done in 128 kbps, a far cry from VBR LAME MP3.


But anyway. iRiver playes support OGG and are cheap.

I also personally think that if you have an ipod and crappy headphones, you can't tell the difference between much. But personally, I record VGM as a hobby, and good quality is important to me. Besides, (in my opinion), if you settle for second or lower best, your ears adapt and you lose you discernment and real ability to tell quality and basically hear as well. To me that would explain all the people who have been listening to crappy MP3's for years and saying "I don't hear the difference between 128 kbps MP3 and FLAC" or whatever.

Anyways, I'm getting a little thereotical. But it does piss me off that people harp on about wanting good quality audio yet most rips are done badly and also then converted to 128 kbps MP3 files. To me that's a sad reflection on a very intelligent group of fans who should care about music quality.

And I'm trying not to be a quality nazi, but seriously. It's not fucking hard to rip a quality 7 OGG file instead of using a MP3, or alternatively rip both the OGG and MP3 soundtrack, or FLAC and MP3 if you want. People have huge shares online anyway (think: VGM Central).

I think we need proper guidelines and 'best practice' guidelines. To me, everyone doing whatever and everyone else having to put up with that isn't good enough, since every fan doesn't have time to rip all the audio they want (hence, being stuck with bad gamerips if that's all that's available). Like me, and I hate that.

Anyway, enough ranting.

- Spike

Double Post:
Update:

Just so I don't sound entirely like a dumbass ranting person who makes stuff up, here's some comparisons. (You'll have to copy/paste into your browser since I don't have enough posts for URL's, or whatever stupid rule it is.)

The game is Ys 2 (Eternal version), and the track is "Ice Ridge of Noltia" (note that any track could have been used to prove the point, the logic applies to all, I just like this one best ).

Anyway. Ys 2 has WAV files on the game CD/DVD, right? So originally it sounds like this:
smc.sq7.org/assorted/12ys242.wav

Then, I converted it to OGG, quality 7 (which has been proven to my satisfaction to be about as close as you can get to CD quality without going lossless):
smc.sq7.org/assorted/12ys242.ogg

Finally, here's the MP3 rip (don't know who did it), which is in most people's VGM shares:
smc.sq7.org/assorted/12ys242.mp3

It's in 160 kbps.

Can you hear the difference?

.. No, seriously.

- Spike

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Well, you could be right. The difference was the WAV file I used was from the YS 1/2 Eternal DVD, and the Mp3 was from those games' "Original Soundtrack". Not sure if the soundtrack was separate. If so, I don't see why they would be so much worse!

I'll try and find a different file and see.

Either way, I think there should be a requirement (or really, a 'best practice suggestion' that people adhere to) that people who encode using MP3 use VBR LAME MP3, or whatever the best proven codec is (MP3 isn't my field of knowledge, since I don't use it).

- Spike

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