# To Convert Your Music, or Not to Convert Your Music. That is the Question



## JetwingX (May 10, 2003)

Alright, now that apple has come out with the AAC format i have converted all my MP3's. i am wondering if 20-30% (amount reduced by on avrage) is enough to convince you to swich to the AAC format. 

are you willing to let iTunes be your only MP3 player (for now) or is converting your songs worth it?


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## applewhore (May 10, 2003)

Jet

I commend you on your stoicism!  You've re-ripped all your MP3s???

I've now got 3,522 in my iTunes folder, and it's taken me quite a while to build that up (I get bored easily!)

To consider re-ripping them would necessitate much more than the Heineken that's sitting in front of me now!

That's not to say I don't consider the 20-30% saving in space a bonus - I just need to find someone who can do my "donkey work"!

You state "In Mac We Trust" (and, as an "applewhore", I wholeheartedly concur!) but I just can't conceive of going through the whole process again...

not just yet, anyway!


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## mfsri (May 10, 2003)

You can use iTunes to convert the mp3 file to AAC format. No need to re-rip the cd. After to convert the song then you need to delete the mp3.


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## ksv (May 10, 2003)

> _Originally posted by mfsri _
> *You can use iTunes to convert the mp3 file to AAC format. No need to re-rip the cd. After to convert the song then you need to delete the mp3. *



easiest way to ruin your music library, yes 
remember, when converting with "lossy" codecs twice, you'll also get twice the quality loss. so when you convert a 192 kbps MP3 to 148 kbps AAC you'll get a file that equals a 96 kbps MP3. very ineffective, as the size is only 30% smaller.


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## mr. k (May 10, 2003)

if your not a big stickler about pristine audio quality - using itunes to convert is the best way to go, although it does take quite a while.  i took that road rather then re rip everything (i was running out of hd space  ) and i haven't noticed a loss between 192 mp3 and 128 aac.  i haven't pumped anything through a hi fi stereo, but the speakers on my imac and my sony wraparound's haven't seemed to change the sound quality too much.  even when both itunes and system volume are set to 100% (i normally have them at around 30 %) i don't notice anything - no beeps or crackles or skips.


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## fryke (May 10, 2003)

Hmm... As you'll still get lower quality - and sometimes VERY audibly so - I suggest that you leave your current MP3s as they are and just import new songs as AAC. The 20-30%, well, so be it...


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## chevy (May 10, 2003)

Can you go back to MP3 later ?


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## anerki (May 10, 2003)

Of course, but you'll lose quality AGAIN so no point in doing that :s


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## toast (May 10, 2003)

Thanks to ksv and anerki (and some others): *People, re-encoding your music from MP3 to AAC damages your music files on a large scale !*.

Have you ever re-saved a JPEG as another JPEG file ? You're doing just the same.

Look. MP3 is a lossy format. A very lossy one, I'd say, try to encode some jazz under 256kbps and you'll understand.
Now, AAC is lossy too. Less, but still, it is.

Now, figure that out: what happens when you re-encode an already damaged file ?
You're just multiplying the damage ! (MP3 damage) x (AAC damage) !

MP3 compression is already eating your sound, if you have re-encoded files, I regret, but you have killed your whole library. The sound will be sh!tty unless you stick to those poor speakers iMacs and portables come with.

Just try this: leave a message on a friend's mobile phone and ask him to call you and to make you listen to the message by the phone (see whatta mean ? :confused) That's double sound damaging, same thing.

So, last: do NOT re-encode your music ! Unless your sole musical interest is Madonna and Britney Spears, any other music will get killed in the process. Barbara Hendricks will sound like Gerry Halliwell.


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## chevy (May 10, 2003)

> _Originally posted by toast _
> *... Barbara Hendricks will sound like Gerry Halliwell. *



Will she look like Gerry too ?


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## ksv (May 11, 2003)

> _Originally posted by chevy _
> *Will she look like Gerry too ? *



After jpeg encoding a couple of times, I can't say I see much difference.


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## toast (May 11, 2003)

LOL !

At least ksv provided us with an explicit demo of what the re-encoders are doing to their music :evil:

Bad people bad !


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## anerki (May 11, 2003)

Well, I was too late ... Before I noticed it, my entire library was converted to AAC and all MP3s deleted :s


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## fryke (May 11, 2003)

Maybe we should a "What NOT to do" forum. ;-) Every time you have a great idea, you could go there and look for it. If you find a What-NOT-to-do about it, you should think again.


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## toast (May 11, 2003)

That would make a great website/forum section indeed.


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## Darkshadow (May 11, 2003)

Hey, hold on a moment there.  Yes, MP3 and AAC are lossy, but they aren't as lossy as JPEG is. 

I can't be as sure of AAC (since I haven't read any specs on it), but with MP3, all that you are losing is certain frequencies that are above/below the threshold of human hearing.  The amount that you lose depends on the bit rate.  Re encoding an MP3 once you have already done it isn't going to really lose all that much more (if anything) unless you re encode it at a lower bit rate.

I'm going to guess that AAC is pretty similar.  It probably has a better schema for what frequencies it filters out, but you most likely aren't going to lose that much in converting a MP3 to AAC.  The resulting AAC wouldn't sound as good as if you had made the AAC from the source file, but I doubt it would sound all that much worse than the MP3 did.


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## toast (May 11, 2003)

Music is much more fragile than pictures. If you substract 10 K from a picture black, it still looks black. If you substract 10 MHz to a musical frequency, you get something completely different.

Plus, your ears are much more sensitive than your eyes. 10/15% people see red as dark orange, while 5% people can hear some infra/ultrasounds.

The MP3 encoding also affects mid frequencies. Is it true you won't realize it when encoding at/over 160kbps, but still.

Last: JPEG and MPEG were programmed by the same Picture Expert Group


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## Darkshadow (May 11, 2003)

That's what I was getting at - you're not really going to hear the difference.  Though I'm one of those 5% people that can hear some infra/ultrasounds. 

(You guys that can't are lucky.  You don't wanna hear the sound a TV/computer monitor puts out.  Very annoying!)


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## ksv (May 11, 2003)

> _Originally posted by Darkshadow _
> *That's what I was getting at - you're not really going to hear the difference.  Though I'm one of those 5% people that can hear some infra/ultrasounds.
> *



Sure, if you're only listening to your music on crappy Apple speakers you won't hear any difference, because most speakers aren't even capable of going as high or low as even the most crappy MP3s anyway


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## fryke (May 11, 2003)

The argument is that however 'good' a lossy codec is, if you multiply the loss by re-encoding a piece with another, different lossy code, the result will be worse. While 160 kbps MP3s may be acceptable, and so are 128 kbps AACs, the result may also be audible by less audiophile people. If you don't _want_ to believe, try it. If the results are good enough for you, why not. But then again, is it really, really worth it? Not for me.


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## adambyte (May 11, 2003)

Well, I did not convert... I deleted my MP3s (all of them encoded at 160) and re-ripped my 20-something disc music collection in AAC format at 160.... We'll see if I can tell the difference in the coming days....


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## Rhino_G3 (May 12, 2003)

Just as it was said before, there will be a huge difference in perceived quality depending upon what type of music you're encoding.  Rock, with it's purposely distorted guitar and scratchy vocals will sound much better than jazz or classical at the same given bit rate.   
If you do try it, before you do re-encode everything, I would try a few differing types of music.  There is some music on my machine that I would never try to reincode, others might not sound too bad.

Basicaly, there WILL be a degradation in audio quality.  The difference will be that some will not be able to hear the audio loss depending upon preference in audio quality/musical tastes/quality of audio hardware.


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## Randman (May 12, 2003)

I dunooo. If I get close to maxing out my iPod and aren't ready to got to a larger size, it might be worth converting a number of and getting a few extra hundred songs even if I lose a little quality (which should be mitigated by running through a stereo with equalizer, or even a good set of headphones).


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## Rhino_G3 (May 13, 2003)

> _Originally posted by Randman _
> *I dunooo. If I get close to maxing out my iPod and aren't ready to got to a larger size, it might be worth converting a number of and getting a few extra hundred songs even if I lose a little quality (which should be mitigated by running through a stereo with equalizer, or even a good set of headphones). *



You MIGHT be able to compensate for part of the lower and upper end loss by the use of an EQ.  The high quality headphones may actually make things sound worse than lower quality headphones.  You'll hear all the small imperfections within the song.

If fitting more songs on the iPod is the reason you're doing this, and you don't mind the slight quality loss, I'm sure it will be worth it.


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