Hi all, I know this may be the wrong forum for a general technical question, apologies if so. I am not a technical expert on codec etc but would like to know how can you tell what quality is on a CD. I am trying to go through all my Queen recordings on CD to make sure that everything is as best quality as possible. Is it just down to file size or do I need a specisl program to run the CD on?? many thanks for any help.
You'd have to rip the CD to WAV and do a spectral analysis in a program like Exact Audio Copy. If it cuts off at around 16 kHz, then you can be pretty sure it's mp3, as the very definition of mp3 is to cut off the frequencies at 16 kHz, under the assumption that most human ears can't tell the difference . But most people today listen to music on a 1" speaker, preferring convenience over quality, but that's a whole other discussion.
But sometimes it gets a bit complicated, as it may cut off at other frequencies. There are plenty of methods of transferring (from DAT or minidisc for example, or even the cables you use) that may make it appear to be lossy. In the end it all comes down to what your standards are, but it can be safely said that mp3 is pretty frowned upon these days by people who take collecting old recordings seriously.
So good luck with that !
For non techies like me and so that I dont get caught out uploading lossy files when I think they are lossless, is there an idiots guide on how to rip from a CD so that I can upload the material to share? any help appreciated.
I am also a non-techie but I read in a local techie magazine that you can rip CDs to flac files with a software called dBpoweramp from link.
However it costs US$36 at time of printing.
Exact audio copy. Probably the best ripping software for Windows, on many music-oriented torrent sites the ONLY allowed software for ripping the audio.
Steps
1) Put your CD into your CD/DVD/BluRay drive
2) Start EAC
3) Rip it to WAV
4) Use Trader's Little Helper (TLH) to encode the wav files into FLAC
many thanks for your inputs. would it be possible for someone to highlight (with screenshots??) how to produce a spectral analysis from EAC. I have downloaded it but am not sure how to read a CD and see if is Flac or mp3. Again many thanks. I realise how important quality is to traders and collectors so feel it is important to understand what I am copying/posting/trading.
FriedChicken wrote: Is there a good program to convert Flac directly to Mp3, without going to Wave first?
Foobar2000 is your friend: http://www.foobar2000.org
When you have that installed, right click on the songs loaded in the playlist, go to "Convert > ... ", change the settings accordingly, and go from there :-)
FriedChicken wrote: What about recording old recordings when you only have a 16, or 24 bits system. Or working on 44.1 kHz. That also makes a lot of difference.
You only need to worry about that if you're fretting over vinyl or cassette to PC digital transfers.
Besides, 96kHz/24-bit soundcards such as the SoundBlaster series can be had fairly cheaply now compared to 5-10 years ago.
inu-liger wrote:
FriedChicken wrote: What about recording old recordings when you only have a 16, or 24 bits system. Or working on 44.1 kHz. That also makes a lot of difference. You only need to worry about that if you're fretting over vinyl or cassette to PC digital transfers.
That's usually what you're doing when you're recording old recordings, right? :P