BBC Testing Ogg Vorbis Streaming

jregel writes: "Credit must go to AirLance who posted a comment on Slashdot that the BBC are currently testing Ogg Vorbis streaming. As the comment says, users should email the BBC and show support. It would certainly suggest that someone at the BBC is quietly pushing open source. Is this the first major media outlet to use the format?" I hope someone from NPR is reading this, too :)

Comments

Ogg is good for streaming ...

[Vardamir]

but for personal music jukeboxes of all shapes and sizes, I wish people would use FLAC or some other lossless audio codec. As broadband and microstorage become more common maybe these will become more used.

Way to go

[PM4RK5]

If this goes over well, this could be the first big step in terms of OGG's popularity, and a step towards
entering the realm that formats like MP3 and RealAudio have dominated for far too long.

I opened the Radio 1 stream in XMMS, and it sounds much better than an MP3 stream at 60 kbps.

Re:Way to go

[BrookHarty]

Game developers are starting to using OGG, since they dont have to pay the costs for development kits, (And they are major opensource and computer hackers...)

Also Serious Sam plays OGG in game, go download the Serious Sam 2 demo..

I picked up a soundblaster audrey, and It comes with a dvd audio player. Now 5.1 dvd .ac3 audio rocks. Dont know if OGG supports it, but .ac3 rocks over .mp3.

nothing revolutional

[eracerblue]

yes, this is a small evolutional step. but when does the simulcasting revolution begin? i'm itching for something akin to broadcast: where we only use bandwidth once, not in multiples of however many listeners we have.

Entirely subjective, but - Oh wow!

[Snowfox]

I'm used to voices being really "warbly" when streaming at low bandwidths. Ogg Vorbis is really holding up on BBC-4. I'm quite impressed.

The low-bandwith music on BBC-1 is still pretty bad, but about as good as anything else I've heard. It's stellar on the high bandwidth BBC-1 stream, however. It's heavy on the treble, where I'm used to having to boost that range.

I'm having a little trouble EQing to correct for the high treble. It seems to have a huge upward curve on the high end where other CODECs just chop or only represent simple harmonic overtones. That makes it a little harsh on some things, but it's nicer than the sensation of listening underwater or through a tube that Real & MS give.

Re:Why?

[SurfsUp]

And it begs the question "Why?" Lossless = Zip, Rar, Jar, Ace, Arj and a bunch of other compressions.

FLAC is specialized to and optimized for acoustic signals. Try compressing the same WAV under zip and FLAC.

But if I can't hear the difference, what's the difference?

Err, because you're not everybody, and some people *can* tell the difference? Or perhaps you could tell the difference if the rest of your system is good enough - reader, amplifier, speakers, room acoustics, the whole chain.


Whoever set the human ability to hear equal to the 44,1kHz of a CD? For a select few it's maybe more, but for me it's definately less.


Your sampling frequency needs to be *at least* twice the highest audible. 20 KHz is supposed to be the highest audible frequency for humans, and for many it's more than adequate (especially for those who never wore earplugs in nightclubs or at rock concerts). I personally was tested up to around 22 KHz, so the 20 KHz limit is bunk. Not only that, but the 2X rule (think about it) is only *in theory*. It assumes perfect filters, which don't exist. In fact you get artifacts well below what's supposed to be the high cutoff for a 44.1 KHz sample stream.

Lame using the --remix command is more than enough for my ears (actually overkill, but I assume I someday *might* regret not setting it that high). Considering that many ppl are happy with 128kb CBR, I'm probably even picky.

I glad for you, go ahead and listen to the sound the way you like it, but to me and many others the artifacts in 44.1KHz sound are quite audible. As for streams at 128kb, it sounds like it's being played through a phase shifter.