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New Lossless MP3 Format Explained
CNETNate writes "Thomson, the company that licenses the MP3 patent, has released a new lossless MP3 format called mp3HD. It utilises both lossless and lossy audio contained inside a single .mp3 file, and the files will play on all existing MP3 players. The idea is simple: lossless files on your desktop that can be transferred without conversion to iPods and MP3 players. The issue, it transpires, is that although the full lossless/lossy hybrid MP3 file is transferred to players, only the lossy element can be played back. A command line encoder can be found on Thomson's Web site."
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So, it's a container format with two different data streams in it, and you can stuff massively oversized files on your portable player, only you can only play the itty bity portion of that file that's the lossy one.
And the use case for this is?
that you probably thought of when you read the summary ("So now I get a larger-than-FLAC sized file on my portable player so I can get 128kbps?") is acknowledged in TFA.
Great. I'll have 80% of the capacity of my MP3 player used up by bits I will never access. Great job solving the problem fellas.
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
Hm. Sounds interesting, although I'd imagine that holding both audio streams wouldn't be that good for disk space... Most of the newer portable audio players have more than enough room, but if technologies like this become the norm for distributing audio, then the amount of songs that a player could hold would be more than halved...
My tastes aren't refined enough for me to appreciate lossless music over a decent quality lossy version, so while this is interesting, I doubt that it is something that excites me one way or the other...
Although TFA says it's smaller than the mp3 version + the flac version of the file, how much smaller? from their numbers, it seems you save about 5 MB over having 2 versions of the same song.
But, where ever you listen to it, you're only listening to one version of the song. So it takes up more space than should be required on every single device you use.
Maybe instead of coming up with new formats for music that are backwards compatible with existing tech, they should just make iPods and other mp3 players compatible with lossless formats.
01110000 01010111 01101110 00110011 01100100
Is it actually FLAC, and do nightingales have it built in?
At the bottom of the
Good idea, but with music being recorded with horrible loudness levels, its a waste. But I do like being able to not use something other than MP3, and burning back to a CD anytime I want.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loudness_war
The chinese companies already have MP5 players ;)
And it ain't going to replace MP3s on stores. The format is good enough for most sales.
Basically it's a standard MP3 with correction delta as a binary blob in the ID3-tag. Was it really that hard to make it interleaved? Even having the correction data as a separate file, like Wavpack does it in its hybrid mode, would be better as it would make it much easier to add the files to MP3-players without using extra tools. This is just stupid. You won't be able to stream it as it's not interleaved and ID3 tags are limited to 256 MB so you can't have a MP3HD-file longer than 35 minutes or so.
My other account has a 3-digit UID.
Wouldn't an MP5 player not be usable in many countries?
If I have nothing to hide, don't search me
is more FLAC support in portables. Problem solved more elegantly and without yet more proprietary codecs.
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law
I imagine the lower quality audio reduces the amount of battery required to process and play the audio. I'm not too sure about this though. Anyone know about this?
For example, does the audio processor on a portable mp3 player draw more power for higher bitrate files than lower bitrate files?
Relevant hydrogenaudio thread: http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index.php?s=55b656dc8cdb3b97da794e936b2a9b1d&showtopic=70548
In summary, it seems like a fairly useless and poorly thought out format. To be clear, this WILL NOT play losslessly in a standard mp3 player, you must use a special decoder to get the lossless bit. It will only play the lossy component in a normal mp3 player.
Lossless information stored in id3v2 tags? Bad hack that will break just about every tagging program out there. File sizes much larger than real lossless codecs and encoding/decoding speed is much slower than flac. Also you can't have tracks longer than about an hour due to id3v2 size limits. Additionally, a full size flac file and 256kbit mp3 often comes in at a SMALLER size than this one monolithic hacked up mp3.
Nothing to see here people, this is a waste of time. Something like lossy/lossless wavpack hybrid is a much better solution.
Sam
This is how the loudness war is killing music.
This actually could be nice... I mean, I have separate directories for my FLAC files and another for my MP3 (same albums, just in MP3)
I would love for iTunes to take this new MP3 "lossless" and play it back lossless, but if I say drag and drop it on to my iPod, have it just transfer the lossy portion of the encode
Basically, you can now just manage one set of rips / not have to keep managing two sets (lossless and lossy)
I dare say that this insistence on backward compatibility is going to kill this format.
If anyone still remembers, many years ago Thomson released the mp3PRO format.
It was a low bitrate MP3 with some added spectral band data that could recreate the original
music sound quality. So in theory, you could have the same quality for half the bitrate/size.
To my decaying ears, it sounded really good at the time... if played on the supported players.
But when you played these files in any unsupported player, which happened to be all of them
except for the Thomson's Player or the Thomson's Winamp Plugin, you ended up listening to
a HORRIBLE low bitrate sound quality, since the extra mp3PRO information was ignored.
And even worse: you had no way of telling if a file being downloaded was an original mp3 file .mp3pro or something like that, the mp3PRO format might have had some chance...
or a new mp3PRO file, since they both used the same file extension. Maybe if they had renamed
the extension to
Years pass... and now they are doing the same thing again.
Instead of focusing on a lossless mp3 codec for a specific kind of market/enthusiast, they are .mp3hd or something similar.
insisting in keeping backward compatibility with players using the same method as mp3PRO did.
And once more the files are going to have the same extension as the original ones, instead
of
I hope I am wrong, but this surely spells doom to me.
If I clone myself, can I call it a thread?
If a girl winks to us, can I call it a race condition?
The issue, it transpires, is that although the full lossless/lossy hybrid MP3 file is transferred to players, only the lossy element can be played back.
This will be true only until players begin supporting the lossless format.
So presuming the normal case where I have a PC that can play the lossless version and a media player that can only play the lossy version, now have to:
a) waste large amounts of high-value storage space to store "lossless-mp3" data on my pocket player that I can't actually play
and
b) waste disk storage space on my PC for the data for a lossy version that I will never choose to play because the lossless version is also available.
Well, the good thing about this would be that if someone actually buys a MP3 encoded this way they wouldn't be paying prime dollars for low quality lossy audio like they do now. But the bad news is that all mp3 appliances, as well as any current mp3 player that you have on your computer, will only play the low quality sound, the lossless track is rather hidden. And if you copy these mp3 files to your mp3 player, they end up wasting most of the space for something that will not be heard.
And, of course, this just muddies the waters. Some people may come to think that mp3 is decent quality (a few tracks might be), and then unknowingly buy low quality mp3 files without the extra hidden high quality track.
A far better "fix" to the problem would simply be to sell tracks in a high quality format, perhaps including a lower quality mp3 file with a lossless copy, although even if the mp3 were not included it should be able to be created as long as objectionable DRM were not part of the deal. There just seems to be no justification to packing both copies of the audio into the same file. Except, of course, as a marketing point. Lets take care of marketing right after we deal with the lawyers and politicians.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
Does this mean that they're abandoning the mp3pro format? And just as it was about to finally catch on, too....
This guy's the limit!
Why exactly do I want a hybrid file with twice the data on my MP3 player. I may not care about space on my computer hard drive as much but every song transfered to the MP3 player that's twice the size it needs to be pushes out another song that I could have taken with me.
Converting on the fly (if you value space more), or storing 2 versions and only uploading the right one to your player (if you value time more) seems like a much better solution.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
FLAC already does this without any weird conversion stuff, and Vorbis is already higher quality at the same bitrate.
I hope more PMPs support this. It's a good format, it's older, and it's free.
I'd be listening to FLAC on my iPod except that storage space is an issue. The entire point is that you're willing to trade-off lower sound quality for more space - on your portable player.
This just takes up more space. You're unable to play the higher-quality audio on your mp3 player (that's why you have the low-bitrate in the first place)... but you're still taking up space with it... I know! To get that space back, I'll just split the lossless audio from the 120kbps audio...
This is useless. Is there even a legitimate use case for this? The only thing I can come up with is that users are too stupid to manage their CD-rips (lossless) and lower-quality mp3s. That's a software problem - make the transfer program re-encode on transfer. I know for a fact that WMP does this, so it can't be too hard.
I have developed a truly marvelous proof of this comment, which this signature is too narrow to contain.
I predict this will be a raging success on the scale of JPEG2000
My P-133 could do better than real time encoding of .wav -> .mp3
So why, when computers are now routinely 50 or 60 times faster than that, would I bother with two separate file formats crammed into one blob on the relatively tiny memory of my portable device?
Why, when disk space is now so cheap on my pc, can't I have a simple background process converting .flac into.mp3, to be stored separately for transfer to my portable device?
Why would I suddenly want to put up with 9/10th's of the storage capacity of my portable device being used for useless data?
In short, what the fuck were they thinking?
You are in a twisty maze of processor lines, all alike.
There is a lot of hype here.
*Re-perforates eardrums with corkscrew*
This is completely dumb, but if it finally makes LOSSLESS digital music stores a reality (that have no DRM and are not watermarked), I'm all for it!
Didn't RTFA (duh), but I wonder what codec they use for the lossless part? Not that I care, since I would transcode that to FLAC before I even played it.
When you can define "fair compensation", we can start to worry about whether or not artists are getting it.
You are welcome on my lawn.
I'm surprised that nobody thinks this is a good idea. To the poster above that said it's like a car with helicopter blades, I have a better analogy: This is like a car with two motors. One motor is street legal and can be driven in all fifty states. The second is a fully modified fire-breathing 800HP monster that can only be used in closed-course racing. When you're driving to work you use the street legal motor, but you can drive the same car to the race track and get the full potential of the second motor.
As MP3 players get more and more storage space, we're going to see scenarios similar to those in desktop computers - Grandma only needs a fraction of that 500GB drive in her new eMachine. The same will be said for Sally the high school student with her 60GB iPod. If that space is available why not fill it with the highest quality music possible so that music is available wherever one goes? I understand that it won't be playable in my iPod but it will be available to hook up to a stereo or computer etc etc at a friends house / party / barbecue.
Am I alone? :-)
flac is of course lossless, and by definition reproduces a clone of source. it is also becomming ubiquitous. among those who care about quality or who swap bootlegs penetration is near 100%. it's a great format for these reasons. the problem is size. it's huge, on average nearly 2/3 that of a wav file. apes are slightly better, shrinking wavs to about half their size, but still quite large. really, if anything is going to unseat either flac or ape it's not going to be something even larger. it sounds as if this new mp combo file has approached 3/4 of a wav and that is just going the wrong way, paricularly since the disadvantages of girth are not offset by any corresponding advances in sound with everyday players. listeners might as well forget compression, lossless or otherwise and just go with wav files for all the good this piece of pork will do. i'm fairly certain wavs are playable on nearly every existing portable.
the world wasn't waiting for this. but a slim lossless file 1/3 the size of a wav? different story altogether.
- js.
To extend your analogy, having to carry around the extra weight and volume for both engines kills your gas mileage on the street and causes it to accelerate and handle like a school bus on the track.
So when driving to work your fuel economy sucks because you have second engine that probably doubles the weight of the car that you don't use.
And when you are at the race track you lose all your races because you have a second engine you aren't using adding weight to slow you down.
Oh, yes, lets tweak this patent just a tad and see if we can extend it for another 20 years.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
My reply is why bother supporting a proprietary format to incorporate lossless audio when there's already a well-developed open standard already, namely FLAC? By your argument, the expansion of disk space makes lossless storage more attractive. I agree with that, but what I don't want is for everyone to hop on board another standard from Thomson and friends which can't legally be supported in free and open software.
Forward-thinking companies like COWON support open formats like FLAC and Matroska. Other players should as well. We've all suffered long enough with proprietary formats that bring nothing extra to the table other than the marketing power of large corporate backers.
The only reason for MP3 (vs. lossless/uncompressed) is to save storage space.
If your assumption that storage space will increase beyond need is true, then why bother with lossy files at all, let alone combination ones which are larger than lossless?
One can expect that media players, as their storage expands beyond that needed for lossy compressed storage, will support lossless and PCM (".wav") formats. The market leader already does.
Given ample storage, just use PCM (.wav) files, or lossless compression.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
And meanwhile you're carrying around that huge racecar engine, which is taking up your entire back seat and trunk space for backwards compatibility's sake.
Worse, you're not allowed to tune either engine or put your own gasoline in it without paying a huge licensing fee.
A simpler solution is to get FLAC, transcode it to MP3 yourself, and then store them separately on your MP3 player.
A better solution is to make PMPs that can play FLAC.
A crazy solution is to design a new FLAC / Vorbis-based format that stores a Vorbis version with the lost signal appended as a FLAC.
When a cheap-ass PMP sees it, it just plays the vorbis part.
When a good PMP or PC sees it, it plays both and adds them back together to get the lossless version.
Alternately, use a software program to artifically drop the quality, then make the lossy stream just a FLAC encoding of an artifically lost signal.
I know absolutely nothing about audio codecs, but I have a feeling in my balls that this will work.
It's like storing the World Wide Web inside the Library of Congress!
http://007.blogbrasil.com.br/mp10-player/
The device is an Mp10 player, it has built-in all the features of previous devices, that means, inside the mp10 there are an mp3, mp4, mp5, mp6, mp7, mp8 and mp9.
Someone from work one explained to me. Each feature, like a camera, mobile analogic TV, digital TV, fmRadio, etc. Each feature adds 1 to MpX.
Unfortunately, the 800HP fire breathing engine is so big that it took up all the space of your SUV trunk and the back seats (second and third row).
It made your wife mad, so you ended up buying here the minivan she wanted to replace your other car, a small sedan, so at least she can truck the kids around and go grocery shopping.
Then the extra weight on your monster reduce your mileage from 25MPG to 5MPG when you use the 50-states street legal engine on your daily commute.
Your gas bills are getting so huge that you decide to buy another vehicle for your daily commute.
You are really struggling to make the payments on your wife's minivan and your 800HP monster, so you end up buying a used Vespa scooter.
On a rainy day, you are riding to work wondering if Obama's bailout will help you out, when suddenly you get crushed by somebody who is driving another one of these 800HP monster car, illegally set in Fire-Breathing mode, at the corner of 3rd and Market. RIP jerkychew.
You leave your wife with a mortgage payment and two car payments she cant afford on her part time job... but she is glad your madness is over. And maybe now Obama's bailout is going to help her....
And Yes, You are alone.
That MP5 format is really bad for your ears.
Sounds like evergreening to me
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evergreening
Yo dawg, we heard you like music, so we put an mp3 in your mp3 so you can listen while you listen! - I like the fact that when I read this story, the fortune at the bottom of the page was "Everything takes longer, costs more, and is less useful."
-- Increasing the entropy of the universe since 1972.
...And when you crash your race car it means you'll be catching the bus to work...
Isn't that called FLAC?
More than a few pennies per consumer dollar?
What the point ? So... now you have an even larger file with 2 components in it that adds no benefit because players cannot play the lossless portion [yet].
Because they need a new patent so that when their MP3 patent expires, they won't be penniless. This is similar to what the drug companies do -- change dosages and companion medications, compress into a new tablet and you can patent and charge for it as if it were a new medication.
What, we didn't get screwed hard enough by Thomson the first time? Is it not clear at this point that they're not to be trusted?
"Not an actor, but he plays one on TV."
you must have missed the couple of other comments that actually rtfa. the design is stupid, it's not a new format, it's a hack to regular mp3 that adds lossless data to the id3 tags which has a size limit. want long audio files for say a podcast? forget it, want to stream it? have fun since it's not interlaced. want to tag your files?, have fun editing at a snails pace.
The idea may be ok but the implemtation is horrid, plus it's Thomson, they will definitely use this to extend their patent portfolio.
Ask yourself, why are they doing this:
1.) Lossy music compression is becoming pointless as storage and bandwidth is concerned, and they want to charge money--for something.
2.) They want people to become confused on which songs are lossy compressed and non-lossy compressed.
Bottom line: When buying music, look for the Flac quality seal, or rip it yourslelf!
https://www.youtube.com/c/BrendaEM
Just keep all your FLAC files on PC or NAS, and when you want to load them on a player, copy them from the MP3FS directory.
You don't need to keep duplicate lossy files around, and you don't have huge chunks of lossless music taking up space on a player that can't play them anyway.
I read about an informal study that a teacher conducts each semester he teaches demonstrating that people like lossy sound more and more each year... weird...
Not only is this the dumbest thing since DivX, but it's about 15 years too late to matter. If you're the kind of person who needs lossless audio, you're not going to ferry your files on an MP3 player in the first place. And if you just so happen to be the kind of person who "needs" lossless audio and is criminally retarded, well you've been carting FLAC files on your Archos Jukebox for the past eight years.
For everyone else, there's "lame -V0".
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or owning a flying car without a pilot permit.
Michel
Fedora Project Contribut
All the audio quality of lossy compression, combined with all the size of lossless compression. Whoever thought of this is brilliant!
Exactly.
which fraction of the population are non-idiots, according to your definition?
Few. Very Few.
Really.
Have you ever been the one answering the questions?
You mean this?
http://uk.geocities.com/vortx_productions/VORTX_GRAPHICS/Adventure2000/2000AD_cartoon.jpg
is more FLAC support in portables.
Problem solved more elegantly and without yet more proprietary codecs.
iPod's have ALAC. Formats matter much less with lossless since you can cross-convert, unlike mp3.
I wouldn't bet on it. But it should be better than ordinary MP3s, in theory. OTOH do you really expect people won't just keep using the format that takes up the least space?
Damn you, that *hurt*...
XD BAH HAHAhahahahahahaaa...
certainly not the majority, nor even many (statistically speaking) of those who voted for him. But lots of folks will get rich because of Obama.
Of course, many more will get screwed, but hey, that's the game. You are just playing the wrong game.
how about more than $0.00 ?
Can Crysis play mp3HD?
The solution is simple.
Our music manager programs such as Itunes need the ability to maintain a lossless library and sync lossy AAC or MP3 to our portable devices on the fly.
That means you Apple. :) Itunes needs an intelligent management system for maintaining lossless for home and lossy for portables.
FLAC and ALAC (Apple Lossless Codec) are great, and they should be the standard. Apple should open up their format and stop being lame about it.
MP3 had its day, but sound quality wise its poor. It really needs to be at 256kbps or 320kbps to sound good. AAC by comparison sounds pretty dam good at 192kbps.
Apple if you're listening... iTunes is the slowest program on the planet. Fix it. (PC version and Mac) I can sculpt 60 million polygons on my PC in real time (in software mode, without a GPU)... but iTunes can barely scroll. Its pathetic.
Yo dawg, we heard you like mp3s, so we put an mp3 in your mp3 so you can listen while you listen!
lossless mp3
Amazon doesn't sell FLAC
Apple doesn't sell FLAC
Myspace doesn't play or sell FLAC
It may be widely accepted by us geeks yet not broadly accepted by the consumer. We're the hardcore gamers BAWWWING over lack of FLAC support(Xbox360/PS3) while MP3 (The Wii) is more popular.
----- You know you have ego issues when you register a domain in your name.
...lossy portion of the file could be copied to portables (eliminating to need to encode anything).
This is just an MP3 re-release of a technology that was standardized as MPEG-4 SLS, where it is combined with AAC instead of MP3.
Thomson owns more patents on MP3, so they earn more if people don't use SLS. Not to mention they have to buy encoders and decoder from Thomson.
It's like MP3pro, which was a proprietary version of MPEG-4 HE-AAC. HE-AAC is now standard on most phones, MP3pro is dead.
Does this seem pointless to anyone else? An audio compression technology that takes more storage space than the original, uncompressed format--FTW!
I guess that if your reason for listening to MP3s is purely because of the lossiness it brings to your ears, then having a non-lossy format that still allows you to playback at that wonderful lossy quality, would be a great thing.
I, however, was under the impression that compression technologies were invented, you know, to compress the original signal so that it fit more densely in storage media or consumes less bandwidth during transmission; and that the lossy quality was a trade-off, not the feature.
-dZ.
Carol vs. Ghost
MP3 has been fine and a variable bit rate file with 320KBps max sounds perfectly fine with no clipping. It doesn't need a better format for the majority of audio users. For home PC's and media stations then the lossless formats can come into play for audiophiles and people with half decent amps. I think the media companies should focus on an open format like MKA/MKV and then at least they can store both the lossless MP3 and lossy MP3 in the same file. If the music video was also included then it could store that also.
I herd you like mp3s so we put a mp3 in your mp3 so you play while play.
Don't you think a reason for this is the lack of support for open formats in popular players?
This is the typical chicken-and-egg problem. No one will support FLAC until there are devices that can play it. If there's no content in FLAC, player manufacturers won't see the need to include it.
My solution to this is to only buy products from companies like COWON that take open formats seriously.
It would be supercool if the iPods etc had dynamic loudness. If you listen at a lower volume, a certain amount of compression is highly desirable. However, if you listen at a louder volume, compression wrings the life out of the drums and the piano etc.
So, why not just stick it into the players? In three years time, the music biz can produce proper-sounding records, knowing they will sound cool both at louder and lower volumes.
Stop the brainwash
Personally I prefer HE-AACplus SBR w/ PS (v2).
Even as low as 10 kbit/s the audio file sounds half-decent. Try it: http://66.98.164.56:11209/listen.pls (Radio Jackie - South London). Or 16 kbit/s - http://165.230.36.186:8002/listen.pls (WVPH)
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
I am sitting
In the morning
At the diner
On the corner
I am waiting
At the counter
For the man
To pour the coffee
And he fills it
Only halfway
And before
I even argue
He is looking
Out the window
At somebody
Coming in....
Utilizing the synergization of benchmark e-solutions to pre-workaround action items!
Yes. I just identified one of the problems why it is not supported due to lack of popularity.
I recall my Creative MP3 playing FLAC with ease. I know iPod can play FLAC after some effort yet the problem is the EFFORT part. FLAC isn't cool, FLAC isn't hip, it's not jazzy man and all the squares keep buying MP3 Players to play Mp3s.
----- You know you have ego issues when you register a domain in your name.
So, the logical thing to do is to create a new extension, and then work to get an iTunes plugin that will convert the file to lossy as it syncs.
Or, they could create some sort of drag-and-drop app that will do the necessary conversions for the end-user.
But the problem there is that this new plugin is competing with Flac, and has no major selling points. So, they bundle the new codec, with their existing near-monopoly, and viola! You have just leveraged your position in the market to provide an unfair advantage to a crappy product.
FLAC is already supported on a number of platforms—and why not, considering it's *FREE* (licensing-wise) for them to do so. If my miniscule SanDisk Clip can play FLACs, surely all the other manufacturers should be able to figure it out.
mp3HD is a poster-child for stillborn technology. Hey Thomson, nice try staying relevant!
Wouldn't an MP5 player not be usable in many countries?
Oh it's usable. Without a doubt. In fact, my problem is that once I started using it, I had to keep using it until everyone stopped complaining about me using it.
Out of modpoints but really liked a post? 1BDkF6TtmmeZ3yqXbz9yhdYVqRYnwFoXDj
Fine, but who compensates me for inadvertent exposure to certain 'performers'?
You mean like Janet Jackson? In the strip club, that would constitute a free show.
What do I play it with then? VLC?
My reply is why bother supporting a proprietary format to incorporate lossless audio when there's already a well-developed open standard already, namely FLAC? By your argument, the expansion of disk space makes lossless storage more attractive. I agree with that, but what I don't want is for everyone to hop on board another standard from Thomson and friends which can't legally be supported in free and open software.
About the only current format I can think of that isn't supported by open source software is Blu-ray and I gather that people are working on that. The law isn't really relevant to format support.
Is "because it's a clever, nerdy hack" a good enough answer? I'm not sure about the business case for developing this format, but wouldn't it tickle your nerd bone to be the one assigned to make it work?
What a dumb idea. They counter: but drives are getting cheaper! So it will hold lossless easily!
OK, fine: if drives are so fucking cheap, then USE FLAC FILE FORMAT and get the benefit of superior audio quality from a lossless format.
I think this is Thompson looking at FLAC and getting scared, so rather than invent a better lossless format that holds metadata, they would rather baffle people with bullshit.
This also wags a BIG FAT FINGER at Apple who refuse to support FLAC on iTunes. If iTunes supported FLAC, NONE of this would be an issue. Period.
HELLO! APPLE! You wanna be a fuckin' HERO? Support FLAC in iTunes like you do MP3!
Sure - FLAC plug ins for iTunes - *that's not the point*. It should be native. Period. end of discussion.
It's THAT tiny detail that is holding iTunes back from dominating the next generation of audio listening.
RS
Shoes for Industry. Shoes for the Dead.
all music is already compressed anyways
the wonder of joint ventures. periodically somebody who has a license from one vendor will be sued by the other.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
My guess is that Thompson wants their format to be able to sold for lossless downloads, as the formats move that way.
This would be a way for, say, Amazon, to sell lossless downloads and maintain 100% compatibility. Those who care could buy them and then transcode to whatever superior lossless format they wanted to.
> I think an even better comparison would be a car with a helicopter stapled to the trunk.
You mean like this?
You have the compact file size of a lossless codec with the crystal clear playback of a lossy one! Everybody wins!
> I think an even better comparison would be a car with a helicopter stapled to the trunk.
Ack should preview next time; this was my link.
Holly: Listen, Kryten, you had a virus, okay?
Kryten: Yes?
Holly: And, you started to play MP3s, all right?
Kryten: Yes?
Holly: Only your MP3s... were lossless.
Kryten: What do you mean, "lossless?"
Holly: I mean they were realistic, accurate, lossless.
Kryten: Lossless?
Holly: Lossless.
Kryten: What do you mean, "they were lossless?"
Holly: Okay, I'll put it another way. You played MP3s, all right?
Kryten: Yes?
Holly: And they were lossless. I told you it wasn't ordinary computer virus! I told you it was mutated! I knew something like this would happen.
[Meanwhile, in the Drive Room, stand two characters: one of them is named Peter, and the other is a wolf]
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
I don't get all the anger. If you don't like it, use a different format. FLAC 'n OGG work fine for the Rockbox set, and ALAC/AAC are okay for Apple's users.
I see a LOT of use if they can convince the iPod/Portable Audio Device sync programs to play along. Your MP3HD files stay on the home fileserver, where a 200 gigabyte music collection isn't going to strain its capacity. Plug your mp3 player in, however, and it only sends the MP3 data over, leaving you a ton more space for
The market is folks who love to keep their music lossless, but need a smaller mp3-player-friendly copy. From the test shown (e.g. an 8MB MP3 + 14MB of lossless data (22 megs total) compared to a 20MB FLAC is a lot cheaper than a 20MB FLAC and an 8MB MP3 file), I'd be all over this if their "extra" format data also allowed for cover art (e.g. an ID4 or some such for extra info that MP3's don't embed well). iTunes integration would be nice too.
This is like a car with two motors. One motor is street legal and can be driven in all fifty states. The second is a fully modified fire-breathing 800HP monster that can only be used in closed-course racing.
This is an apt comparison - the extra weight of the street legal motor will ensure that you lose every race you compete in.
Free Martian Whores!
I'll wait for when it goes to 11.
The correct way to do something like this is to archive the full lossless version on the media server with a big drive, and then only sync the lossy portion to the device. That would require some new player functionality, but is presumably what Thomson intended, although that's not how it's described in the article. That's how past proposals along this line were supposed to work.
That said, its not clear that there's a meaningful advantage in doing lossy + diff versus just doing a lossy + lossless as seperate tracks. Transcoding at sync is lightning fast anyway; I'm not sure what advantage there is doing it in advance.
The idea of a lossy + lossles layer isn't new: DTS has done it for several years now. And the idea of a lossy + enhancement layer has been around even longer, in MP3Pro, HE AAC, and WMA 10 Pro.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DTS-HD_Master_Audio
My video compression blog
I prefer my Mp9000 player.
If sharing a song makes you a pirate, what do I have to share to be a ninja?
And if you get it to make coffe, it becomes an MP11. Hey, it's funny but its true! Someone got this MPx going here in Brazil... Now the guys that know better are being treated as they were crazy! I am being forced to go along with this MPx shit just to be able do comunicate
-- dnl
A 48MB file size for 6'22"? Forget it it, I'll stick with 44k PCM. WAV or AIFF both work on iPod, as does Apple lossless, and frankly, I can't see the problem with 256kb MP3 anyway. Nobody listens to music for entertainment in a perfect environment, especially not on the go.
Bloody audiophiles and codec programmers. Complete wankers the lot of them.
"I hope you like Guinness, Sir. I find it a refreshing substitute for, er... food." Col. Jack O'Neil, SG-1
Why turn to a new format without better benefits?
For the meta-data? right...
--- I am known for the ones who want to find me on the net. Is that a privacy risk or a privilege? One might wonder..
My player goes up to mp11