Support and General Use > Audio Playback, Database and Playlists
AACplus/HE-AAC playback on Ipod 5G Video
Llorean:
Why wasn't LAME used for the 128 one? It even clearly says that LAME is comparable at 128, and that the performance gap is solely because they ended up encoding at 112, basically meaning that your point of them being significantly different is said to be spurious even by the tests you personally cited. Considering they're comparing AAC+SBR to MP3 without SBR (there is a version of MP3 with it, though it's patented even more than standard MP3) it's rather a silly comparison anyway.
As well the first test you cited CLEARLY states "there was no winner in this listening test. Musepack didn't win. All modern codecs are tied at first place, simple as that." I don't know how you can misinterpret that. This puts Ogg/Vorbis sitting on level ground.
I'm not sure how the second test can state unequivocally that there's no margin of error in their results, and that their results are even VALID considering they send out test files to people who then listen to them on varying hardware.
If I send out 4000 test files from different formats, there's a possibility that everyone who gets the one from an Ogg/Vorbis will have worse audio hardware than those who get the MP3s, or some other silly combination. A proper test needs to be done on identical hardware by the same person, or the same set of persons each of them listening to every format. As far as I'm concerned that second test doesn't provide any useful results. Read their testing procedure and see for yourself, it's not even an ABX test.
Gamesoul Master:
::Shrugs:: This is what they had to say about it:
--- Quote ---Taking into account that Lame used less bits (112 kbit/s) for coding SoundExpert test samples, its performance gap doesn’t look so dramatic. Thanks to Lame developers MP3 quality is still comparable at the most popular bitrate – 128 kbit/s.
--- End quote ---
They had it set on quality 5... I guess the encoder itself decided to go that low for their samples. Still fairly valid, unless you think it could jump up 2 full points in 16 kbps...
As for the first test... reading that statement is all well and fine, and I'm not sure why he said it... but scroll down and look at the charts. Read the sentence or two of results for each one.
Llorean:
I think it could easily jump into the "statistically equivalent" range, especially considering how flawed their entire testing procedure is.
Gamesoul Master:
Possible. Though I really don't care... the initial point I was trying to make was that AAC is technically superior to MP3. That is fact. It may seem small to some people at this point, but that is due to the encoders, not the format. MP3 encoders have very little room left for improvement, while AAC encoders still have plenty of room. And during tests and discussions, it's quite rare to see anybody try to say Lame MP3 turns out better than Nero AAC (within the last year or two), but it's pretty common to hear that they're either roughly equal or AAC is superior (by whatever margin, it matters not).
Test results are irrelevant because of how much variety of music is out there. For instance, AAC completely dominates MP3 with metal music, but they are nearly tied when it comes to electronic music. In the end... it all comes down to user preference. And from my own tests, AAC suits my purposes much better than MP3.
Llorean:
Yes, and you're perfectly welcome to your preference. But have you *any* proof that MP3 cannot be optimized further than AAC? Just because it's older doesn't mean it can't. AAC could've been made initially with less room for improvement. Have you done a thorough investigation of encoding methods and understand both algorithms well enough from an engineering perspective to be able to say this?
All we ask here is that you don't state something as "fact" unless you can actually back it up rather solidly. AAC is technically superior in the "it was invented more recently, and contains more modern techniques" sense, yes, but this doesn't mean that it will be better on average, or that MP3 can't or won't surpass it in the end. It's also inferior in some ways (resource requirements) so it even strongly depends on what grounds you're basing "technically superior."
Saying "I prefer AAC over MP3" is fine. Anything you want to present as objective better be backed up with facts that are provable.
And if you say "test results are irrelevant" then please don't cite tests to try to prove your points. Especially greatly flawed ones like that second one. It's rather hypocritical to attempt to prove a point with tests, then say they don't matter when someone points out how flawed they are.
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