to re-encode or to not re-encode mp3's ?
Jason
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not sure if this is technically the right place, but thought i'd just pose the question out of interest. no worries if nobody wants to reply 
got 8,000 mp3's on my 64gb iPhone 5 with about 4.4gb free. Always wondered how much space i could free up if i re-encoded the 320kbps files down to VBR 192kbps.
I'm in no way an audiophile of any description - i'm just happy if the quality is decent when i listen to them on my headphones when i'm out and about, so in theory i shouldn't really notice a huge amount of difference.
So i backed everything up and did the deed. Re-synced the iPhone and the 4.4gb free went to 16.5gb free
I'm going to give it a couple of weeks of use to see if i really do notice any difference. If not then i'll likely make it a permanent change and delete the backups and keep things as they are, but if it does sound crappy by my standards (which would most likely make an audiophile throw up in their mouth a bit) then I'll just restore the originals and re-sync it all back again.
So, would anyone else do the same, or have you already done it ?. And if so, are you happy with the results ?
got 8,000 mp3's on my 64gb iPhone 5 with about 4.4gb free. Always wondered how much space i could free up if i re-encoded the 320kbps files down to VBR 192kbps.
I'm in no way an audiophile of any description - i'm just happy if the quality is decent when i listen to them on my headphones when i'm out and about, so in theory i shouldn't really notice a huge amount of difference.
So i backed everything up and did the deed. Re-synced the iPhone and the 4.4gb free went to 16.5gb free
I'm going to give it a couple of weeks of use to see if i really do notice any difference. If not then i'll likely make it a permanent change and delete the backups and keep things as they are, but if it does sound crappy by my standards (which would most likely make an audiophile throw up in their mouth a bit
) then I'll just restore the originals and re-sync it all back again.So, would anyone else do the same, or have you already done it ?. And if so, are you happy with the results ?
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Now got a player that can take 128gb micro SD cards, so can have as much music in FLAC quality as I want.
Certainly wouldn't downgrade 320kbps mp3s to 192kbps mp3s just to save space (or put more on a device).
Part of me is already itching to put the original files back already though, without even listening to how they sound
I certainly would. And once upon a time I was one of those dreaded audiophiles, expensive turntable, interconnects, indecently good headphones (Stax Electrostatics) .... then I grew up.
Unless you're listening on ridiculously expensive headphones in a perfect environment, there is no reason to carry around 320kbps MP3s. By all means keep a master set at home in either FLAC or high rate MP3/aac, but the benefits on a phone are minimal.
So if you're listening on the commute on a train, or in the car, or whilst down the gym on a treadmill - yes, drop down to 192kbps, odds are that you won't even begin to notice.
likewise
Does the device you have play FLAC files?
Some people do actually have the ability to clearly hear the distinction between the two. Some people just convince themselves they do. I knew I was one of the first group, so I carried out a blind test a number of years ago. I failed.
I can (or at least could) hear a difference as well, but it depends on the environment - if you're on a train, or in a normal car, there isn't any noticable difference.
I think I spent too much time in clubs in my 20s for higher quality to be worthwhile .... these days I'm more about enjoying the music rather than any inane chasing of higher quality.
I'm not about to ditch my backups just yet though. I'm going to give it a good couple of weeks just to be absolutely sure i'm happy with the results and I'll get rid of the backups then and fill up the 12gb i've freed up with more music knowing me .. heh
192Kbps audio files sound pretty good when done with iTunes. Saying this though, that's with AAC. MP3 doesn't sound anywhere near as bad as I thought it did (after encoding an audio track to MP3). No wonder MP3 albums and single tracks are still available to download on torrent sites. MP3s actually sound very good.
320kbps is lossy, and although most human can't really tell, the encoder can't re-encode what isn't there.
A VBR 192kbps from the original PCM source (wave or flac) is said to be as good as a 320kbps constant rate.
How on earth can that be? 192Kbps is a lower bit rate than 320Kbps.
A different way of doing it.
I've always been happy with the quality of my MP3's. Funnily enough, while i was working all this out last night, i actually found i've still gone some songs encoded in .. *shudder* 96Kbps
But the bit rate will still be under 320Kbps.
Better you than me. I've never endcoded to MP3 in less than 192Kbps.
Well neither have I, but this MP3 collection I have has been nearly 10 years in the making so there are bound to be a few stragglers
It is about compromise. Mr. Watkins here wants to try and free up some space on his phone. He is willing to reduce the bit rate a little to reduce the file size and appreciates this may or may not have a noticeable (to him) affect on audio quality. Whether or not it does is up for him to decide, and as he states that this is for listening to when "out and about" one can presume that there will be some level of background noise, whether it be traffic, train or general hubbub that would render any noticeable quality issues under optimal conditions redundant.
The interesting point will be if he can work out if it is possible to keep both the original 320kbps files and copies at 192kbps VBR and have iTunes only sync across the 192VBR files. I may even have a crack at trying that.
I think you have to do it manually.
I had loads of duplicate songs of different bit rates and was able to just sync the bitrates I wanted.
Eh? I wasn't talking about what Jason was doing when making that post, but was replying to another poster that was saying that VBR 192Kbps was said to be as good as 320Kbps.
I've tried this experiment as well with a friend that claims he can hear the difference. Of 15 or 20 tracks he was able to correctly identify all but one as being higher or lower bit rate, I barely got half. Some people really can tell the difference.
Then make it a little clearer as to who you are responding to.
Well, the fact that I bolded a bit of their post and then talked about that bit should have been a BIG indication of what I was talking about and who I was talking to.
What I did was sort the songs in the music folder by bitrate and then copied the 320kbps songs out in to a temporary folder, which i then made an additional backup copy of.
It took me a good few hours to re-encode everything as i did have over 3,000 songs at that bitrate, but once i'd done it, i then moved them back in to the music folder, choosing to overwrite the existing files.
In iTunes, I again sorted the songs by bitrate and what I did was to select them all in one go and add the "BPM" field to the song info, to which I entered "999".
Clicked "Ok" to force iTunes to update the info on just those files alone, which it did, then, just to be a pain, I selected them all again and removed the "999"
Synced the iPhone and it did just sync up the newly re-encoded, smaller files and that's when i saw that i'd freed up over 12gb.
Out of interest are you a Mac or PC user?
This little experiment sounds ripe for creating a little AppleScript or even Automator iTunes plugin.