I'm converting music files from ogg to wav....128 megs per song!!??

as a conversion from ogg to ACC runs 9 megs and MP3runs four megs per song and Flack runs 18-25 megs...what's up with MS wav files?

I'm using sound converter BTW

Strange things are happening! Dumped the the conversion that was handing me 128 megs per song and tried again. They averaged around 25 megs this time. Compared to M4a which run around 5 megs a song.
25 megs a song tells me that i'm a M4a kind of guy... with M4a kinda hard drive space!

Converting to opus codex now. early on it looks kinda like they will take up the kind of space I can afford.

You will have to check the bit-rates and the KHz as well. CD quality is 44 KHz
WAV files are uncompressed files, so they are always bigger and sound better.

Depends on the codec chosen for the WAV encoding, but typically when people say 'WAV' what they really mean is 'PCM', or plain-old 16-bit digital encoding, which is as fat as you can get audio, but also as close to the original analog signal as you can get; CDs are typically recorded as 16-bit 44 KHz PCM stereo.

Here's the rub with doing format conversions: EVERY format conversion introduces noise, or more accurately 'generation loss'. To convert from PCM to e.g. ACC (as long as you are resampling e.g. changing sampling resolution or sample rate as well) requires a single conversion step and so the distortion introduced is relatively low. However, to convert from ACC to e.g. MP3 requires a minimum of TWO steps: one to get from ACC to an intermediate PCM format, and a second to get from the intermediate PCM format to MP3. This is made even worse if both the source and destination formats are lossy compression formats (as here). In principle, converting between loss-less formats should avoid the 'generation loss' issues, but in practice there is almost always some, although loss-less format conversions tend to fair far better than lossy ones.

If you keep re-sampling the original file, it shouldn't introduce noise, correct?
like:

• SongA - sampled to Mp3
• SongA - sampled to WAV

If you take SongA and sample it to Mp3, then sample the Mp3 to M4a then there might be some noise introduced.

that's basically what i'm doing Booman/ I ripped my CD's to ogg and work off those original rips to gain other formats.

here are the choices offered by 'sound converter' MP3, MP4, ogg, flac. , opus, AC3. wav.

I think there's another one but can't check while Sound Converter is running

Tomorrow, Once I've finished converting from Ogg to Opus, then I'll post what options I have available to me in Sound converter.
(Anyone know of a better converter?) I couldn't find one in package manage.
PS3 "Says it will play AAC files, but it seems them, lists them perfectly , will even sort them, but it won't play them.

It's been a real pain!! I'm trying to use a micro SD 64 gig chip to store and play the music I have on the PS3. But the PS3 ONLY copies files to the native PS3 Music file, it offers on choice as to where you eave them!

so first I have to load 32 gigs to the PS3, music file. Then I can copy them from the PS3 music file to either my thumb drive OR my Mirco SSD. MP3 will work, AAC will not. There are some words in the on line manual, But I'm not sure I have properly understood them. I'll post tomorrow with pics and more info.
Perhaps at that time someone will guide me in the arcane magic of file conversion."}

I rip CDs directly to FLAC, which I find to be a superior format. The files tend to be on the big side, but not as big as .wav files.

FLAC is a lossless format, and there is very little if any noticeable difference between a properly created FLAC file and the original CD. I was in the high end audio world in my former life, and my 'semi'-expert ears still prefer analog, but for digital formats, FLAC is quite good.

As I have a 2T external usb drive and lot's of time...I'm converting to as many format as I can. However I'm afraid it's to late to turn away from ogg as my base source.

300+ albums is more that I want to rip again unless I can get live in person performances out of it! ":O}

Opus needed to be restarted...I should probably break my collection into 10 gig pieces for S.C to convert. i would lose less that way when Sound converter locks up...which it does 30% of the time.
Opus is doing something interessting1

rather than simply convert, it's creating a ogg + opus file, Seems it's working more closely with ogg ..."in some way"/

I'm not an 'expert' on file formats, but I have investigated them in the past, and I know what sounds good to me. If any of the technical info I give you isn't quite correct, I hope someone will chime in, although I doubt the information would be radically wrong.

As I remember, .ogg isn't really an audio format by itself; it's a *container or framework* for an audio codec. There are several that are used with .ogg, the most notable was Vorbis, which I think is a separate project. Its value is that it can stream several media streams at once, like video+audio+text. It is used more in browsers than in dedicated music players, I think.

Ogg+Opus isn't a particularly high-quality combination; it's a lossy format primarily for spoken word and low-quality audio, because it has a fairly low [although variable] bitrate. I'm not sure what its highest bitrate is, but iirc its purpose isn't to save your audio collection forever.

I don't think that would be the combination you'd want for your music, but if space is an issue, I could understand it.

I think it would be better to figure out how your particular app would make Ogg+FLAC, [I'm pretty sure that can be done] because the *primary purpose* of FLAC is to make archived copies of music CDs.

But for you, Dan, your ORIGINAL choice of format is the most important; what did you use? If it was ogg+vorbis or ogg+opus, you encoded to lossy formats. If you are lucky, you ripped your CDs to ogg+PCM, which is a non-lossy format that is similar to the original .wav files on the CD, like Chris told you in his post. Then, you have all of the bits, and you could convert to FLAC, which is really, really where you want to go. [But I don't think you did this, from what you've said] If you used .ogg+opus, what bitrate did you convert to? You can probably find out in the 'properties' metadata in the files.

So the big question is: when you ORIGINALLY ripped your CDs, what format did you use [remember, ogg isn't an audio format, it's a container within which an audio format operates]

[You might have a new hobby. 300 CDs aren't really THAT much now, are they? Rip directly to FLAC, you won't be disappointed]

A lot of games use .ogg because its an open format.
Like Frets On Fire, which is open source.
I've always used Mp3 because the files are smaller due to lossy compression, but you can adjust the amount of compression and bit-rate so they are just as high quality as CD's

It really depends on how you want to play back these albums.
if you are using VLC, then it will play just about any file format video or audio.

That's true, yes. As long as the original file doesn't suffer any bit-rot you should be good.

I like that "bit-rot"
Cool name for a game

its amazing to think of degradation with digital media, but I understand what is happening. Recompressing and recompressing over and over can create noise. Just like with a jpg that keeps getting compressed over and over.
Reminds me of analog media

Much to think on, much to re great! ":O} Back when I knew even less than i do now.. I ripped to ogg-verbose, upon some long ago recommendation.

Here's my real problem I want to put my music on my PS3, Computer and my Roku streamer. Flac is not a problem for my computer as I have a Drive (90 gigs) I use just for music. Roku will except Flac, but I'd have to have a huge usb thumb drive...And as always cash is at a premium

But the PS3 and the Roku both have access problems as well as space and Codex limitations. The PS3 and the Roku don't except the same codex. I can only load to The PS3 by way of my USB thumb drive ( 64 gigs) and Space wise I can only load to the SD micro chip (64 gigs) I've installed to save my hard drive space for games.

The Roku like wise can only except music from a USB dive that must be left in as the Roku player has no hard drive.
So whatever I do moving files around I have to end up with the USB in the Roku. And come at under 64gigs of space.

Which was twice my current needs...until you came around with all your fancy talk sabout lossy and lossless!! LOL

In any case for whatever reason "Sound Conveter" does like trying to convet to flac from ogg and keeps messing up. I may need a better converter if there is one?

Thank you TR. I really appreciate your taking the time to set me straight on the basics at lest.

Yeah, I think you mean Ogg Vorbis, which is a lossy format. I think that you are aware that the purpose of lossy formats is not file fidelity - it's file compression. You can strike a fair balance between the two by tweaking the encoding settings, but the data loss is there, nonetheless. [and it's permanent; you can't get the bits back, ever]. This is most noticeable in the frequencies that are close to the boundaries of the human-audible range - i.e. the extreme lows and the extreme highs. Lossy formats use a formula, an algorithm, that cuts the bits in those ranges out to some degree; this saves tons of storage, and keeps the majority of the data intact. This can be an audible difference, or not - it depends on the listener. My ears are still hearing well into those ranges, more then the average listener, so I can generally hear the difference. Yours may or may not.

Lossy formats were more important in the days of high-cost data storage. That isn't so much the case anymore, with cheap, high capacity drives. Now, folks are more interested in archival storage and fidelity to the original source.

Like Chris said, every generation of conversion adds noise and other defects to the sound; the only way to avoid that is to encode from the original sources, which are your CDs themselves.

Question:

I have ogg as I orginally ripped to ogg. Since then I have always used ogg as my base file and converted from ogg to whatever else I can. Wilii this still induce data rot?

I'm considering re ripping my CD's to flack and working from flac as my base file. In this case would I retain everything or would I have to rip from CD for each format I wished to use?

Here as a few of the choices that Sound converter offers"

Sorry about the duplicate. I'll leave them in case one of use is cross-eyed":O}