[CLUE-Tech] better ogg sound quality

[Sean LeBlanc]

On 05-30 12:57, Timothy C. Klein wrote:
> * Sean LeBlanc (seanleblanc at americanisp.net) wrote:
> > On 05-28 21:06, Jeffery Cann wrote:
> > > Warning:  newbie @ linux sound
> > > 
> > > I have been using grip to rip CDs into ogg vorbis format.  For certain types 
> > > of music, the reproduction has a lot of distortion.  I am using grip 
> > > (cdparanoia) to rip the CD and oggenc to encode the rip'd wav files.  I also 
> > > tried cdda2wav and the results were similar.
> > > 
> > > Here's the oggenc command line specified in grip:
> > > 
> > > -o %m -a "%a" -l "%d" -c "genre=%G" -b "%b" -d "%y" -N "%t" -t "%n" %w
> > > 
> > > Most of these values have to do with track, title, etc. and the values of "%x" 
> > > are specified by dialog boxes in the grip gui.  
> > > 
> > > The -b specifies the bit rate.  I am under the misconception that a higher bit 
> > > rate = better sound reproduction.  I have tried encoding the same song at 4 
> > > different bit rates, from 128 to 387 kbps - all sound similar and have the 
> > > same distortions.
> > > 
> > > BTW - I can play the CD through the same speakers as the ogg file is played 
> > > and there is no distortion, so I can rule out speakers / sound card as the 
> > > source
> > > 
> > > So, how can I get better quality?  Is my rip from the CD the problem?  It 
> > > seems likely since the different encoding bit rate didn't seem to affect 
> > > things too much (the higher rates do sound better, but the distortion is 
> > > always there).
> > > 
> > > Maybe I should dispense with Grip and do it on the command line?
> > > 
> > > I'm open to suggestions.
> > 
> > Jeff,
> > 
> > Are you sure that digital audio extraction on your drive is supported? I
> > know some rippers will resort to analog if the drive does not support it. In
> > my experience, analog rips sound like crap. I'm not sure what cdda2wav does
> > in this case. Can you resort to the command line, just rip a track, and play
> > the resulting wav? If that's crappy, it's not encoding that is your problem. 
> > 
> > Zonker might be on to something with the copy-protection scheme. Do you have
> > a green marker? ;)
> > 
> 
> This kind of confuses me. The cdparanoia FAQ specifically states that it
> NEVER uses analog, "The data never comes anywhere near the soundcard,
> and does not pass through any conversion to analog first." It doesn't
> mention any caveats. A little web search brought up some info about DAE,
> which apparently not all drives support, but cdparanoia (and I think
> cdda2wav) seems to only need a CDDA capable drive. Aren't all CD audio
> drives CDDA? Am I really confused?

I should have said that "some *Windows* rippers resort to analog". I used to
have a company laptop that didn't have a DAE capable CD drive in it.
MusicMatch Jukebox did analog rips as a result...when I finally got around
to listening to them, it was like listening to a realaudio stream over a 14K
dial-up, only worse. :) This was back in 1998 or 1999 timeframe.  As I said,
I don't know what cdda2wav or others in the *nix world do when they bump up
against drives with no DAE.

-- 
Sean LeBlanc:seanleblanc at americanisp.net  
http://users.americanisp.net/~seanleblanc/
Get MLAC at: http://sourceforge.net/projects/mlac/
If you can't laugh at yourself, make fun of other people.