The mp3 format is better or worse than the other formats?
Some people often say, and almost always in a connoisseur’s tone, that the mp3 format is obsolete and old and that it sounds worse.
This is not necessarily a truth.
The reality, to start with the real thing, is that a 320 kbps mp3 that is based on good quality original audio will sound so good that only 1% could even slightly tell the difference.
Multiple investigations have been conducted, even with hearing trained personnel, and it has been found that an mp3 that exceeds 192 kbps can have such good sound that it is very difficult to distinguish when compared to high quality audio without compression or loss.
This means you don’t have to run around looking for a new format and convert your mp3s to that format, which would also be a mistake, because converting one format to another will never make it sound better.
Mp4Gain for example can not only convert between formats, but at the same time add processes that make the volume sound more even between the different mp3 files and also the quality improves or at least sounds better to your ears.
But this is the result of a series of processes added together and not just a conversion from one format to another or changing one bitrate to another.
The same is true for video file formats like mp4, webm, etc.
Mp4Gain can optimize them to match loudness or volume levels, but it’s not just as a result of converting one format to another or setting them all to X bitrate. It is a slightly more complex phenomenon.
