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The audio formats with the best sound quality

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The audio formats with the best sound quality

First of all, divide all types of music files into three parts as follows:

Uncompressed file formats: .WAV, .AIFF

Lossless compression formats: .FLAC, .ALAC (Apple Lossless)

Destructive compression formats: .MP3, .AAC, .WMA, .OGG

Below are their respective advantages and disadvantages.

1. Uncompressed file format
Uncompressed music files are just like the concept of Raw files. Essentially no compression will of course have the best sound quality. (The sample rate and bit rate of the original recording are also very important. If the compressed music file is converted to an uncompressed file, the music won’t magically improve the sound quality.)

The most common disadvantage of uncompressed files is the file size. Generally, the file size of a song is around 25 ~ 40 MB. While that capacity is no longer an issue for cloud hard drives, it is still an issue for email. Also big (25MB max for Gmail attachments). Also, some portable music players or devices may not be able to play such music files.

Advantages: original sound reproduction, no compression, lossless, easier to use in post production

Disadvantages: large file format, fewer supported devices

2. Lossless compression format
The term “compressed and lossless” seems contradictory, but compression does not necessarily affect sound quality. More precisely, it’s more like “compressed to save space”. It’s like compressing a high quality file into a .ZIP and decompressing it when you want to use it, the quality of the file will not be affected.

Therefore, this type of file has a compressed capacity, but the file will be decompressed during playback to restore sound quality. Although the concept of reducing capacity without affecting sound quality is great, the downside is that support for this format is extremely low and in order to decompress the file during playback, an additional codec is required to use it, and it will. also take some performance.

Advantages: small file capacity (about 1/2 ~ 1/3 lossless files), good sound quality

Disadvantages: Decompression can eat performance when used, and support from hardware or software is extremely low

3. Destructive compression format
The destructive compression format is currently the most common music file format, the main reason is that it has the greatest compatibility with portable devices (mobile phones, MP3 players, etc.), and the files are small and have a space of limited storage. , users can store more music (compressed capacity is about one-tenth of lossless sound quality), and most of the music provided by today’s streaming media is files in this format. There is always a price to pay for smaller files. Compared to lossless formats, this destructive compression will affect the audio range that the original sound can present and will cause some distortion. So, to be safe, keep the compression rate above 320 kbps as much as possible.

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The best popular audio formats

The best popular audio formats

I looked around the forest of audio formats for normal use and chose the 5 most important ones. It is true that, in part, a bit simplified, a bit rough in presentation. I refrain from differentiating the exact settings of the respective codecs, that would be too complex.

I also don’t want to get into the nasty topic of DRM. The most important one I dropped is probably Vorbis. . Of course, I assume that the correct settings are used when encoding and that a high quality level is selected.

1st place:
MP3 (MPEG-1 Audio Layer 3)

The most widespread digital format, with good encoding (for example, with LAME) in high bit rates, a format of the highest quality and transparency.

Quality (4.5 / 5 points)
Popularity (5/5 points)
Compression (4/5 points)
Total: 13.5

2nd place:
AAC (advanced audio coding)

It became famous especially for its use in the Apple iPod, a codec that has small advantages over MP3 at low bit rates due to technical developments.

Quality (4/5 points)
Popularity (4.5 / 5 points)
Compression (4.5 / 5 points)
Total: 13

3rd place:
WMA (Windows Media Audio)

Windows proprietary format. Of course, Microsoft has the reins here, so variable format doesn’t run on all playback devices. Otherwise, no major strengths and weaknesses and, for example, the standard format with Napster.

Quality (4/5 points)
Popularity (4/5 points)
Compression (4/5 points)

Total: 12

4th place:
FLAC (Free Lossless Audio Codec) !!

As the only lossless codec on this list. FLAC works in something like a ZIP program: the original can be restored from the compressed file by approximately 50% without restrictions. In times of low hard disk space, a real alternative, especially since many playback devices can play this format. My winner of hearts, the popularity will certainly increase in the future.

Quality (5/5 points)
Popularity (3.5 / 5 points)
Compression (3/5 points)

Total: 11.5

5th place:
Wav

The original format of the normal audio CD data. Impeccable quality and still widespread thanks to the well-known compact disc. It actually started out of the competition because it’s completely unzipped.

Quality (5/5 points)
Popularity (5/5 points)
Compression (0/5 points)
Total: 10

Better audio formats

You have decided to digitize the music tracks in your audio CD collection by transferring everything to your computer, and in doing so you have begun to evaluate the possibility of converting them to a more pleasant format for you. However, having little experience in this regard, you would like to receive some advice on the subject so that you can make the best decision. How to say Things are exactly this way and would you like to know if I can help you by indicating what are the best audio formats? Of course yes, that was exactly what he intended to do.

If you allow me a few minutes of your free time, I can actually tell you, by thread and by sign, what are the most popular audio formats in circulation, their strengths and weaknesses and for what uses they may be more or less convenient to contact . condition to opt for those that you think may actually be right for you. To complete the information and to give you an even more complete description of the matter, at the end of the article it will also be my concern to indicate what tools you can use to perform various conversion operations. You will see that after reading this guide, you will no longer have any doubts about what to do.

So? How about putting the talk aside and finally getting to the heart of the matter? You? Brilliant! Therefore, I suggest not wasting any more time and immediately start focusing on the topic. Get comfortable in front of your trusted computer and read everything below. I am sure you can say that you are happy and satisfied with what you have learned. I wish you, as always, happy reading.