Bit rate preference

Do you prefer keeping your music at a specific bit rate? I use to keep all mine at 128kbps so I could fit more onto my iPod, but I soon found out that when I played those files on my stereo (loudly, of course) that there was a fair bit of distortion.
Since then if I am ripping CDs i rip them to 160kbps and I will allow files up to 256kpbs into my library, on the rare occasion I was have some that are 320kbps.
What bitrate and/or file type do you use or recommend to other users?

You might find this article interesting, you'll get an extensive comparison of the AAC and MP3 formats and bit rates benchmarked against CD format: Planet of Sound - Quality of AAC audio and MP3

Similar Messages

How can I download music from itunes store at a higher bit rate than 128k?

I have been able to import music from cd's at bit rates higher than 128kbs by clicking into the preferences item under the "edit" drop down menu. however, I have not been able to locate a similar command for itunes music downloads. is it possible to increase the bitrate of music downloads from itunes faster than 128kbps? if so, how?
gateway Windows XP AMD 64

No, store downloads have always been ONLY 128 kbps. With new deal between EMI & Apple, sometime next month you will be able to download EMI artists only at a higher bitrate without the DRM, for a slightly higher price. For now, though, all downloads are still 128 kbps. Your import settings only affect the CD's you rip your self. Hope this helps.

How can I reduce the bit rate of songs in my Music Library to enable me to

At the moment i can only fit about 1300 songs on my iphone and also have used up half the space on my 120gb Classic with 7000 songs which is a lot less than what i was told would fit on. so............
How can I reduce the bit rate of songs in my Music Library to enable me to fit more songs onto my iPhone or iPod Classic.. and what is the minimum rate that i should stick to in order to retain good sound quality.

For existing tracks, see:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1550
For CDs you import in the future, change the Import settings in the iTunes -> General preferences.
As to what will be a good bit rate, that's going to be up to you and what quality you find acceptable, but many people find that 128 kbps AAC is the optimum balance between small file size and quality.

Bit rate too high

I have been encoding a DVD all day, using the same settings (DVDSP's factory default for an SD DVD). I then had to replace some footage in one of the videos and that is when I strating getting the message about the bit rate being too high. The replaced footage was the same duration as the previous media and no additional video effects or audio were added.
I searched forums which suggested that I should delete a dvdstudiopro.plist file, but I can't find this file! I am running OS Lion 10.7.4 and the latest version of DVD Studio Pro.
Any ideas? (Thanks in anticipation)
Mike

The file is in: your user name/Library/Preferences.
Alternatively, you can download this free tool, which will remove the file for you and provides the option to backup your FCS Preference files.
Mac OS X Lion hides the Library directory by default, to access it temporarily bring Finder to the front, hold the Option key and select it from the Go menu bar item.
To have permanent access type the following into Terminal:
chflags nohidden ~/Library/
execute the command by pressing Return.

Unwanted automatic decrease in bit-rate upon saving. How do I fix this?

Hello all,
After a recent, unexpected computer crash, Audition seems to have lost all of my previously programmed presets and preferences causing one quirk in particular I wish to fix as soon as possible. Please help!!
When working with any MP3 file, as I make changes to the file in Edit view and simply hit ctrl+s, every time I do so a message prompt comes up saying "You may be saving to a compressed (lossy) format. Be sure to keep a backup of your original file if you wish to preserve full audio fidelity." After that, it proceeds to save the changes while at the same time decreases the bit-rate of the file to between 80-96kbps down from 128, 192, etc. It has never done this before, usually it would just make the save without altering the bit-rate also. I'm searching the menus everywhere to find a checkbox that I may have had un-checked before but has gone back to the default since the crash, but can find nothing. I really do not want this automatic downsampling to continue, in order to get around it I have to Save As every time, which makes for a lot more work having to delete the old copies and keep track of which are the edited versions I wish to keep. I work with tons of files, so this gets difficult.
I am using Adobe Audition 3.0 Build 7283.0 on a Vista PC.
I can't thank you enough for any help you might be able to offer. Here's a screenshot of the message itself: http://img809.imageshack.us/img809/8558/ausc.jpg
Melissa R.

Hello SteveG,
Thank you for your prompt reply. Ah yes, I am aware of such a feature in the mp3 options menu, but do you know why my copy of Audition is behaving in this way and how I can get it back to the way it was? Saving As does save the file with the criteria I prefer, but it creates an extra copy that I'd like to avoid since cleaning up the previous versions of each file that are no longer needed can take a lot of work since the folders that contain them I work with are very large, having to be searched by hand to remove the unedited copies.
As where if I hit Save before it would just overwrite the file avoiding creating two of the same file (one with edits the other without), leaving its bit-rate intact instead of reducing it by as much as half at times. Having that aspect of Audition working again would be very helpful!
Thanks again,
Melissa R.

320 & 128 bit rate in iPhone.

I haven't found an option that lets you choose the bit rate you want to convert your music to in my iPhone. All my music is 320 bit rate or lossless... So it's going to take a chunk of space. I'm converting the music I want on my iPhone to a 128 bit rate and throwing that in a playlist to sync to my phone... which I really don't want to do because now I have the same albums twice and it's makes my library messy. Any quick fix or solutions?

I can't speak for iPods cause I never bought one. I've always been the kind of person who rather have one device (Moto Razr V3i w/ iTunes) then two devices (reg. phone and an iPod). My phone would covert the music to 128 bit rate to optimize space. It would make sense that apple would give us an option to convert the size of our music files to optimize space as well. This making duplicate albums in two different bit rates is a hassle! Unless you've gone into Edit > Preferences > Advanced > Importing... the music you rip on your computer is going to be a defult ACC 128 bit rate format. Which there is nothing wrong with. If you share music with friends and they don't have iTunes there's going to be an issue. So I changed my encoder to MP3 and also adjusted the audio quality. You tend to lose lower frequencies when music is ripped at a low bit rate.

Is it possible to raise the bit rate of songs higher than 256 on iTunes? If not what should i use or do to raise the bit rate of songs?

Is it possible to raise the bit rate of songs higher than 256 on iTunes? If not what should i use or do to raise the bit rate of songs?

Songs you rip from CD can have their bitrate increased to a maximum of 320Kbps from the iTunes preferences; alternatively, the default encoder can be changed to a lossless one. Songs from other sources have a fixed maximum bitrate.
(67928)

Bit rate too high error

hi,
i am trying to burn my project which has 2 videos of 10 minutes each.
one of those videos has 19 sub-menus, which are very simple pages with nothing more than a button that says play (leading to the 2nd video). I also have 19 subtitle streams. all the video was encoded in compressor and the audio is ac3.
for bit rate setting i am using 6 and a max at 7. still getting error. not sure what the next step is here. the total i see as the project in terms of space looks like only 800 megs so i am not sure why i am getting this error. please help. thanks.

Try trashing your preference and getting rid of any PAR file associated with the disc and rebuild. Delete your old asset from the import window and trash it on your computer as well. If that doesn't work I would build the project from scratch and try again. Im looking for the data rates for a subtitle but I cant find it right now. But 6 mb/s CBr should be good.

Encoding error- Muxing bit rate too high

hi,
i am trying to burn my project which has 2 videos of 10 minutes each.
one of those videos has 19 subtitled tracks and simple sub-menus. All the video was encoded in compressor and i tried both a VBR and CBR. I am only using audio that is AC3. For bit rate setting i am using 6 and a max at 7. The muxing craps out about 33% though. When i open the last file in MPEG Clipstream, i can see it dumps out at about 8 minutes but there is nothing on any of the subtitle streams that appears out of place. Total project is under 1 gig in terms of space so i am not sure why i having problems. i also posted this on the dvdsp forum but so far, no one has been able to help solve the issue. please help. thanks.

Eric suggested:
"Try trashing your preference and getting rid of any PAR file associated with the disc and rebuild. Delete your old asset from the import window and trash it on your computer as well. If that doesn't work I would build the project from scratch and try again. Im looking for the data rates for a subtitle but I cant find it right now. But 6 mb/s CBr should be good."
What happened when you tried this?

How do I change the bit rate for dls?? How times can I download one song??

I'm new to iTunes. I already downloaded 3 songs when I realized that the default bit rate is 128Kbps. I tried changing the bit rate to 192Kbps with a (Variable Bit Rate) checked.....unfortunately when I downloaded the next 2 songs the bit rate turned out to be the same.
Do I have to restart Windows or iTunes before downloading again?
And now that I have 5 songs with a lower br than I wanted... in order for me to have(download) the song at the higher bit rate...Is it possible to download one song more than once?
Thanx.

You have no choice as to bit rate when purchasing from the iTunes Music Store. The official bit rate of all tracks there is 128 kbps (a very few have been reported to be at higher rates, but that's not a choice you can make, it's how the track was encoded by the record company). The setting in the iTunes Importing preference is for tracks you import from CDs only and has no effect on iTMS purchases.
Is it possible to download one song more than once?
No. Except in extraordinary circumstances, the iTMS allows only one download per purchase.
Forum Tip: Since you're new here, you've probably not discovered the Search feature available on every Discussions page, but next time, it might save you time (and everyone else from having to answer the same question multiple times) if you search a couple of ways for a topic before you post a question.
Regards.

What are the Bit Rates of the Music Store and Podcasts?

What is the bit rate quality and format of a song downloaded in the Music Store? And podcasts? Are they perfect, Apple Lossless quality or what...?

This might be true, but you won't experience any improvement in sound quality. Here's some info on bit rates:
This was originally posted by the incredible Sparky the wUnderdog
"As a general principle, you can fit more CDs on your iPod if you encode at lower bitrates (making smaller files), but at the cost of audio quality. Lossless promises to capture all the data on the original CD (thus preserving quality) but coded so the file takes half the space. MP3 and AAC (an implementation of variable bit rate MP4) both eliminate some of the information on the CD in order to compress the digital recording into ever smaller files--the lower the bitrate, the smaller the file, but smaller files mean more information lost and consequent poorer sound quality.
iTunes's MP3 encoder is so-so; the LAME encoder is better at preserving sound fidelity to the original. AAC files ripped in iTunes certainly sound better than its MP3s, with audio quality close to the best LAME MP3s at higher bitrates. With the type of music I listen to most often, sound quality declines substantially as bitrates fall below 256kbps, but LAME or AAC @ 256kbps sounds pretty darned good, and at 320kbps LAME alt-preset-insane is amazingly faithful to the original. However many users claim that with the music they listen to they can't hear the difference between 192 or even 128 kbps files and the original CD source, so they naturally choose higher compression rates to fit more "songs" on their iPods.
CDs take approximately 10MB per minute of music; Apple lossless takes 5MB/minute; LAME insane takes 2.5MB/min; AAC or MP3 at 256kbps take 2MB/min; and iTunes Store files (AAC@128kbps) take 1MB/min. At these rates, a 20GB iPod (really 18.6GB) can hold anywhere from 30 hours to over 300 hours of music. (iPod marketers express this potential playback capacity as "songs," figuring 4 minutes per song--thus 300 hours at 128kbps = 4500 "songs.") You will need to listen to samples ripped with different bitrates and codecs to determine the optimum tradeoff point for you between quality & quantity. It's worth taking some time to do this at the start as it sure beats reripping everything in your collection 2 or 3 times to get it right later.
So far as convenience goes, nothing beats iTunes's one-step process. To change bitrate as you import from CD, go to the iTunes menu > Edit > Preferences, select the Importing tab, choose AAC or MP3 encoder in the "import using" selection box, then choose "Custom" in the "setting" box, and the window permitting bitrate selection will pop up. If you choose iTunes MP3 encoder, at least use VBR (variable bit rate) to maximize the sound quality. (VBR increases sample size as data complexity increases.)
If you would prefer LAME MP3s, fear not, for the easy-to-use CDex ripping software is a free download and requires only one simple extra step to get the files into iTunes for transfer to your iPod. Now if AAC sound quality is comparable to LAME MP3, you might wonder why you should even consider LAME: Because of portability to other devices. At present, hardly anything but iPods can read AACs or Apple Lossless, but almost everything reads MP3s. So if you plan to burn CDs of your compressed files for playback on your home or car CD player (for instance), it would be wise to choose MP3.
One other consideration specific to the iPod: It has a 32MB cache. If you choose a compression rate that results in large files (i.e. lossless), then the cache won't hold very much 'music' and the hard drive will have to spin up frequently to fill it, and that will shorten your battery life somewhat."
JC

Bit Rate Not Working

I'm setting my bit rate differently and it is not affecting the size of the file. I'm setting the main bit rate (not Max), and I'm in an SD session setting the SD settings. Any ideas why it might not be making any difference on the file size. I've tried the lowest bit rate and the worst motion setting and it still makes no difference of the file size.

Welcome to the Boards
Your best bet is to encode video outside of DVD SP using Compressor or other encoder and not set it in DVD SP. Take a look at page 66, changing preferences will not reencode assets already bought it. YOu can delete the asset and PAR files, or better yet, duplicate the .MOV with a new name then use the newly named asset and place it in the track.
But using Compressor helps avoid having to jump through those hoops.

Best average bit rate & max bit rate for DVDs playing on laptops...

I encode and burn many DVDs for use in regular DVD players....usually in the half hour range and have been encoding with Compressor 3 using these specs:
6.6 average bit rate
7.8 max bit rate
Those same DVDs, which play flawlessly in the DVD players, can occasionally hiccup when played from a laptop. Should I change the max bit rate from 7.8 to 7.7. or lower? Is that the biggest part of the equasion that may affect a laptop's ability to play without choking?
Many thanks,
John

Thanks for all your help, David S, but the point is
that I have tried many different bit rates, from 4.0
to 7.0, and I don't have time to waste all day trying
different bit rates for an 8-minute project.
My main question is: Why would it work fine on all
of my other short projects, including the 8-minute
one, and then when I cut out 20 seconds of that same
project, it starts screwing up!?!
I am going to try trashing my preferences. It is
starting to seem like a corrupt pref file to me.
It turned out to be a corrupt pref file, as I thought. Thanks for your many, many questions, David S.

Transferring CDs at 320 bit rate

I'm transferring several CDs to iTunes (7.5). For a few of the classical ones, I've set iTunes for AAC and custom (320 kbps and 48 kHz) and Variable Bit Rate unchecked. I presumed this would produce the highest quality (?). After transferring, most of the songs are listed at less than 320 (i.e. 311, 309, 298, etc).
1. Why is this?
2. Should I be using different settings?
Thanks for any suggestions. HNick

I think you will find that at certain bit rates with the AAC encoder, the variable setting is a default setting and cannot be changed.
To see what I mean, go to your import preferences and select the 320kbps setting.
Now put a check mark in the variable box and the kbps setting will immediately change to 128.
Now try to select 320kbps from that list and you will see it's 'greyed out' and cannot be selected.
It's one of the reasons I am still using the mp3 encoder.

Changing bit rate from 128 to 192

I'm getting shure e4 headphones and want to experience the full potential of its sound, so i want to change the bit rate from standard 128 to 192. Can anyone give me directions on how to do this? also can you adjust bit rate to higher than 192?

You don't say which file format you are using but regardless, this is how to change your Import settings. Open iTunes go to iTunes>Preferences>Advanced>Importing. Once there, from the "Import Using" menu pick the encoder you want to use and below that from "Setting" choose "Custom" and in the box that appears choose the bit rate you want. Both MP3 and AAC formats will let you choose up to a bit rate of 320 kbps

Bit rate preference

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