Smaller audio files with almost the same mp3 quality

Just found about this yesterday.

There’s an audio format in town that is almost the same audio quality as mp3 but 80% less the file size!

AACPlus!

aacPlus is widely adopted by many international standardization bodies. aacPlus v2 is specified as the high quality audio codec in 3GPP (3rd Generation Partnership Project), and all of its components are part of MPEG-4. aacPlus v1 is standardized by 3GPP2, ISMA (Internet Streaming Media Alliance), DVB (Digital Video Broadcasting), the DVD Forum, Digital Radio Mondiale, and many others. As an integral part of MPEG-4 Audio, aacPlus is ideal for deployment with the new H.264/AVC video codec standardized in MPEG-4 Part 10.

Example applications
• 3G mobile music and A/V services
• Internet audio for streaming and download
• Digital Radio
• Digital Satellite and Cable broadcasting
• IPTV
• Portable players

Source: Coding technoligies

This audio format is mostly used in audio streaming (internet radio) due to its low bit rate yet light weight format, its the ideal format!

If you’ve tried to listen to online stations, you know they sound grainy if they’re streamed at any less than 128 kilobits per second—maybe 96 kbps if you’re not fussy. That makes a broadband connection a must. But aacPlus sounds nearly as good as a CD, even when it’s compressed enough to play through a dialup line. Don’t take my word for it—see the results of the European Broadcasting Union’s listener tests, in which aacPlus was deemed the “clear winner” at a dialup-friendly 48 kbps.

t seems crazy until you try it, but Mostly Classical proves that aacPlus can sound great at 24 kbps. At 48 kbps, it’s almost as crisp as a CD. At 128 kbps, it can deliver 5.1 channel surround sound. AacPlus works by combining three technologies, each of which shrinks the size of an audio signal. The first is AAC, the Advanced Audio Coding technique that Apple licensed from Dolby for iTunes. AAC analyzes the sound and throws away any data it knows human ears won’t be able to hear, which is a lot. Then, aacPlus adds Spectral Band Replication, which strips out all of the music’s high frequencies and replaces them with a tiny bit of analytical data. AacPlus players reconstruct the highs as a mathematical function of what’s left. As a final space-saving trick, aacPlus tracks are recorded in parametric stereo. Instead of a left and a right channel, one channel is the sum of the left and right signals (L+R), and the other is their difference (L-R). This takes up less bandwidth, and the player can easily flip the two channels back to the original left and right.

Source: www.slate.com

What does this means to me?

Well… smaller file size with ALMOST the same audio quality as an mp3 file = more songs to be carried on your portable player. And my portable player is my nokia 6233. Good thing the Nokia 6233 plays accplus files. NICE!

So 6233 + aacplus = more songs to be played = less battery life! hahahha.

Before I made this post, i tried this new thing first. I made some tests using mp3toaacplus a free mp3 to aacplus converter. (download all the files and read the “Read me”file for instructions). Or you can use Easy CD-DA extractor. U can use it during the trial period. You can buy one if you like how it works. or settle for the free mp3toaaacplus. =>

Ok.. so the main mp3 file is ” This Time” by Jojo. – 4.8 mb (rounded off). I used both mp3toaacplus and Easycd-da extractor to convert the file to an mp4 file with aacplus as its audio format. I chose a bit rate of 32kbit/s, both programs gave an output file of less than 900 kb. The other file formats you see on the picture below are part of my experiment on determining what file formats will best be paired with aacplus.

The winners are: (file format + audio format) aac + accplus and mp4 + aacplus. The sound is ALMOST THE SAME as the original mp3 file. If you’ll ask me if there is a loss in quality. I’ll say YES.. for sure there would be. But if you are not that conscious about a slight change in quality of your file, then you’ll find this great!

I have now 57 mp4 files in my music folder in my 6233. It only uses 55.3 mb on my micro sd! That’s less than 1 mb per file! NICEEEEEEEEEEEE!

The sound.. well as ive said.. with a 32 kbits/s bit rate.. its close to an mp3 file.. If you want better sound and less the file size, just increase the bit rate.. =>

Update:

I use Easy CD-DA extractor. But i learned that the nokia PC suite can convert mp3 to aac. Haven’t tried it though.

Related Posts:

• Windows Media Player AAC+ plugin