MP3 - related utilities

[ddrueding]

MP3Tag is the easiest and most powerful ID3 tag editor i've ever seen, and it's pretty too.

Anyone have suggestions for a MP3 web server app?

 

[Groltz]

ID3-TagIT is the MP3 tag editor that I've used. Freeware.

 

[Mercutio]

Maybe I'm dense, but what's the point of these tools? ID3 tags are wrong sometimes. So what?
Is there some element of organization that I don't understand?

 

[ddrueding]

Maybe I'm dense, but what's the point of these tools? ID3 tags are wrong sometimes. So what?
Is there some element of organization that I don't understand?

These tools simply make identifying and correcting tags easier. For me, it's mostly about ripping CDs I have that aren't in the CDDB (tango imported from Buenos Aires, etc) and these tools make naming them after a bulk rip much easier. But I can also see their use if you have aquired significant amounts of music from the internet and want to standardize the naming conventions of the tracks, sort into folders, etc.

 

[Mercutio]

When I run across a disc that isn't in CDDB (happens often, as there aren't a lot of classical listeners among contributors to FreeDB or Gracenote), I add it myself. Takes five minutes.
When I store files on a fileserver, I symlink it in ever relevant way I can think of so that I can access a file structure by performer, composer or major works contained on an album. This also takes about 5 minutes and gives me amazing flexibility for finding any particular piece of music.

Operating systems with filesystems that don't understand symlinks are fucking retarded.

 

[ddrueding]

I'm looking for a program (free is really nice) to convert a whole bunch of WMA and m4a files to mp3. Does anyone have a suggestion?

 

[Mercutio]

dbPowerAmp

 

[sechs]

People still use MP3?

 

[ddrueding]

People still use MP3?

Of course. It's the most prevalent audio format out there that is DRM-free. I won't work with WMA or m4a for that reason; FLAC, APE, etc are too fussy when it comes to playback on different devices.

 

[Mercutio]

I like FLAC, but if I bog a system down enough, playback goes to hell. I like Ogg, since it supports multichannel audio.

Apple Lossless just pisses me off. It won't play in ANYTHING I use. AACs are almost as bad, simply because an AAC is a container format that might have Apple Lossless in it. APE pisses me off, since most of the time APE files are provided as a large file with a CUE instead of as single tracks, and beyond that you get into weird crap like WavePack, which pisses me off because I have to go looking for a converter or something.

dbPowerAmp can convert anything into a non-sucky format. APEs and m4as and AACs and other stupid formats can be changed to something decent with as little as a context-click.

 

[ddrueding]

Thanks Merc, working great. Currently have it batched to a folder of 1300+ WMAs

That should keep one of my cores busy for a while...

 

[sechs]

I like FLAC, but if I bog a system down enough, playback goes to hell.

This is really a comment more on your system than the codec. If you bog any computer down enough, the operating system will go to hell, too.

FLAC doesn't really take remarkably more processing power to decode than something like MP3, but the bitrates are much higher.

 

[Will Rickards]

Still recommend dbPowerAmp for batch conversions? I have a whole lot of wav files I need to get converted to say ogg and make sure they have all the appropriate tags.

 

[Mercutio]

These days I use xrecode, but only the 1.0 product that is freeware. Version 2.0 is nagware and pisses me off.

Nice thing about xrecode is that it'll process .cue files.

FormatFactory is also very nice for batch processing, albeit for a shorter list of formats.

 

[Will Rickards]

Thanks, I'll try formatfactory. It looks easy enough to use.

 

[Will Rickards]

But the quality sucked when converted to ogg.
Playing it through doubletwist.

 

[Will Rickards]

xrecode wins, it let me set ogg to 256Kbps which seems good for me.
The ogg sounds good at this setting and had all the metadata without me touching it.

 

[Mercutio]

But the quality sucked when converted to ogg.
Playing it through doubletwist.

There are options for the various options that you can set. It shouldn't be THAT bad.

I use Format Factory more for video files though. It's very handy for that.

 

[Will Rickards]

I turned the quality all the way up and it was still bad.
I think it is just a bug in that part.

 

[Stereodude]

Still recommend dbPowerAmp for batch conversions? I have a whole lot of wav files I need to get converted to say ogg and make sure they have all the appropriate tags.

Foobar 2000 can do this as well, (with the exception of keeping album art when converting). How do you have wave files with tags though?

 

[timwhit]

I've used CDex in the past. It's done what I've wanted.

 

[Will Rickards]

I don't know how it knew the tag info. But it found the tag info for just about all my albums. The only ones it didn't find were the him albums. It even pulled the album art. My guess is it pulled the info from windows media player.

 

[ddrueding]

CDDB

 

[sechs]

I turned the quality all the way up and it was still bad.
I think it is just a bug in that part.

I find that vorbis always sounds better than an MP3 at about the same bitrate. So, I'd have to agree.

It seems odd that anyone would use anything other than the reference encoder in something resembling commercial software.

 

[fb]

I don't know if this is related to the topic, but if someone wants to compare different sound qualities it's possible here:

http://soundcloud.com/linnrecords

Linn Records put up a few FLAC tunes in CD-quality and different Studio Master qualities. I just wish more and bigger record labels could release their music in studio master quality...