Home Page Forums Other Emulator Message Boards Audio Overload AIFF, mp3, or OggVorbis exports in the future?

Hey,

Bannister and co. have done an exceptional job in developing AO over these past few years. One thing I'd love to see implemented in the future, is the option to have the native music files exported to other file formats outside of WAV. I got nothing against the Windows-based music format, it's just that I wish WAV didn't compress the sound so much where it sounds considerably different from the native format.

If this feature can be expanded upon in the future, that would really make my day (btw, thanks sooo much for your work in adding .DSF playback!)!

Huh? WAV export in AO is uncompressed. It is literally exactly the same data that's being sent to the soundcard during playback.

Actually, I'm more curious as to what crack the OP is on that he calls WAV a "Windows-only" format. What the hell?

Edit: It's a good thing he "got nothing" against it, at least.

Erm, yes, what he said. WAV is uncompressed audio.

MP3 export will not happen until the patents covering it expire. Look at the costs on http://www.mp3licensing.com/ if you want to see why. OggVorbis could be done, but I don't see any reason for it. WAV covers all.

I like how MP3Pro costs twice as much as MP3 even though nobody has ever used it in the history of Earth outside of a few demos.

Yeah. I wonder if Thomson/Fraunhofer have tried to enforce those patents against anyone using LAME...? I haven't looked...

Ok, let's go into more detail, yes? The following is referenced from the PS2 track "Flower Garden":



You're right, Belmont, it IS uncompressed; the PSF2 file is a mere 426 KB compared to the WAVs massive 5.1 MB [for just a 30 second clip]. However for some reason, the playbacks are different when you compare the original to the UNCOMPRESSED version played through player like say, iTunes.

Like the CD-Vinyl audio wars before us, even with iTunes volume cranked all the way up (even with SoundCheck on), it can barely achieve even half the decibels when the original is streamed through AO. The reverb and echo effects, appear to be untouched, which is good.



I said "Windows-based" (as in its origins are in Windows) not "Windows-only" (if that were the case, my Mac...forget it).




Wow, patents, you say? Still, what of AIFF? Are there [patent] issues with that as well?

Oh. What you're hearing is that the Mac version of AO *doesn't* compress the WAV output and it does compress it's own playback. This makes AO's playback louder at the expense of losing the dynamics in the source material (this is similar to but less extreme than the "CD loudness wars" which have made it impossible to buy a pop/rock CD since roughly 1998 that uses more than 4 bits of resolution). You can "normalize" the output WAV with something like Audacity and you'll get better volume without hurting the dynamics.

Er, no it doesn't - the Mac version normalizes the output signal to 100% level, but it does *not* do dynamic compression. Quiet bits are just as quiet as they'd be in the original.

Ahh. It sounds pretty dynamic compression-y to me when I enable it.