Dubstepforum.com

Stream:

If you record from the stream then save your files at 64kbps mono. I have seen stream recordings saved at 196kbps which is wasting lots of space. Rinse streams at 64kbps so saving anything higher is pointless.


FM Broadcast:

If you record from FM radio then save your files at 96kbps mono. This will save lots of disk space. Rinse broadcasts at 96kbps so saving anything higher is pointless.




Big up Chef, Darkside and Drange for the kbps details etc

If you were to record as a wav file then you would get the equivalent of 96kbps, if you record at 96kbps you will get substantially less than that mark. It is the same idea as if you re-encode mp3 files. If you start off with a 192kbps file convert to wav again to downgrade it to lets say 128 kbps, you have two loads of encoding and despite the file saying it is a 128 kbps file infact the quality will be less because you have made a 128kbps file of a 192kbps file.

same idea as constantly re-saving jpgs

Thanks for the info Deapoh ... I was never sure what the stream was broadcasting at ... with the mono/stereo its best to just record a mono file to start with yeah ?

Dunno about others but I record as a .wav first so I can normalize the level before encoding in a seperate app. with LAME enc.

ive wondered y people have put up 192's b4!1 i thought hang on the stream is no way 192....

like the radio 1 stream is bout 50 kbps...

ProtocolX wrote:ive wondered y people have put up 192's b4!1 i thought hang on the stream is no way 192....

like the radio 1 stream is bout 50 kbps...

Yeah thats what I thought. Some files are ridiculously big for no reason.


Doomstep: I have to chat to you on IRC sometime bout saving in wav and that. It sounds like I should start doing this and as scoz said it's better.

the wiley - kode9 set was recorded at 220kbs and came out to a 200mb download. big up to whomever knocked it out, but please no more 220kbs. it's bandwidth murder.

thats wierd because i swear i have listened to exact broadcasts coming from the same stream, then recorded at 64 and at 156 or 192, and the higher bitrate sounds better.

i could care less about space personally, i know it is a problem for server space eventually.but for me i cannot even listen to a poor recording.

than there could be a placebo effect for me...

i'll look into this

Speak with Darks or Drange. The stream is 64kbps... I dunno how it could sound "better" at a higher bitrate...

Is there a reason why the stream is so bad lately?
Was there a change, did they deliberatley decide to bring down the sound quality?

Because this is barely listenable, it has not been this bad before.

Just curious, I hope its not just me getting these results from the stream.

It's on FM like this.. the levels are too loud and the bass is distorting the audio. It happend once before and if I remember correct Darkside fixed it.

ahhh....alrighty.

was just curious, thanks.

Hmmm...the past several times I've had Rinse streaming, Windows Media Player picked it up as 40kbps.

Yeah, The N-TYPE show was frustrating yesterday as it sounded shite for at least a third of the show

Deapoh wrote:Speak with Darks or Drange. The stream is 64kbps... I dunno how it could sound "better" at a higher bitrate...

scoz and alex already explaind this - but maybe they weren't clear enough
i'll try to explain it in simple words:

when you record rinse stream - basically you are recording wav - and then you compres it to XXXkbps. and during every compresion you lose quality. so even if you compres it to 320kbps you lose a bit of original(64kbps or 96kbps) quality.
so if you encode it in higher bitrate you will have better quality no matter what is the original quality.

but, yes - there is no sence to encode 64kbps stream in 320kbps.. because you gain little quality and lose a lot of space/bandwith..

problably 128kbps mp3 for 64kbps stream, and 192kbps mp3 for 96kbps FMstream is optimal.

just double the original recorded bitrate - and quality lost will be very small (i think so..) and you will not spend too much space/bandwith

i'm pretty sure i won't be able to get my recordings much smaller without losing quality. i will do some tests tonight with the distance set and see what happens.

boomnoise wrote:i'm pretty sure i won't be able to get my recordings much smaller without losing quality. i will do some tests tonight with the distance set and see what happens.

bigup professor boomnoise

Big up all the massive that record the shows and upload them, your large!!!

Right, there aint much point stream recordings above 96 to 128 kbps. It wont make it sound no better than the original sound source is.

Save recordings direct from the FM at woteva you want, we dont transmit in kbps or nothing were analogue, id say anything above 192 isn' needed.

Last thing, make sure its mono, we're transmitting in mono so saving files as stereo just takes up more file space than neccesary.

Prsonally I save my ALL my recordings at 128 bit rate, 32000 sample rate and in mono.

Hopefully the levels should be sorted soon, its hard getting the right balance on the comp for vinyls, cd's, dubs, grime, house music, dubstep etc.

DJ Chef wrote:Last thing, make sure its mono, we're transmitting in mono so saving files as stereo just takes up more file space than neccesary.

this is VERY important!!!
cos (if my logic is good) - it will double the quality of your recording!