The file format that inspired millions of downloads hopes to inspire music fans to do something else: buy more speakers. Now officially released by the Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits IIS and Thomson, coinventors of the MP3 format, the new MP3 Surround supports 5.1 multichannel sound. "We asked ourselves, where can music go?" explains Henri Linde, Thomson's vice president of new business, intellectual property, and licensing. "It seemed that surround sound was the logical evolution for us." To encourage people to exploit the multichannel advantages of the new file format, free MP3 Surround encoders will be available until the end of 2005. After that, the encoders will be subject to typical licensing fees. Read the rest of the article at PC Mag. | Download codec.
I wonder if anybody will actually pay for licenses? OGG Vorbis has been multichannel and free for years now. Not to mention the fact that it's got a better compression to quality ratio than MP3... go figure.
This'll be interesting for sure. MP3's been the main music format, but with OGG and even WMA formats available, MP3 starts looking like it needs some weight loss and/or new features. Paying for something...I dunno, especially when there are good free alternatives out there makes it really tough to justify. For me, WMA works fine, and seems to have good sound overall, and supposedly can do a better job than an MP3 at an equivalent bitrate. They're also a little smaller.
I'm gonna go .ogg when I get a job and start buying CD's again Quality is noticably better. Even on my MiniDisc player you can tell a slight difference
Yeah, I like ogg a lot better than WMA, mainly because it is a lower-loss algorythm and it isn't bound by DRM. Have you ever noticed that WMA audio goes in and out of phase in the high range? It's even more noticable through 4.1 or greater sound systems. Most people probably don't notice it, but I'm a bit of an audiophile.
*AAC is very good with the same sound quality @ 128Kb as *MP3 @ 192kb. Also smaller file size too, pity only works with iPods.
AAC is indeed a very good codec, and better in every way than WMA, which is the most readily comparible codec. They're both designed more for DRM (read: corperate licensing considerations) than for audio capabilities. I still prefer either variable bitrate OGG or MP3-Pro though, because AAC uses some weird scaling/dithering algorythms that don't sound right at certain frequency ranges. You're not supposed to be able to perceive of the imperfections with the human ear, but in practice you really can.
