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Re: wavpack ???
by Michael Chapman-4
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Rate this Message:
On Thursday 20 March 2008 8:31 pm, you wrote:
> On Thu, Mar 20, 2008 at 4:22 PM, Kevin Cosgrove <kevinc@...>
wrote:
> > Has any thought been given to adding WavPack <http://www.wavpack.com/>
> > support to SoX? I'd really like to be able to store my files in
> > WavPack format and convert them to something else without needing
> > to first go through the WAV format. I like WavPack because it's
> > lossless and works on 32-bit files.
>
> i've never heard of wavpack but was an interesting read of their
> webpage, but it appears flac already does all of this and sox does
> support flac.
>
> anybody know some pros/cons to wavpack vs flac? i am a very
> satisfied flac user - converting my entire archives over to it (over
> 1.5TB already)
Ah, what is 'an audio format' and what is 'a container format' and which
is Wavpack and which is Flac ....
I'll cut the philosophy and get to the differences, once I have just asked
whether SoX should deal with 'containers' (the question is rhetorical as I
presume it does Ogg ( as in Ogg-Vorbis: Ogg the container, Vorbis the
audio format)). (Should Sox 'do' Matroska?)
Flac is more widely supported (but older technologies generally are).
Flac (one would need to check this, but there are/were figures on the
Flac website) gives better compression.
Flac is open source, Wav is a proprietary standard (if that makes
any difference).
Flac has a metadata system.
Wav (and hence Wavpack) allows floating point (Flac is integer only).
Wav allows virtually ulimlited channels (?2**16?) (Flac is limited to
eight --this really is a major problem for multi-channel
work. It would be for domestic, if the dreaded 10.2 ever
flies.)
Wav has no nice metadata system. The information in the headers
is very, very limited. Wavpack has a metadata system
(good for sticking album covers in) but no metadata
sticks with the unpacked files. (Not sure how serious that
is, especially if unpacking is always on the fly.)
There is a serious file size problem (?2GB) with Wav. Would have to check
for Flac. Maybe Wavpack allows seamless joining of multiple files (no "two
second gap between the 'tracks';-)>., one would have to check.
Wav (?)muxes multiple channels. I do not think Flac does. That (and
whether or not metadata is stuck at the beginning of the end) is very
important for 'streaming' audio.
Could one could stick multiple Flacs in a container (?Matroska) and
circumvent the channel limit?
The above are 'off the top of my head'. As the basis of a serious
discussion they would need references (and if anyone wants to make a
decision they should get some), but I throw them to the collective wisdom
of the list for correction.
In my opinion, it is a close call between the two ....
Michael
( 2GB at 10.2 is 166MB/channel, or just over a quarter of an hour at 44.1/16.
It's not an awful lot more for 5.1 at 48/24, let alone 48/32. Certainly
not an hour!)
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> On Thu, Mar 20, 2008 at 4:22 PM, Kevin Cosgrove <kevinc@...>
wrote:
> > Has any thought been given to adding WavPack <http://www.wavpack.com/>
> > support to SoX? I'd really like to be able to store my files in
> > WavPack format and convert them to something else without needing
> > to first go through the WAV format. I like WavPack because it's
> > lossless and works on 32-bit files.
>
> i've never heard of wavpack but was an interesting read of their
> webpage, but it appears flac already does all of this and sox does
> support flac.
>
> anybody know some pros/cons to wavpack vs flac? i am a very
> satisfied flac user - converting my entire archives over to it (over
> 1.5TB already)
Ah, what is 'an audio format' and what is 'a container format' and which
is Wavpack and which is Flac ....
I'll cut the philosophy and get to the differences, once I have just asked
whether SoX should deal with 'containers' (the question is rhetorical as I
presume it does Ogg ( as in Ogg-Vorbis: Ogg the container, Vorbis the
audio format)). (Should Sox 'do' Matroska?)
Flac is more widely supported (but older technologies generally are).
Flac (one would need to check this, but there are/were figures on the
Flac website) gives better compression.
Flac is open source, Wav is a proprietary standard (if that makes
any difference).
Flac has a metadata system.
Wav (and hence Wavpack) allows floating point (Flac is integer only).
Wav allows virtually ulimlited channels (?2**16?) (Flac is limited to
eight --this really is a major problem for multi-channel
work. It would be for domestic, if the dreaded 10.2 ever
flies.)
Wav has no nice metadata system. The information in the headers
is very, very limited. Wavpack has a metadata system
(good for sticking album covers in) but no metadata
sticks with the unpacked files. (Not sure how serious that
is, especially if unpacking is always on the fly.)
There is a serious file size problem (?2GB) with Wav. Would have to check
for Flac. Maybe Wavpack allows seamless joining of multiple files (no "two
second gap between the 'tracks';-)>., one would have to check.
Wav (?)muxes multiple channels. I do not think Flac does. That (and
whether or not metadata is stuck at the beginning of the end) is very
important for 'streaming' audio.
Could one could stick multiple Flacs in a container (?Matroska) and
circumvent the channel limit?
The above are 'off the top of my head'. As the basis of a serious
discussion they would need references (and if anyone wants to make a
decision they should get some), but I throw them to the collective wisdom
of the list for correction.
In my opinion, it is a close call between the two ....
Michael
( 2GB at 10.2 is 166MB/channel, or just over a quarter of an hour at 44.1/16.
It's not an awful lot more for 5.1 at 48/24, let alone 48/32. Certainly
not an hour!)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
This SF.net email is sponsored by: Microsoft
Defy all challenges. Microsoft(R) Visual Studio 2008.
http://clk.atdmt.com/MRT/go/vse0120000070mrt/direct/01/
_______________________________________________
Sox-users mailing list
Sox-users@...
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/sox-users
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