The MP3 format can be played on almost every device, and the audio files can be shared and saved without any restrictions. This process is called perceptual coding, and it helps the format reduce size without compromising the quality. It is used to reduce the file size of CD tracks by getting rid of the information that users aren’t able to hear properly.

MP3 is one of the most well-known audio formats offering universal compatibility.īeing one of the first compression formats, the MP3 format has been in the market for quite a long time.

Both are lossy compression types, which mean that they use compression to lower the file size while sacrificing some of the audio quality. I know that this is not an original new problem but I am wondering if there is still no way to convert with ubuntu/kubuntu 12.04 after a lot time passed and I can't find some of the bug issues mentioned in the other thread anymore.M4A is a higher quality audio format, even at smaller file sizes, while MP3 is much more compatible with a wider range of devices. Other programs don't work reliably (see this thread Howto convert audio files to *.m4a?) Even when it says it does so the resulting files still have 152k instead of 192k.įfmpeg also has/had a bug not writing the bitrate into the audio file tags which means when testing you have to calculate the bitrate manually by dividing the filesize by the length of the audio in seconds (resulting in 152k - see above)Ĭhoosing faac as converter gets me the same results Please don't suggest using another format - i thought this through as far as it goes.įfmpeg obvioulsy can't convert to a higher bitrate than 152k. Since about two years now I am trying to find a way to convert high quality mp3 files to m4a or aac files with a fixed bitrate 192k.

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