mp3 Creation

[BbAltered]

Hello. I recently completed a recording and wanted to email it to a friend. The recording was just around 5 mins. in length: the file size was 51Mb at 16 bits, 44.1kHz. Using the default settings on CD-Ex, the resulting mp3 was over 6Mb. This is a little too large for my email server: it wants attached files to be less than 5Mb.

 

How do I get more "compression" when making mp3s? Is there an optimal bitrate to use when making an mp3 that gives reasonable audio quality and small size? What bitrate to you all use when making mp3s?

 

Thanks

[bfields]

I know a lot of people do it, but it's really not great to send big media files as email attachments.

 

Upload to dropbox/google drive/soundcloud/youtube/whatever, and send a link to the upload.

 

(I know, that doesn't really answer your question, sorry. I always just accept the defaults.)

[Delaware Dave]

The lower the rate the lower the quality. Reduce it and listen to it, does the lower bit rate sound acceptable to you? Only you can be the judge...

[Reezekeys]

I use 192 kbps for most music, but my damaged ears probably couldn't tell the diff between that and 128 kbps! Do you have Audacity? You can try tons of mp3 bit rates & encoding schemes there â fixed, variable, average, and rates from 8 to 320 kbps. You should be able to find a setting there that works. That's a pretty restrictive email server you got â I'm on Comcast/Xfinity where the maximum attachment size is 25mb.

[drawback]

I use WeTransfer. You don't have to join or pay. Make your mp3 as large as you want, or send your original, won't matter.

[bfields]

That's a pretty restrictive email server you got â I'm on Comcast/Xfinity where the maximum attachment size is 25mb.

 

Your side might be fine with it, but the receiver's might not be. Or maybe they'll accept it but it'll put their inbox over quota and they'll lose subsequent mail. Or it'll work, but it'll slow their mail client to a crawl.

 

Email just isn't great for this.

 

Upload and send a link.

[Docbop]

As already pointed out you can lower the quality of the MP3 and shrink the file some, but in these case best to just get online storage and send them a link so they can download it to where ever they want. There are lots of these services these days free and monthly. I'm always leery of free, they're making money someway storage isn't cheap. In my programming days having online storage was really handy to have files stored somewhere I could get at them from anywhere on any machine.

 

I'm sure there must be a handful of people here that use these services and can make recommendations and warnings.

[MathOfInsects]

All the studios/engineers seem to use WeTransfer.

 

I usually just upload to Google Drive and delete the file after the recipient gets it.

[Dr Mike Metlay]

+1 to the above. Codecs have gotten a lot better over the last couple of decades; a 128K MP3 made today is going to sound significantly better than one made in 1998... but it's still not going to win any awards. Trying to crunch your files down even smaller to get them under a file transfer limit will eventually render them unlistenable. If you want, you could compress to 64K and get that song way under your file limit, but don't be surprised if the person listening to it tells you that it sounds awful and needs to be re-recorded.

 

WeTransfer is the shizzle. Absolutely free, no strings attached other than that they have to verify your email address (so they can send you emails about delivery), and you can send 2 GB of data per transfer. That's like three full CDs at Red Book quality. Just do it.

[cp-the-nerd]

I use 192 kbps for most music, but my damaged ears probably couldn't tell the diff between that and 128 kbps! Do you have Audacity? You can try tons of mp3 bit rates & encoding schemes there â fixed, variable, average, and rates from 8 to 320 kbps. You should be able to find a setting there that works. That's a pretty restrictive email server you got â I'm on Comcast/Xfinity where the maximum attachment size is 25mb.

 

I also recommend Audacity. Any recording interface worth its salt should give you a range of MP3 settings and bitrates. 192 kbps should get the file small enough without sounding too compressed, especially just for quick sharing purposes.

 

Alternatively, you can get a DropBox account for free and host any music file you want and just send your friend a link to the download.

[cfcboc]

Thanks for the tip on getting a DropBox account. Just signed up for the free account, which provides 2Gb storage. Will upload a file this afternoon and try out the sharing option.

[Reezekeys]

I've had Dropbox for years and have shared tons of files that way. Also Google Drive. But I've had occasional issues with slow or stalled uploading to them... to the point of unworkable. Not sure what's going on there but my other online activities weren't affected so I have to assume it was something on Dropbox's end. Bottom line - in my opinon - is that none of those large file-share or transfer services can beat the convenience of dragging an mp3 file into an email and clicking "send." I don't recall ever having an mp3 file bounce back to me because either mine or the recipient's email server rejected it. Then again I'm not sending symphonic works, more like pop/jazz/whatever ditties, so the file sizes have been between 4 and 12 or so megs. Maybe I'm just lucky. Of course if your outgoing email server limits you to 5MB attachments, you have no choice in the matter but to forget emailing for most song files. It just seems ridiculous in 2021.

[NoLights]

If you absolutely positively have to compress a file, I've had good luck with SoundCloud Pro. I'm running it on a Mac -- don't know if there's a windows version:

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/soundconverter-pro/id1544495533

[Theo Verelst]

Compression is a mathematical process where you can vary the compression amount and weigh it against the loss of perceived quality. Most normal mp3s are not variable rate, which is something I think AC3 or ACC might be able to do, but it isn't that common in audio.

 

I use ffmpeg to do compression and certain conversions, which is free tool with a lot of options, and when used as a command line tool an immense number of options, of which one is the data rate. Making a file twice as small by chosing a lower compression quality will not make it impossible to discern audio, but a well made 192 or 256 kbps usually is considered ok, 320kb/s sort of pro (if you can speak of that with mp3's), 128k a nice compromise maybe for slow connections, 64k a bit on the ugly side in the highs and accuracy, etc. Most free compressor programs will let you ajust the compression.

 

T

[ralphden]

I advise you to search for information about FLAC and OGG sound quality. You will learn a lot of valuable things. You won't hear the difference even at 128kbps on simple speakers. But on the speakers of a 2.1 system - you can listen to the difference in sound output, and you can distinguish the difference in classical music by your ear. On an excellent audio system, 5.1 and 7.1 - you can best see the difference in sound. Of that, I always choose the better quality FLAC. It's excellent for my eardrums. I usually take my favorite song from YouTube and convert it via online loader and loader.to the converter. All my friends recommended to take the best from music, and we deserve it.