Lossless translated from English means “lossless.” If the audio signal is compressed using special lossless audio codecs, it can be restored with absolute accuracy if desired.
The advantage of lossless for storing an audio collection is that the quality of the recordings is much higher than that of lossy codecs, and they take up less space than uncompressed audio. True, lossy files are smaller in size than lossless music files. Most modern player programs understand the lossless format. Those programs that are not able to play it can easily learn it using the lossless plugin. What are lossless audio formats?
Audio formats without loss of quality
A true music lover is unlikely to be satisfied with the sound of music recorded in Ogg Vorbis or MP3 compression formats. Of course, if you listen to audio recordings on household audio equipment, sound defects cannot be detected by ear, but if you try to play a compressed file on high-quality Hi-Fi equipment, sound defects will immediately become apparent. Of course, creating a collection of quality music on CD or vinyl records is not easy. There is a reasonable alternative to this path for lovers of high-quality sound - lossless music. It can be stored on a PC in a form that allows the original music parameters to remain unchanged, even if compression is applied. This way simultaneously solves the problems of high quality music and its compact storage, because audio equipment for listening (headphones, speakers, amplifiers) has a very affordable price.
Uncompressed audio formats without loss of quality:
- CDDA is an audio CD standard;
- WAV - Microsoft Wave;
- IFF-8SVX;
- IFF-16SV;
- AIFF;
- AU;
- RAW.
- FLAC;
- APE – Monkey's Audio;
- M4A – Apple Lossless – high-quality music format from Apple;
- WV – WavPack;
- WMA – Windows Media Audio 9;
- LA – Lossless Audio;
- TTA – True Audio.
- LPAC;
- OFR – OptimFROG;
- RKA – RKAU;
- SHN - Shorten.
Ready presets for OBS
Standard stream settings:
| Parameter | Plus | Minus | Video | Audio | FPS |
| 1080p 60fps | The maximum bitrate on Twitch is suitable for top desktop systems and eyes. | Excessive CPU load in dynamic scenes. | 3500 | 128 | 4300 |
| 1080p 30fps | Good picture. | Poor smoothness and rendering of scenes in motion. | 2000 (or lower to 1500) | 128 | 4300 |
| 720p 60fps | Available for medium hardware category. | Cloudy picture due to scaling. | 1500 | 128 | 2500 |
| 720p 30fps | Available for weak iron category. | Low Twitch bitrate affects the blurriness and makes it noticeable. | 1500 | 96 | 2500 |
Select parameters based on the characteristics of your computer, but try not to overload the central processor.
FLAC format
The most common format is FLAC (Free Lossless Audio Codec). What distinguishes it from lossy audio codecs is that no data is removed from the audio stream when used. This makes it possible to successfully use it to play music on Hi-Fi and Hi-End equipment, as well as to create an archive of a collection of audio recordings.
The great advantage of the format is its free distribution. This is important for musicians who record their own music. The format has recently gained great popularity, thanks to which its support is included in the vast majority of media players.
FLAC file and iTunes
FLAC file is not compatible with the popular iTunes . However, FLAC can be converted to AIFF while preserving the metadata (including images). FLAC can also be converted to ALAC (*.m4a resolution), which provides lossless compression.
When converting files for iTunes, you need to ensure metadata compatibility. For example, if you are using the FLAC converter AuI ConverteR, in Settings > Metadata > o in the Compatibility metatags with iTunes .
APE format
Unlike FLAC, the APE format only has codecs and plugins designed for the Windows platform. For other platforms, there are expensive solutions from third-party software manufacturers. The algorithm is capable of achieving lossless compression of audio information by approximately 1.5-2 times. It includes three main encoding stages, of which only one is based on the use of properties inherent in sound for compression. The rest are similar to regular archivers. Despite the fact that the compression algorithm is distributed free of charge, the license restrictions are such that it is practically inaccessible to amateur musicians.
Bits and bytes
If you learn only one thing from this article, let it be the difference between bits and bytes. Bytes are the standard basic unit of computer memory capacity. Megabytes, gigabytes, and terabytes are multipliers of bytes. So how do bytes relate to bits? A byte is a sequence of eight bits.
Bits are designated by the Latin lowercase letter "b", while bytes use the Latin capital letter "B". To make it easier for you to remember, just remember that the capital letter “B” means a larger unit, a byte. And also the capital letter “B” in uppercase resembles an eight, the number of bits in a byte. Every time you use these units, pay attention to the letters next to the value, because this difference is very important.
| Table of byte and bit equivalents | ||||
| Prefix | Factor | Units | Equivalent (B) | Equivalent (b) |
| — | — | Byte Byte (B) | 1B | 8b |
| kilo | Thousands | Kilobyte Kilobyte (KB) | ~1,000B | ~8,000b |
| mega | Millions | Megabyte (MB) | ~1,000,000B | ~8,000,000b |
| giga | Billions | Gigabyte Gigabyte (GB) | ~1,000,000,000B | ~8,000,000,000b |
| tera | Trillions | Terabyte Terabyte (TB) | ~1,000,000,000,000B | ~8,000,000,000,000b |
In digital technology, and this is the vast majority of modern technology, a binary system is used to store data, where each unit of measurement is based on 2, not 10. Like in the cartoon: one two, one two...
1 KB is actually equal to 210 B, which is 1024 bits. Therefore, the above figures are approximate and technically imprecise. But they are close enough for the purposes of this article.
Apple Lossless Format
High quality lossless music can be listened to using Apple's audio compression codec without sacrificing quality. This format was developed by Apple for use on its own devices. The format is compatible with iPod players that have special dock connectors and the latest firmware. The format does not use specific rights management (DRM) tools, but the container format contains such capabilities. It is also supported by QuickTime and is included as a feature in iTunes.
The format is part of freely available libraries, which makes it possible to organize listening to files in Windows applications. In 2011, Apple published the source codes of the format, which opens up broad prospects for the codec. In the future, it may become a serious competitor to other formats. The tests showed good results. Compressed files range in size from 40-60% of the size of the originals. The decoding speed is also impressive, which justifies its use for mobile devices whose performance is low.
One of the disadvantages of the codec is that the extension of the audio files matches the AAC (Advanced Audio Coding) audio codec. This leads to confusion because AAC is not a high quality music format. Therefore, it was decided to store the data in an MP4 container with the .m4a extension.
Among other formats, it is worth mentioning Windows Media Audio 9 Lossless, which is part of the Windows Media application. It works with Windows and Mac OS X. However, users do not respond very favorably to it. There are often problems with codec compatibility, and the number of supported channels is limited to six.
Variable or constant bitrate
Let's briefly talk about the difference between constant bitrate (CBR) and variable bitrate (VBR). Sometimes you will be asked to choose between these two options, depending on your editing program, video converter, or codec you are using.
With a constant bitrate, the encoder compresses every second of video to a set number of bits. This way the bitrate remains constant throughout the entire file. This is usually a faster compression method, but may result in poor quality for some individual frames.
Variable bitrate is essentially a smarter technique that looks for sections of a video that require less data than others. Frames with little movement on the screen or large blocks of the same color (sky, wall, etc.) allow the video to be compressed more, so they are encoded at a lower bitrate.
This is where the target bitrate you set becomes basically the average bitrate of your compressed file. For example, if your file has a variable bitrate of 15 Mbps, one second might only contain 5 MB and another might contain 25 MB. Together they will average 15 Mbps. You may also be asked to select a minimum and maximum bitrate, which will ensure that no part of your video is compressed above or below a set threshold.
It's worth noting that compression is an inexact science, and your target bitrate is just that: a goal. The actual bitrate of your compressed file may be slightly higher or lower, but in most cases the difference will be negligible.
WavPack format
WavPack is another freely available audio codec that compresses audio information without loss of quality. WavPack integrates an exclusive combined mode that allows you to create two files. One of the files in this mode is created in a relatively small size with loss of quality .wv, which can be played independently. The second “.wvc” file corrects the previous “.wv” and, in combination with it, makes it possible to fully restore the original. Some users may find this approach promising, since there is no need to choose between two types of compression - both will always be implemented.
Also worthy of attention is a video codec with high-quality sound - lagarith lossless codec. It works quickly and efficiently.
Internet data transfer speed
Now let's talk about the second practical use of bitrate for video producers: Internet bandwidth. Here, bitrate measures the number of bits that can be downloaded to or downloaded from the Internet in every second of time. I recommend you visit sites like speedtest.net or fast.com to test the speed of your own internet connection.
See also: Video codecs, video formats - what does it all mean?
Checking your Internet connection speed on fast.com
Insufficient bandwidth will seriously hinder your work, so make sure you know what you're working with. Having high-speed internet access is critical for sharing large files or streaming.
Digital players with lossless support
Users respond well to the digital players jetAudio, Foobar2000, Spider Player. There are no fundamental differences between them. The choice of any device is based on the subjective opinion of a music lover about the convenience of the interface for lossless playback. You can find out what a lossless format is by testing these players.
The Apple Lossless format is played using iTunes. In addition, this codec is supported by the popular video player VLC.
Owners of Apple-compatible computers can use two interesting programs: Vox and Cog.
They support the following lossless formats:
In addition to this, there are many useful features, for example, Last.fm services are supported.
Owners of Windows computers can use any application that is compatible with music codecs without loss of quality: Foobar2000 or WinAmp. Winamp requires special plugins. Lossless music plays well on iTunes and KMPlayer. An advantage of iTunes that other players do not have is the ability to support tags.
Coding
The VBR, CBR and ABR algorithms used for encoding in the MP3 format do not ensure complete preservation of quality - it is lost. However, this can only be felt when viewing (playing) only on high-quality equipment.
To the unprofessional eye, material recorded using VBR, CBR and ABR mechanisms will look quite high quality.
Let's analyze the differences in the VBR, CBR and ABR algorithms in order to know which one to use correctly for recording and subsequent storage or transfer of files. Which one is better for quality or for solving other problems.
Lossless compatible devices
For example, owners of Android devices can use the andLess player. It is capable of playing FLAC, APE, uncompressed WAV and other formats supported by Android.
The situation is worse for owners of devices on the Blackberry platform. Only owners of the Bold 9000 and 8900 and later models can listen to the lossless format.
Owners of Apple devices can use the ALAC codec without any problems. It is supported by iPod (except shuffle), iPhone and iPad. For FLAC format, you can download FLAC Player from the App Store.
The FLAC codec is supported by Samsung Galaxy devices, some Sony Ericsson smartphones and iriver players.
Stationary devices from many manufacturers also received support for FLAC. Media players and media centers allow you to do without a personal computer when listening to songs without loss of quality.
Which bitrate should I choose?
If we talk about the common audio format MP3, it is an audio compression that results in data loss. The higher the bitrate , the better the sound quality becomes. Speaking about the choice of bitrate for a given format, we can say the following:
In video formats, this value is calculated differently. For example, for YouTube videos, a bitrate of 10-16 Mbit/s at a resolution of 720p is sufficient. This will allow you to achieve a clear image and a small file size. If there is a need for improved picture quality, this value can be increased to 18-25 Mbit/s . Maximum image quality will be achieved at 50 Mbps and 1080i resolution. In general, the impact of bitrate on video quality is expressed as follows:
Listening equipment
It is difficult to recommend anything to fans of high-quality sound equipment (Hi-Fi or Hi-End). The choice in this area is limited only by budget and tastes. Equalizer, amplifier, acoustics - the choice of these devices has many options. PC owners who are choosing high-quality acoustics for their computer are better off choosing budget monitor speakers from any well-known brand. Users respond well to the Microlab SOLO series acoustics. To make lossless music sound good, it is important to purchase acoustics with a subwoofer. Two-way acoustics cannot cope with the reproduction of the lower frequency band.
Average bit rate
Average is translated from English as average. This is a type of ABR, which is in some way a cross between VBR and CBR.
When choosing the ABR mode, the user sets a certain value in kilobits per second. The codec can change it in one direction or another, adhering to the established average value.
Average bitrate algorithm
The ABR method compares favorably with others in the assigned number of bits per second. You can choose absolutely any numeric parameter from 8 to 320. While CBR encoding can only use sixteen times the value.
From the above it follows that if the size of the resulting file is important for the result, then for the highest quality it is better to take a closer look at ABR or CBR encoding.
Otherwise, pay attention to the VBR 2 Pass method.
In this article you learned about VBR, CBR and ABR encodings. Now you know how each one is different, which one is better for your specific task, and which one you should choose.
Results
New digital sound formats have made it possible for lovers of high-quality music to acquire their own libraries on large-capacity storage media and listen to their favorite compositions in high quality, saving quite a lot of money and quite a lot of space. The ideal option, of course, is a full set of Hi-End equipment, but budget options will also bring great pleasure to music lovers. After all, the experience of listening to music is incomparable to MP3 on plastic speakers.
Lossless format is often used in home music studios. It allows you to save the created track in good quality. The composition will not take up much space, but it can be shared with friends. Lossless music is becoming increasingly widespread. It is possible that it will even begin to displace traditional mp3 formats.
WAV: for those who...
Storing music in WAV today is completely impractical. Yes, this is the format “from which the music on the computer came,” but storing it in it is precisely what is impractical. Of course, if you write music and store samples, WAV is where you should store them. But I don’t see the point in listening to regular music.
In general, there is no particular point in talking seriously about WAV in the context of this article.
FLAC, APE, ALAC and all, all, all – or simply lossless
Now we'll finally move on to lossless compression formats. Of course, in first place is FLAC, which beat all the others in terms of popularity and support, and then trampled on. No, of course, APE and ALAC are very much alive. But on the side of FLAC is popularity, popularity and once again popularity.
Today this is also important, because if your device supports hardware decoding, everything plays with less resource load. In the case of smartphones, this is more than relevant. Moreover, lossless formats are already supported by most home audio equipment, both cheap mini-systems and quite serious High-End devices.
What are the benefits of lossless formats? Roughly speaking, these are the same original WAV files, but compressed with an archiver like RAR. This is very rude. The main advantage of lossless formats is that no information is removed from the audio stream at all, as in MP3. That is, no matter what device you play it on, you can be sure that you hear everything that your device can produce. What it can, it produces, and what it cannot, is a problem for the device itself and in no way for the file itself.
As for how
lossless formats do this - for this, again, I refer you to Wikipedia, where everything is described in detail. The point of my passages is that FLAC is the golden mean between MP3 and WAV. Something that appeared quite naturally - when the volume of hard drives ceased to be a stumbling block, and everyone finally had the opportunity to store Large Files.
Formats from another planet: WavPack, Opus, MPC and other scary letters
It is impossible not to mention them. Today, in the galaxy of audio file formats, they occupy approximately the same place that OGG occupied when I was in school. That is, it is there, it’s fun to experiment, and then choose FLAC or MP3.
No, we are not talking about the fact that all of the above is bad. Some of this even compresses better than MP3. But! Remember (if you are an oldfag) how the struggle between VHS and Betamax in the home video segment ended in the early 1980s? A complete and unconditional victory for VHS! With worse picture quality and everything else! And why? Because it’s cheap on all fronts (both equipment and consumables), easy and there is no copy protection.
About the same thing awaits “opuses” with WavPack – plus support for hardware and software today. Simply put, these formats have remained the preserve of enthusiasts. You can try and proudly store music in them, but when you try to copy it to a smartphone or player, you will be upset because no one supports them and there is simply nothing to play. Not to mention the lack of hardware
support. Do you need it? Yes, let it be the Betamax of the digital audio world. But who cares?
FLAC vs MP3
Yes! That's what you've been waiting for! It's the same! It’s impossible to count how many copies have been broken on this topic. FLAC adherents are foaming at the mouth and proving that you can hear everything
; MP3 adherents phlegmatically declare that MP3 is enough for them, and they do not hear what is not there. Particularly cruel ones add that even at 128 kbit/s everything is perfectly audible. FLAC fans immediately faint and are soldered off with Valocordin.
The truth, as usual, is somewhere in the middle. And the truth is that, in general, everyone is right. But - with various “ifs” and “buts”.
First: you will hear the difference between FLAC and MP3, unless an elephant is trampling on your ears, only on more or less decent equipment. That is, you won’t hear it on cheap plastic speakers with a sound card built into the motherboard. On a cheap smartphone with headphones for five bucks, you won’t hear it. And we are talking about global differences.
If we take the differences between the higher bitrates of MP3 (256-320 kbps) from FLAC, then you will hear the differences (and even then, if you have good ears) only on good equipment that costs from a thousand dollars for a new set - amplifiers and three-way floor acoustics at least. If you don't want a separate Hi-Fi system, you can achieve this on a computer. To do this, you need an external audio interface priced from 300-400 euros for a used copy, acoustics priced at 300-350 euros for a new set and (very preferably) a digital optical path.
Even more than that - if you send sound through optics from a solution built into the motherboard, you will hear the difference. Actually, this is how I have it: the sound is sent via the Toslink optical channel from the default Realtek to the optical input of an external Edirol “sound speaker” and then output via regular analog RCA to a modest acoustics priced at 350 euros. And - the differences between MP3 320 kbit/s and FLAC are audible to the naked ear. The conclusion is simple: if you want to really hear the difference with FLAC and other APEs, there is no need to splurge on expensive hi-fi if you are satisfied with “everything in the computer”.
The compromise option here is also simple. 99.9% of users are not audiophiles, so it makes sense for them to store music in FLAC only in the distant future, when there is more money, the grass is greener, and the rivers are cleaner. No, of course, if you don’t have a lot of space, then I recommend storing your music in FLAC. In all other cases - MP3 320 kbps. In addition to space, those who listen to music on Bluetooth headphones should opt for MP3 - even the aptX codec cannot transmit Dima Bilan in a quality comparable to a wired solution.
MP3 - sound quality with minimal volume
I remember when I got my first MP3 discs. They seemed supernatural after CDs and even more so cassettes, since they contained not 20 songs, but several albums of their favorite artists. This is the advantage of this format. What I mean?
There were times when storage capacity, traffic and Internet speed were limited, that is, downloading and storing volumes of music was problematic.
The MP3 format (full name MPEG-½/2.5 Layer 3) became the salvation. Appeared back in 1994. With its help, the weight of tracks can be significantly reduced.
Is compression scary?
For this purpose, a lossy compression algorithm is used. Which ones exactly? Information indistinguishable to the human ear is lost in order to preserve the track as close as possible to the original. With the development of technology, it is becoming increasingly possible to achieve this effect.
For example, thin sounds above 17 kHz and bass sounds below 40 Hz may be subject to stripping.
For reference: a person hears in the range from 16 Hz to 20 kHz; and since the brain, and not the ear, is responsible for the perception of sounds, not all incoming data is perceived by it.
Thus, when listening on non-professional equipment, you will not feel any losses. Elderly people should not worry about them due to natural hearing loss.
For clarity, you can compare MP3 with JPEG extension images. Only a professional photographer on a high-end monitor will be able to notice the difference between a compressed image compared to the original in RAW, for example.
How to rate an MP3 file?
Most users only pay attention to the bitrate when downloading a song. For those who are not in the know: it is desirable that it be 320 kb/s - then the sound is clearer and more balanced. In principle, for those who don’t bother too much, bitrate is a sufficient criterion for evaluation. But for pretentious listeners, he may not be the only one.
It would also be a good idea to look at the properties of the codec used to perform the conversion. I won’t describe them in detail - that’s not what I’m talking about now. In short, it’s good when the file:
- Converted to the latest version of the codec, for example, LAME 3.100 (at the time of writing).
- Marked “Stereo”, because if instead you see “Joint Stereo”, then to reduce the volume, some components have been converted to mono, which means the track has lost a little depth in sound.
- As for the bitrate mode (CBR, VBR, ABR), each of them is good for a separate situation, but this is too deep digging, which is not within the scope of this article.
Preparing for the test
2.1 Equipment
All power saving technologies and HyperThreading are disabled in the motherboard BIOS. To eliminate delays associated with writing/reading the HDD, a RAM disk (Z:, 3 GB) is used for tests.
2.2 Software
Where possible, 64-bit versions of encoders are used. For the test, the latest version of the portable foobar2000 with the necessary plugins and encoders was specially installed, after which converter profiles were previously created for each encoder.
OS:
Windows 10 Pro 64-bit
Video driver:
ForceWare 385.41 WHQL
foobar2000:
Core (2017-07-10 05:24:08 UTC)
foobar2000 core 1.3.16
foo_benchmark.dll (2017-09-04 20:26:52 UTC) Decoding Speed Test 1.2.3
foo_bitcompare.dll (2017-09-04 20:26:52 UTC) Binary Comparator 2.1.1
foo_converter.dll (2017-07-10 05:22:28 UTC) Converter 1.5
foo_input_la.dll (2010-12-08 22:45:00 UTC) Lossless Audio(La) decoder 0.01
foo_input_monkey.dll (2017-09-04 20:26:54 UTC) Monkey's Audio Decoder 2.1.7 foo_input_ofr.dll (2017-09-05 14:18:58 UTC) OptimFROG Lossless/DualStream Decoder 1.31
foo_input_std.dll (2017-07-10 05:22:04 UTC) FFmpeg Decoders 3.2.4 Standard Input Array 1.0
foo_input_tak.dll (2017-09-04 20:26:54 UTC) TAK Decoder 0.4.7
foo_input_tta.dll (2017-09-04 20:26:54 UTC) TTA Audio Decoder 3.4
foo_ui_std.dll (2017-07-10 05:22:34 UTC) Default User Interface 0.9.5
Coders:
FLAC 1.3.2 GIT20170314 x64 ICL Flake 0.11 FLACCL 2.1.6 Lossless Audio (LA) Compressor v0.4b Monkey's Audio Console Front End v4.22 OptimFROG Lossless Audio Compressor v5.100 x64 refalac 1.64 TAK v2.3.0 TTA 2.3 64-bit SSE4 WMA 0.2.9c 64-bit WavPack v5.1.0
The player process (as well as the converter in its settings) had real-time priority set.
2.3 Musical material
For the test, a disk image of one of the modern electronic music composers was chosen. The recording has a wide frequency and relatively good dynamic range.
2.4 Selection of encoding parameters
Initially, I planned to conduct a comparison at the maximum compression settings for each encoder. But for some reason this seemed impossible, and the meaning of such a test would be very doubtful. For example, to encode a 30-second segment of standard audio material with the OptimFROG codec with maximum parameters, it takes 230 seconds (encoding speed about 0.13x). Thus, I formulated the following requirements:
- encoding speed at least 1x
- decoding speed at least 2x
- ability to use scrolling for compressed files.
Since the compression gain decreases as the parameters increase, the compression ratio with the parameters I selected is practically no different from the maximum.
General converter parameters:
Output bit depth:
Auto Dither: Never Output folder: Source track folder Fiilename pattern: %filename% Processing: None When finished: Do nothing
Encoders and parameters
Note: For coders without the ability to encode on the fly, the input file was specified directly in the parameters (instead of the %s variable). This is done so that encoding occurs directly from the source file to the final one, without creating a temporary one (which takes a significant amount of time and distorts the results). Below the parameters for the mentioned encoders are listed with the %s variable.
Testing methodology
3.1 Coding
After preparation, little remains to be done. The first stage of testing looks like this:
- Close all processes in the task manager except those that are necessary.
- Launch foobar2000 and set the foobar2000.exe process to the highest priority.
- Add Z:Image.wav file to the playlist
- Having selected the file in the playlist, click the conversion button, load the first converter profile and start the encoding process.
- Once the conversion is complete, record the time and encoding speed (in the form of N*realtime) from the player console.
- Do the same using each of the 9 converter profiles. Add the received files to the playlist.
- Record the compressed file size, compression ratio (in %) and FBR (see below) for each encoder.
After doing the coding I got the following result:
The playlist displays the file name, codec, FBR (file-based bitrate = file size/duration), compression ratio in % and file size in mebibytes.
3.2 Verification
The compressed file must contain all the data necessary to reconstruct the original stream. To check the accuracy, I compared all received files with the original using the Binary Comparator plugin. In order to make such a comparison, you need to select the uncompressed and tested compressed files in the playlist, select Utilities->Bit-Compare Tracks
.
For all formats except LA, the result was positive (No differences in decoded data found).
In the case of LA, the player closed with an error. For this reason, decoding of the Image.la file had to be done using the la.exe console encoder/decoder and the la-core.dll library (which were used for encoding). The uncompressed stream thus obtained turned out to be identical to the original one. From this we can conclude that the LA decoder in foobar2000 does not work correctly, but during encoding the encoder does not lose information and it can be restored.
3.3 Decoding
Decoding speed was assessed using the Decoding Speed test plugin. Decoding occurred with high priority, in 5-10 passes. Buffering into memory is disabled (files are already physically located in RAM), the number of threads is set to 1 (under standard conditions, decoding occurs in one thread). The plugin window is shown below.
For each coder, the average decoding time and speed were recorded.
Note: for the LA format, decoding was performed via the console (see “Verification”).
We carry out calculations
To calculate the video bitrate, a special formula is used. You should find out the size of the video in kilobits and divide this value by the playback duration , measured in seconds.
For example, there is a need to record 2.5 hours of video (9000 seconds) onto a DVD disc. Its standard size is known - 4480 MB. Bitrate is measured in megabits per second, which is important to consider.
So, the calculation looks like this : 4480 MB is divided by 9000 seconds and multiplied by 8000 (to convert to kbps). The result is 3982 kbps or 3.98 Mbps.
At the same time, the video file also uses an audio track, which should be taken into account. Therefore, making a more accurate calculation manually is problematic. To make the calculations more accurate, it is advisable to use special applications (for example, MediaInfo).
results
The test results are presented in a table and sorted in descending order of compression ratio.
| Codec | Compression ratio | FBR, kbit/s | File size, MB | Compression time, s | Compression speed | Decoding time, s | Decoding speed |
| L.A. | 66,55% | 939 | 535,55 | 589,28 | 8.11x | 519,90 | 9.20x |
| OFR | 66,74% | 941 | 537.06 | 1028,78 | 4.65x | 558,19 | 8.57x |
| A.P.E. | 67,23% | 948 | 540,98 | 252,92 | 18.91x | 327,8 | 14.59x |
| SO | 67,79% | 956 | 545,53 | 128,91 | 37.10x | 12,62 | 379.02x |
| TAK (2 cores) | 67,79% | 956 | 545,53 | 78,92 | 60.60x | 12,67 | 377.36x |
| W.V. | 68,75% | 970 | 553,28 | 1741,86 | 2.74x | 39,86 | 119.99x |
| FLACCL | 69,51% | 980 | 559,36 | 14,01 | 341.40x | 10,99 | 435.21x |
| TTA | 69,60% | 982 | 560,12 | 22,94 | 208.51x | 32,42 | 147.53x |
| Flake | 69,67% | 983 | 560,66 | 432,33 | 11.06x | 14,07 | 340.03x |
| FLAC | 69,90% | 986 | 562,49 | 39,98 | 119.61x | 9,13 | 523.48x |
| ALAC | 71,00% | 1002 | 571,38 | 42,56 | 112.37x | 18,92 | 252.822x |
| WMA | 71,68% | 1011 | 576,81 | 38,72 | 123.52x | 32,26 | 148.28x |
| PCM | 100% | 1411 | 804,67 | — | — | — | — |
Standard video bitrates
- 400 Kbps - low-quality videos shot on low-resolution cameras.
- 750 Kbps - used by YouTube algorithms for 360p videos.
- 1 Mbit/s is the same for 480p videos.
- 2.5 Mbit/s - videos in 720p.
- 3.8 Mbit/s - the same YouTube, only video in 720p and 60 frames/s.
- 4.5 Mbit/s - YouTube sets a similar bitrate for 1080p videos.
- 6.8 Mbps - the same thing, only at 60 fps.
- 9.8 Mbit/s - used in the production of DVDs with films.
- 19 Mbps - used by HDV format at 720p and 1080p resolution.
- 24 Mbit/s - often used when recording Blu-ray media.
- 29 Mbit/s - can be found on HD DVD discs.
- 40 Mbps is the highest quality for 1080p Blu-Ray recording.
- 45 Mbps - bitrate for 4K video
