Talk:Windows Media Audio

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Compare this "neutral" page to the page to AAC, and you'll see zealotry at work!

-- What are your problems with this article? It seems neutral to me. Try not to post flamebait without some sort of evidence to back it up. RenesisX

Contents 1 Please Correct 2 Whats with this NBPOV ? 3 Problems with Sound 4 Request for link to tools 5 Flawed Comparison 6 Janus (DRM) 7 Delete Sound quality section

[edit] Please Correct

In the bullet point quoted below, the text "a roughly equivalent quality than MP3" seems to contain a grammatical error, or is at least very confusing.

"At mid-low bitrates (64 kb/s or more, less than 128 kb/s), latest private tests (80 kb/s (2005/07), 96 kb/s (2005/08)) show that WMA has a lower quality than the lossy audio codecs AAC (HE and LC) and Vorbis, a roughly equivalent quality than MP3, and a better quality than MPC."

oops, OlJanx 07:50, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Whats with this NBPOV ?

I've added links to the largest, double blind and independent listening tests I know of twice now, and both times they've been backed off and replaced with nonsense about how the difference has not been determined. Anyone who has looked at the evidence can see this is not the case.

Could I get some clarification how exactly citing the conclusions from double blind tests is biased? Its not as if the people evaluating the formats even knew what formats they were, so how could they be biased? As far as I am aware, these are the two largest, and most comprehensive tests of the formats, and they have been reviewed and accepted by developers working on a number of open and closed source audio codecs as well as virtually the entire audio testing community and most of the less insane audiophile webistes. Calling the results biased is ridiculous. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 150.135.157.10 (talk • contribs) .

The link is fine, but the prose is grossly unencyclopedic. It has all the appearance of trying to add a non-netural POV to the article, and you will get a lot of push-back on that. Warrens 18:24, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

The linked article wasn't nearly as cut-and-dried as the most recent revision of the Wikipedia article made it seem. I've kept the link, but added some clarifying text in an effort to reach an NPOV medium. Raider Duck 18:42, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Problems with Sound

At least from my personal experience, Windows Media Audio has horrible high ends. Any track with a lot of cymbals sound absolutely horrible, and very liquidy. This may have changed since I last used it, so, I don't want to write about it unless this can be verified by other people.--68.196.38.13 18:32, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

I've found this is a problem with all popular lossy audio formats, including AAC and MP3. I find that I have a acute sense of hearing in the really high frequencies that most people don't hear though (dog whistles, old cathode ray tubes, and damaged capacitors really bother me) so it may be that the engineers that created these formats didn't take into account that the range of hearing of individuals varies widely.

[edit] Request for link to tools

Hi,

I have a WMA file that I've recorded and I want to split it into smaller files.

It would be great if someone could please add either some links/discussion of tools, or a link to a page that has same?

Thanks in anticipation, Ben Aveling 08:26, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Flawed Comparison

I just deleted the following from this page:

Due to the nature of the compression, Windows Media Audio and MP3 files at 128 kilobits persecond have virtually no difference in sound quality. However, the difference between WMA at 64 Kbits and MP3 at 128 Kbits is also nearly indistinguishable. The quality comparison of the two music compression formats can be found on the microsoft website [1]

If you look at the files, you will see that this is not a fair comparison. The 128kb/s samples are fine (and both sound virtually the same.) However, while the 64kb/s samples do have the same bitrate, they have different sample rates. The wmas are 44100Hz and the mp3s are 22050Hz. With the 32 and 20kb/s samples, it is 22050Hz wma vs. 11025Hz mp3. The cuts in the higher frequencies are very significant in the given samples which are fairly high guitar (type) music.

Please correct me if I'm missing something.

[edit] Janus (DRM)

I am removing the section discussing Janus (v10) DRM because the DRM technology is not a part of the codec technology, just like Apple's FairPlay technology is completely unrelated to the AAC codec technology.

• You are probably right, in a way. Janus seems to be the tech used for portable devices. I added a link to Windows Media DRM in the See Also-section. --apecat 17:06, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Delete Sound quality section

The goal of Wikipedia project is to make an encyclopedia, not a well of rumors and slanders. I propose to remove Sound quality section as long as there is no claim originating from a reliable professional source such as an independent sound studio or university research paper. --Ondrejsv 15:49, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

• Are you the same one who edited this section a few hours ago? I don't see anything wrong with the hydrogenaudio listening tests. In fact, both Apple Computer and Nero AG have paid close attention to these tests and worked to improve their codecs as a result. Why do you consider this "rumors and slanders"? --Mcoder 17:33, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

• • Well, the problem is how these "tests" were done and by who. They are not prepared by a professional who knows which parameters to test and can carefully prepare sound samples. Also, to deduce results, you must also know something about statistics and reliability levels. Besides this, these tests are only subjective "good/bad" checks, no analysis or real research has been done. And frankly, you absolutely don't know the people who ranked the samples. --Ondrejsv 14:52, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

• • • Not including comments on the Hydrogenaudio-endorsed test results would be a mistake, considering the authority of Hydrogenaudio, which is as close you get to "professional audio" discussion on the web. I think Wikipedia definitely should provide information that exposes the complete bullshit which is used by those selling proprietary audio formats. --apecat 16:51, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

• I have yet added another {{fact}} template to the section.... *sigh* Kilo-Lima|^(talk) 19:33, 13 June 2006 (UTC)