MP3 at 128kbps public listening test

Lasse Penttinen
16 Jan 2004 20:45

RareWares continues their series of public listening quality tests. This time they tackle the MP3 format at 128kbps, but also include Apple iTunes as a challenger. Another extremely interesting contender is the new LAME 3.95.1.

Even with the launch of several newer, more efficient audio encoding methods in the last few years, MP3 still is the winner format in popularity and support. Every computer operating system worth it's salt has at least an option for MP3 playback, often available "out of the box". MP3 can also be played on mini systems, portable players, car players, etc. No matter how better the newcomer formats are, MP3 already gained a lot of momentum and it'll be a long time until it is surpassed.
Being such a popular format and featuring an open specification, it's expected that a multitude of encoders are available for the end user's choice. The purpose of this test is to discover which of the most popular implementations offer highest encoding quality at an average bitrate of 128kbps.
The encoders and parameters tested are:

LAME encoder 3.95 --preset 128

FhG MP3 encoder from Adobe Audition 1.0 VBR quality 40, "Current - Best" codec.

Apple iTunes 4.2 112kbps VBR, Highest quality, joint stereo, smart encoding

Gogo-no-coda 3.12 -b 128 -a -q

Audioactive Encoder 2.04 128kbps High Quality

Xing MP3 Encoder 1.5 VBR quality normal