Saving to WMA Lossless issue

[Geebster]

GB -

There is a saying common in the engineering world that sums up the situation nicely and it is:

"Standard is Better than Better"

Craig

How true!!!

GB

[Ringmaster]

This might be a dumb question; but, could "Excel" be used for an Audio Database?

[Brian]

This might be a dumb question; but, could "Excel" be used for an Audio Database?

If by "database" you mean a type of catalog of your .wav files, restored songs, ripped CDs, etc. then the answer is a qualified yes. Qualified because it isn't what it is really designed to do (but, having said that, it is a very common use of Excel) - and secondly because a far simpler and more elegant solution is to use the DC Tunes Library (under the "files" drop-down menu) database already built in to your copy of DC7. You would have to spend weeks writing macros to get Excel to do half of what DC Tunes is already set up to do.

If by "database" you mean actually storing the data that makes up a .wav or .mp3 file, the answer is a no.

Brian

[Geebster]

I use Excel, but my database needs are not too great. I mainly just want to know what I have and where it's located in the house (hard copy) and which hard drive the music (ripped or restored copy) is located on.

I don't go searching trying to find specific songs or words or titles, so almost anything would work for my situation.

GB

[Ringmaster]

Database

Thanks Guys,

I use Excel for cataloging the CD's that I make. My numbering system is CDR-00001 through CDR-10000. This really works well for finding "Album Title"; "Artist" & "Genre"; I also use the "Pivot Table" to list the "Names" & "Numbers of Copies" that I've given/loaned to people. I also have separate catlogs of my "LP's", 45's & 78's (I doubt if I ever get these completed!).

Right now I'm deciding if I want to use the "DC Tune Library", or "Data Base 2000" for my Media Library. Both of these programs will do what I need. The "DataBase 2000" is very extensive and exceptionally good for tracking Classical Data, including "Composer", "Symphony/Movement", "Conductor", "Orchestra", "Track Length", "Year of Composition, etc.; but I don't know if it will do Song Leveling of my Play Lists.

I used another database for my original Library; it was excellent. It did "Song Leveling" for all of my "Play Lists" that I created; however it did not let me assign my own "Genre", that was familiar to me. It was more oriented to "Disk Jockey" Genre, many of which I know nothing about. It did not lend itself to cataloging the type of Genre that we need for cataloging our type of restorations.

Since I own the DB2000 software, I may go that route because I can delete all of the colums that I do not need. However, if it will not do "Song Leveling" of my playlists, I will use the DC Tune Library, but first I have to figure out how to do "Batch Processing" for automatic "Song Leveling", and the maximum number of tracks that I can use for my Song Lists. My Song Lists are pretty extensive, because I use my "Genre" assignment for Out-door entertainment, Holidays, Weddings, etc.

I went into a little more detail than I had planned to do; but, I thought it might be helpful to other members that might not of thought of the different methods and functionality of creating "Catalogs" and "Play Lists". When the "Sound Leveling" is applied to my "Play Lists", I don't need to keep running into the house to change the volume for tracks that are lower or higher in volume. It is all done automatically!

[Craig Maier]

Saving to wma lossless fixed in v7.09

The problem with saving to wma lossless has been fixed in v7.09. That will be available to everyone shortly.

[Ringmaster]

.wma

Is .wma truly lossless?

It seems like I read somewhere that .wma is not truly "Lossless". I would prefer to keep all of my audio files as .wav. For some reason, I feel rebelus, when I feel I am being "pushed" into using the Windows Media Format.

Dumb question: What are "Tags"?

[Geebster]

Is .wma truly lossless?

It seems like I read somewhere that .wma is not truly "Lossless". I would prefer to keep all of my audio files as .wav. For some reason, I feel rebelus, when I feel I am being "pushed" into using the Windows Media Format.

Dumb question: What are "Tags"?

I did some testing awhile back on all the various lossless formats..wma, .ape, .flac and so on. I found that .wma does have a method for lossless compression. There are many flavors of .wma though. Just because a file has the .wma extension, doesn't mean that it is a lossless file.
The .wma format for me, scares me a bit, because I read some reports that in the future that M$oft is thinking about charging for the use of the codec that will be necessary to create or play .wma files. This may happen to all files in the future, but it just makes me a bit hesitant using the format.

Tags became all the rage when MP3 became popular. Many of the popular audio file formats have a method of storing information about the file in these "Tags". Information such as song title, artist, track number as well as cd cover art are common uses for this tag information.

Hope this helps a bit....

GB

[Audyossey]

...The .wma format for me, scares me a bit, because I read some reports that in the future that M$oft is thinking about charging for the use of the codec that will be necessary to create or play .wma files...

Somehow I doubt that it could get away from it anymore. Microsoft used to be able to force the industry to adopt its standards just by making them Windows standards. But after screwing over Netscape with a "proprietary" (that is, a slightly different) standard, knifing Apple in the back with a "strategic partnership" that let them "develop" their own proprietary version of QuickTime, another con game on Adobe, and so on, the industry finally rallied. Nowadays proprietary Microsoft standards are generally ignored in favor of open industry standards. I don't see Microsoft being able to charge for this kind of ordinary, copycat "technology" anymore.

HB

[Ringmaster]

Thanks Guys,

It looks like we are all on the same track. Now that plenty of storage is available, I am keeping all of my files in the .wav format. Also, I do not transmit Media files over the Internet.

[Geebster]

Thanks Guys,

It looks like we are all on the same track. Now that plenty of storage is available, I am keeping all of my files in the .wav format. Also, I do not transmit Media files over the Internet.

Exactly...I figure what is the real point in compressing anymore, with cheap storage easily available. On the rare occasion I do use compression (for transit usually), I decompress the file immediately for permanent storage.

GB

[Geebster]

Somehow I doubt that it could get away from it anymore. Microsoft used to be able to force the industry to adopt its standards just by making them Windows standards. But after screwing over Netscape with a "proprietary" (that is, a slightly different) standard, knifing Apple in the back with a "strategic partnership" that let them "develop" their own proprietary version of QuickTime, another con game on Adobe, and so on, the industry finally rallied. Nowadays proprietary Microsoft standards are generally ignored in favor of open industry standards. I don't see Microsoft being able to charge for this kind of ordinary, copycat "technology" anymore.

HB

That may be true, but I don't like the .wma format anyway, so I choose not to use it at all...

.wav all the way!!!

GB

[sus4chord]

Tags became all the rage when MP3 became popular. Many of the popular audio file formats have a method of storing information about the file in these "Tags". Information such as song title, artist, track number as well as cd cover art are common uses for this tag information.

If WAV files supported tags, then part of the issue of saving in a different format goes away. Granted, tags won't always have "all" the info you need (or want), but it really is nice to open an MP3 file, for example, and right away see which album the song came from, track number, copyright information, artist, etc, etc. I wish we could get the same with WAV files.

I still need MP3's for portable listening devices, though. Sure, they'll play wav files, but again, you won't get the information about the file displayed and you limit your capacity. And I would much rather be able to take a single iPod Classic 160GB with over 2000 albums on it than have just over 300 albums on it because it's in WAV format. So I just archive both versions. Yes, 300 albums is plenty of listening time, but MP3 lets you carry your whole (well, maybe not yours, Geebster ) collection with without having to delete songs and add new songs and update playlists, etc.

[Brian]

If WAV files supported tags, then part of the issue of saving in a different format goes away. Granted, tags won't always have "all" the info you need (or want), but it really is nice to open an MP3 file, for example, and right away see which album the song came from, track number, copyright information, artist, etc, etc. I wish we could get the same with WAV files.

What you're describing is the Broadcast Wave Format, the recording format of most file-based non-linear digital recorders used for motion picture and television production. Almost any device that can playback .wav can also playback Broadcast Wave (which still ends in .wav) - non-broadcast wave units just ignore the portions of the header with the tags and other metadata.

Playback units that recognize Broadcast Wave can also seamlessly stitch together files to permit breaking the 4GB (actullay closer to 2GB) file size limitation of the .wav format (but you still end up with a series of sequetially numbered files, each of which must meet the .wav limits). An even more powerful version of .wav is RF64, develpped and used extensively by the European Broadcast Union (which also invented .wav) and now an approved international standard. The main strength of RF64 is multichannel audio (up to 18 channels plus stero mixdown and a couple of other streams - all in one file).

Craig, any utility in incorporating broacast wave header read/write capability into the DC line? It should make the software more useful to audio-for-video and film production engineers. Or, by jumping right to RF64, you could make it compatable with all pro formats. Just a thought.
Brian

[Craig Maier]

Quoting Brian,

"Craig, any utility in incorporating broacast wave header read/write capability into the DC line? It should make the software more useful to audio-for-video and film production engineers. Or, by jumping right to RF64, you could make it compatable with all pro formats. Just a thought."

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We will look into it.