Weak sounding MP3s?

[AAP]

Why are the MP3s I make so weak sounding? The digits on the car radio go up to 38. When listening to the radio or a store bought CD, I can put it on 14 and it will literally be thumping around. If I burn some songs from my computer to a CD, I have to turn it up to like 32 just to barely hear it.

WTF?

 

[Y_lifter]

GOD and ASCAP are punishing you for listening to Illegally pilfered music...

Support musicians by purchasing overpriced music on CD's from you local retailer.

thanks.

 

[Buddy_Christ]

What are you using to burn them with? Also, are these CDs that you're ripping the songs off of yourself and then reburning, or is it stuff that you're downloading?

If you're using winmedia to rip and burn, you can adjust the settings of the rip and burn to get a bit higher quality. If you are using winmedia, I'll tell you where the settings are. If not, you're going to have to check the program you're using.

 

[Y_lifter]

My guesses as to the problem as one of these or a combo ..

Ripping or Downloading media at less than 192KBPS
Using some crap free/shareware software to rip/burn
Using supercrap blank media CD's
CD player not fully compatable with the type CDR's and MP3 .

I do notice a SLIGHT volume difference between burned and bought
CD's due to the Full CD WAV vs Burned MP3/WMA formats with the storebought CD's being a bit louder. But it isn't as great of a difference as you mention.

 

[Buddy_Christ]

My guesses as to the problem as one of these or a combo ..

Ripping or Downloading media at less than 192KBPS
Using some crap free/shareware software to rip/burn
Using supercrap blank media CD's
CD player not fully compatable with the type CDR's and MP3 .

I do notice a SLIGHT volume difference between burned and bought
CD's due to the Full CD WAV vs Burned MP3/WMA formats with the storebought CD's being a bit louder. But it isn't as great of a difference as you mention.

I've seen a variety of volume levels between CDs. Some store bought CDs that I have from 10 years ago aren't quite as loud as some burnt CDs that I have.

I don't like winmedia for burning. If you have songs that run together and are only separated by the track number, there's a noticable "gap" between the songs. I've been using Nero and I can remove the 2 seconds between tracks so there's just a hair second of gap between tracks. Kind of necessary when I'm burning Live albums and has also been necessary on a few that one track leads into the next.

 

[AAP]

y-lifters 1 through 3 reasons are pretty good. damn, he must know me by now.

I download them of shareaze and then I use Roxy CD maker (came bundled with the CD burner) to burn them.

 

[UA_Iron]

Its the encoding software that is being used.

And the BEST encoding software is FREE. Do not be fooled.
The best encoding options are VBR - you can get an mp3 smaller in size than a normal 192kbps and have it sound better.

EAC - exact audio copy
lame - codec which it will encode mp3s

with this software you can encode at 128kbps and not notice a difference between CD quality.

 

[Y_lifter]

And you buy your blank CDR's from Office Max in 100 spindles
where they are free with rebate ?

 

[AAP]

And you buy your blank CDR's from Office Max in 100 spindles
where they are free with rebate ?

Yes. (no joke, I do)

 

[AAP]

Its the encoding software that is being used.

And the BEST encoding software is FREE. Do not be fooled.
The best encoding options are VBR - you can get an mp3 smaller in size than a normal 192kbps and have it sound better.

EAC - exact audio copy
lame - codec which it will encode mp3s

with this software you can encode at 128kbps and not notice a difference between CD quality.

bro, gimme a link to that free software.

 

[UA_Iron]

Exact Audio Copy
http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/

Lame Codec Download
http://www.free-codecs.com/download/Lame_Encoder.htm

It might be a little tricky at first, but once you go through it and everything you'll have it down. The CD info from freedb.net is really convenient - and you can specify how it names and tags your mp3s.

 

[Buddy_Christ]

And you buy your blank CDR's from Office Max in 100 spindles
where they are free with rebate ?

I buy mine from Walmart. On my 2nd pack of Memorex. Havn't had any problems with them yet and they're reasonably cheap.

I have a ton of shit to burn that I keep forgetting to do. I'll probably use up half that spindle once I get around to it.

 

[Firebaall]

Naw...

All you need to do is normalize your mp3s to a standard level. Lots of people don't know what they are doing when they encode.

Try this free proggie out:

http://mp3gain.sourceforge.net/

Quick, easy and free.

As much as I hate Apple, they have one of the best free programs out to rip and create mp3s from your cds. iTunes. There's a windows version too.

http://www.apple.com/itunes/download/

 

[seizer]

I pledge my soul to NERO...burning ROM. That is a good all purpose burning program. Make sure that when you steal your music that its bitrate is fairly high, atleast 128kbs...preferably 192.

If you download single songs at a time, you are gonna get a lot of mixed qualities and formats and its gonna sounds like shit in your car. I recommend stealing full albums at a time...reason being...well, full albums are all ripped with the same quality, so you get consistency, and full albums are generally higher quality because they are taken directly from the source. Where as singles that you download one by one are passed around like saggy slut and are just plain bad once they get to you.

Just my two cents.

 

[blut wump]

It should have nothing to do with the bitrate. Most rippers will have some option to enhance, adjust or normalize the playback volume and a lot of people don't use it.

You might be able to re-import the mp3s into iTunes or Lame and enhance the volume before writing them out to audio cds. You shouldn't lose any quality if you import them from mp3 to wav and then write out the wav files as audio tracks. You can always delete the wav files afterwards to get your disc space back.

EDIT: when you rip your own for an iPod, or whatever, make sure to play with any options to enhance and normalize the volume until you find a setting which suits your playback deck or headphones. It should have no bearing on quality.