n00b questions about ipods and linux (fedora 6 and 7)

[Craig White]

On Sat, 2008-01-12 at 05:44 -0800, Michael A. Peters wrote:
> Dean S. Messing wrote:
> > I am thinking about buying a 160 GB iPod for my daughter for her
> > approaching golden birthday (she's turning 18).
> >
> > I know _zero_ about iPods (or any other external device toys).
> I've had excellent luck with gtkpod - but with brand new models, it 
> sometimes takes some time.
> With respect to AAC - my experience is that Apple's AAC encoder is 
> better than faac (linux encoder) but it's been awhile.
> 
> I myself just use lame to encode to mp3 -  I use preset-standard and the 
> quality is fine, but if she has an excellent musical ear, she may want a 
> higher bitrate. I prefer to use mp3 because mp3 works with everything 
> out there.
> 
> As far as how it compares with AAC - that's something audiophiles argue 
> about all the time.
> I can't tell the difference between a 192VBR lame encoded MP3 and a 
> 192VBR quicktime (iTunes) encoded AAC. But I don't have a good musical 
> ear, let alone a trained good ear.
----
I might be inclined to agree with you except the default is to generally
use 128 bits to encode mp3/aac and at that bit rate, aac is clearly
better. In fact, I think it takes 192 bit rate for mp3 to get the
quality of 128 bit rate aac at which point, the size equation is
definitely slanted to aac.

Craig