Topic: converting to mp3

[georgeh]

for listening to music on cell phone, what do you all use to convert to mp3?
Traders Little Helper has the capability, and I already use it for flac, so good enough?
I use my phone at work to listen to music, looking to add some mp3's. I have also just downloaded what LMA has converted as well.

[Life In Rewind]

for listening to music on cell phone, what do you all use to convert to mp3?
Traders Little Helper has the capability, and I already use it for flac, so good enough?
I use my phone at work to listen to music, looking to add some mp3's. I have also just downloaded what LMA has converted as well.

TLH all the way!

[Gene Poole]

LAME is still one of the best encoders.  I've used it in linux in the past (I'm all flac these days) but I believe Audacity uses the LAME encoder for exporting MP3.

[Ultfris101]

foobar2000

[dyneq]

Short story: I use LAME VBR V4 for most of my music. If it is difficult to encode stuff (metal, certain acoustic music), I'll use V2 instead. I'd encourage you to do some of your own testing. I use dbpoweramp for ripping and conversion, but also occasionally use foobar2000.

Here is a wiki page describing LAME's settings, etc: http://wiki.hydrogenaud.io/index.php?title=LAME

Longer story:
A couple of years ago, I did my own ABX testing of the LAME VBR modes and discovered that I couldn't tell the difference between V5 and the lossless file. At V6, I could begin to hear certain compression artifacts. I tested using good cans in a quiet room, so for noisy environments, V4 works great for me since I can put so much more music on my portable devices. Public ABX tests have shown that some other codecs (AAC and OGG) can deliver transparency at even lower bitrates! I chose MP3 because it is universally supported by hardware and software. I still have everything in FLAC for home listening in a quiet environment on a good system.

[Life In Rewind]

TLH uses LAME as its encoder.

Dont think it comes with Audacity - I think you have to add it with another download.

[georgeh]

TLH uses LAME as its encoder.

Dont think it comes with Audacity - I think you have to add it with another download.

thanks, TLH seems to work. I had dbpower, may still..?
Not expecting high quality out of any mp3....size for more options is good enough. I have used some flacs on cell's card, but more options as far as more shows is probably my best option.

[bombdiggity]

TLH uses LAME and lets you specify your encoding mode and bit rate.  What's not to like?  The other suggestions will do it fine too but I'd generally use something I already have that's good rather than add more software.  Among what one has the functionality should be relatively comparable unless there's a dud in the arsenal... 

Lately where I know things are going to musicians that want a set in MP3 (damn MAC/iPod influence!) I'll save out an MP3 set in TLH when making the flacs, send it and delete once I get confirmation they have them.  I tend not to keep any MP3's myself (but am not an iPod user). 

[Ultfris101]

foobar uses LAME or other converters if you point it at them. I've been exporting as FLAC from samplitude lately and then tagging, file renaming, and converting to mp3 when necessary all from it.

I like TLH a lot but like having a simpler workflow.

And I use foobar to listen on my computer so it's in use a lot.

[bombdiggity]

^ Yeah my workflow is Audition > TLH.  I'm not a tagger though... 

I agree a simple workflow is best. 

In this case OP seemed to be thinking about going through and converting files post facto in which case the workflow considerations may be different (though no less important).  Foobar seems to have a few more steps in the process or be a little more confusing to me though I may not know how to use it best/fully... 

Foobar is absolutely best for converting the European broadcast MP2's to WAV though.  Better processing than other options in that case (TLH doesn't support those). 

[todd e]

dbpoweramp - version 11.5

then hit "lame" button: this is where you tell it where to export files and encoding options
hit "expert" tab  in custom options, put : "-b 320 -m j -h -q 0" (or change 320 to 128,256, 192, whatever) and check "use only custom options"

and this is directly from FLAC.

[danny3]

I use NCH Switch for everyday conversions.

[brad.bartels]

^ Yeah my workflow is Audition > TLH.  I'm not a tagger though... 

I agree a simple workflow is best. 

In this case OP seemed to be thinking about going through and converting files post facto in which case the workflow considerations may be different (though no less important).  Foobar seems to have a few more steps in the process or be a little more confusing to me though I may not know how to use it best/fully... 

Foobar is absolutely best for converting the European broadcast MP2's to WAV though.  Better processing than other options in that case (TLH doesn't support those).

Another vote for Foobar2000. It's been a while since I used TLH to convert to MP3, but if your FLAC files are all tagged with artist, album, song titles and track numbers, it seems like TLH doesn't preserve everything when you convert to MP3 - I want to say the track numbers? So if you wanted them back you had to add them back in manually (folks can correct me if I'm wrong, like I said it's been a while, but there's a reason I kept looking for an easier way)? In any case, I looked for quite a while to find something easy that preserved all the tags and foobar2000 was it for me. It does take a little time to set up the first time (you have to download and install the right plug-ins, I think they call them VSTs - but definitely LAME is available and that's what I've been using). Once you have it set up, all you have to do is open the FLACs, right click and pick "convert". After the first time (assuming you want to keep all the same options like bit rate, etc. - I always use 320 kbps), all you have to do is pick "last used" and point it to the folder you want them to go to and you're done.

I use Audacity to process and tag everything as I export to FLAC. To get the MP3s, then all I have to do is open them with foobar and select convert and point it to the directory I want them to go to. It's as simple as I've been able to get the workflow and still have everything tagged, etc. like I want it. I'm sure there are probably other ways to do it, but that's as simple as I've been able to make it. I've tried a lot of MP3 conversion utilities but stopped looking for something else when I started using foobar. Just my 2 cents;)