Replaygain MP3 tags - avoid clipping or not?

[frankvw]

I'm looking for your experiences and opinions here: when adding replaygain tags to MP3 and other audio files, is it better to avoid clipping or not?

• Avoiding clipping will prevent distortion and audio quality degradation, but may result in less consistent normalization.
• Not avoiding clipping may lead to distortion and degradation, but can produce more consistent normalization.

What is your preference, and why?

// F

 

[airborne]

Why even bother, I’ve never used replaygain tags or settings and never needed them either.

 

[Crowley]

I'm looking for your experiences and opinions here: when adding replaygain tags to MP3 and other audio files, is it better to avoid clipping or not?

• Avoiding clipping will prevent distortion and audio quality degradation, but may result in less consistent normalization.
• Not avoiding clipping may lead to distortion and degradation, but can produce more consistent normalization.

What is your preference, and why?

// F

Honest question.

Why do you still use mp3 when Spotify and Google music is available?

 

[airborne]

Honest question.

Why do you still use mp3 when Spotify and Google music is available?

Why not?

 

[frankvw]

Why even bother, I’ve never used replaygain tags or settings and never needed them either.

I've got a huge collection of albums, many of which are recorded at different sound levels. So playing random selections of a single artist across multiple albums can be a pain due to the different sound levels.

 

[frankvw]

Honest question.

Why do you still use mp3 when Spotify and Google music is available?

Because I've got a locally stored collection of digital audio (not just MP3 at a minimum of 320kbps but also flac) that I like to play when the Internet feed is down. Which frequently happens in our neck of the woods. There's also the subscription issue. I've bought a truckloads of CDs in my days and paying to play the same music in some online streaming format makes no sense to me. I'd rather convert my own CDs to digital audio files.

Then there's the atrocities that streaming audio vendors commit to digital audio recordings. Apple music is better than Spotify, but still. Dynamic range, detail, clarity... <couch>

 

[backstreetboy]

Because I've got a locally stored collection of digital audio (not just MP3 at a minimum of 320kbps but also flac) that I like to play when the Internet feed is down. Which frequently happens in our neck of the woods. There's also the subscription issue. I've bought a truckloads of CDs in my days and paying to play the same music in some online streaming format makes no sense to me. I'd rather convert my own CDs to digital audio files.

Then there's the atrocities that streaming audio vendors commit to digital audio recordings. Apple music is better than Spotify, but still. Dynamic range, detail, clarity... <couch>

Spotify and Apple Music etc. allow you to download music for offline listening. You just need to have an internet connection every 30 days.

 

[frankvw]

Spotify and Apple Music etc. allow you to download music for offline listening. You just need to have an internet connection every 30 days.

My own locally stored collection of digital audio allows me offline listening of my favourite music right now. Why on earth should I bother with Spotify or Apple and then save it using an Internet connection and paid subscription when I already have that?

Anyway, all this is beside the point. My question was about replaygain tags and clipping protection vs. no clipping protection, not about whether or not I should discard my enormous private music collection ad replace it with a dependency on paid online streaming services.

// F

 

[garyc]

Then there's the atrocities that streaming audio vendors commit to digital audio recordings. Apple music is better than Spotify, but still. Dynamic range, detail, clarity... <couch>

If sound quality is important to you then replaygain is a bad idea.

 

[backstreetboy]

My own locally stored collection of digital audio allows me offline listening of my favourite music right now. Why on earth should I bother with Spotify or Apple and then save it using an Internet connection and paid subscription when I already have that?

Anyway, all this is beside the point. My question was about replaygain tags and clipping protection vs. no clipping protection, not about whether or not I should discard my enormous private music collection ad replace it with a dependency on paid online streaming services.

// F

Just pointing out that you are wrong.

 

[frankvw]

If sound quality is important to you then replaygain is a bad idea.

Why? A replaygain tag merely provides the player with a volume scalar, i.e. by how much to increase or decrease volume in order to achieve normalization. Sound quality is not affected (if clipping is avoided, that is).

 

[Gudnews]

Oh boy this takes me back to the early 2010s! I didn't even have the readily available internet to Google the meaning of clipping. I'm pretty sure I avoided the clipping (not by design) because those albums I treated sound distorted at times.

 

[DrJohnZoidberg]

Probably best to ask this question somewhere else like a suitable subreddit. My coworkers work with this stuff and are very knowledgeable on the topic but they aren’t on myBB

 

[Crumbl0x]

This mostly applies to my specific use case -- music in the car and central speaker -- I clip my ReplayGain to have the most consistent experience. I've noticed more often than not anyways that music from the late to early 80/90's and onwards, a big thanks in part to the loudness wars, need to be lowered to match the Δ -4.00 dB standard, and a few quieter songs or mastered versions raise slight enough to either not clip, or have minute sections that may clip for a split second but remain soft as a result for no good reason, and these sorts of things aren't noticable in the above-mentioned scenarios anyway. Of course, exceptions crop up now and then.

For personal listening, I mostly do whole albums or curated lists for which I don't touch the source or need this to take effect. That's just my reason though.

 

[frankvw]

I've noticed more often than not anyways that music from the late to early 80/90's and onwards, a big thanks in part to the loudness wars, need to be lowered to match the Δ -4.00 dB standard...

You do raise a good point there! Analysis of the audio on many CDs from that era tend to show that many tracks were already clipped there. So products of the Loudness Wars won't benefit much from clipping avoidance when generating replay gain tags anyway.

(That's why some audiophiles prefer vinyl, I suppose - simply because vinyl recordings are, by and large, treated much more respectfully.)

 

[Hemps]

You do raise a good point there! Analysis of the audio on many CDs from that era tend to show that many tracks were already clipped there. So products of the Loudness Wars won't benefit much from clipping avoidance when generating replay gain tags anyway.

(That's why some audiophiles prefer vinyl, I suppose - simply because vinyl recordings are, by and large, treated much more respectfully.)

Also releases to Japan are also often better according to the boffins. Especially for pre 90's stuff.
I find vinyl to digital releases some have on websites/soulseek etc to actually sound pretty good.