Windows Media Audio 8

Microsoft released a brand new encoder , the Windows Media Encoder 8 . Although it's still in beta I was impressed by the efficiency . Of course don't believe what Microsoft talks about (48Kbps for a CD Quality) , but I was satisfied with 80-96 Kbps compression . OK you can't have the same quality between 96K wma & 160K mp3 , but you cannot compress mp3 "difficult" samples lower that 128K . Even the 80K wma does not have disturbing phase artifacts , just some treble attenuation . Most of pop / dance songs can be fitted with a 80K compression . That means over 300 - 320 songs on a CD !! .

Speed is good but not so high compared with my favorite Gogo encoder . For a particular song Gogo took 1:00 minute to make it 160K mp3 as opposed to 1:40 that WM8 needed for 96K mp3 .

Compared with the older MsAudio4 files there's not so much difference - as it is announced - but I have to admit that it's better .

So the conclusion is still similar with MsAudio4 : If you are a pure Hi-Fi enthusiast stay to 160K mp3 (or better) . If for some reason you have to compress very high (80-96 Kbps) then WM (4,7,8) is the only solution .

- How to get WM8:

Go to Microsoft and download all the appropriate files . You can still use Media Player 6.4 or even WinAmp . There are also many third party front-end programs to help you encoding (the encoder is still a command line program) . You can also download the brand new Windows Media Encoder 7.1 (supports WM8) .

Microsoft did it this time: to supersede the mp3 compression specially in lower bitrates . But have in mind the following:

- Disadvantages of WMA:

- WM format is NOT Public Domain . 
- Like WM7 , WM8 is not so practical . You cannot use the codec with a third party CD-Ripper or other application . You have to wait for a CD-Ripper that includes WMA 8.0 .
- There very few hardware devices that can play WMA files (as opposed to mp3 players) , and even there it's not sure that they can play WMA8 files .
- There are no companies making encoders other than Microsoft. 
- We have seen in past many other formats better than mp3 that did not succeed mostly because there was not public domain: Yamaha's VQF , Liquid Audio e.t.c. .

- How to decode wma files back to WAV:

- Is there any CD-Riper that can use WM8? :

WM8 does not include any codec (like WM4) so it cannot be used by any third-party rippers . You can make .wav using a ripper and then you can encode & tag edit them using the new Windows Media Encoder 7.1 . This is a lot of work isn't it ? .

So if you want to have complete wma files with tag information , you have to stay with MsAudio4 Codecs . MusicMatch Jukebox , PCDJ (free) & CD-Copy are some of many programs that can handle MsAudio4 compression .

Probably if we wait a bit more we will see some famous multimedia programs (like MM Jukebox) including WM8 .

Update: 25/05/01
Michael Hondrosmos