Opus files ?

[audiophilesnack]

Hi guys, does it makes sense to use Opus files exclusively for BT audio ? I was thinking and after reading this article , I could benefit and enlarge my music library on my iPhone using Opus files since I mostly use the iPhone with TWS , it seams there’s a lot of vantages over mp3 but not sure if I should maintain my flac files ? Less files better quality? , does the audio source quality makes a difference on BT, a difference that really matters ? Ty

 

[MaxwellsEq]

Hi guys, does it makes sense to use Opus files exclusively for BT audio ? I was thinking and after reading this article , I could benefit and enlarge my music library on my iPhone using Opus files since I mostly use the iPhone with TWS , it seams there’s a lot of vantages over mp3 but not sure if I should maintain my flac files ? Less files better quality? , does the audio source quality makes a difference on BT, a difference that really matters ? Ty

If you take the long view, do you think BT will develop to be largely lossless and storage to become cheap and relatively unlimited? If you think either or both is possible, or alternatively you will use a new protocol at some point in the future, sticking to lossless makes the most sense!

 

[Vincent Kars]

not sure if I should maintain my flac files

Storage is cheap today. So if you do have lossless sources, keep them. They are the best possible quality and are the way to future proof your collection.
You can always transcode (format conversion on the fly) to another format if needed. For use on a iPhone you simply transcode them to a lossy format supported by your iPhone. Try a couple of them like MP3, AAC and Opus.

 

[audiophilesnack]

Storage is cheap today. So if you do have lossless sources, keep them. They are the best possible quality and are the way to future proof your collection.
You can always transcode (format conversion on the fly) to another format if needed. For use on a iPhone you simply transcode them to a lossy format supported by your iPhone. Try a couple of them like MP3, AAC and Opus.

I’m not thinking off get rid of my flac files , I have my gear at home to listen to my library, I was just questioning if there’s an advantage of keeping flac files on my limited storage iPhone that I mostly use with TWS , when I can have a massive opus library occupying the same space , does it make a difference if I’m listen to a flac or a Opus when using BT ? That’s basically my question, ty

 

[J Dilla]

Opus could be a better choice for saving space while still sounding great. The difference between FLAC and Opus on Bluetooth won’t be huge, especially since most wireless audio setups are limited by the codec. Keep FLAC for home use, but Opus makes more sense for your iPhone if storage is tight.

 

[audiophilesnack]

If you take the long view, do you think BT will develop to be largely lossless and storage to become cheap and relatively unlimited? If you think either or both is possible, or alternatively you will use a new protocol at some point in the future, sticking to lossless makes the most sense!

maybe I was not clear on my question, I was just questioning if it makes a difference to listen a flac or a opus file when using BT because the if there’s no advantage it’s better to have more files on the same space

 

[Berwhale]

I have over 1.3TB of FLAC files in my library. I use MusicBee to sync the whole library to my phone (Nothing Phone (2) 512GB) whenever it is connected. MusicBee transcodes the FLACs to High Quality Opus on the fly. The Opus files take up 298GB on my phone, so less than 25% of the FLAC size.

As well as being a fraction of the size, it is several times faster to transfer the compressed Opus files to my phone. This makes it much quicker to update my phone with my latest music. My CPU, a Ryzen 9 7900 with 12 physical cores, can easily transcode faster than the files can be transferred to my phone. I'd guess that any recent i5/Ryzen 5 would be fast enough to do the same (I just checked MusicBee and it defaults to 8 threads).

I'm using a Qudelix 5K, connected with LDAC to my phone. I don't have any concerns regarding the inaudible loss of quality when converting from FLAC to Opus. I wouldn't have any concerns even if I was using a USB DAC with my phone, rather than Bluetooth.

 

[antcollinet]

I’m not thinking off get rid of my flac files , I have my gear at home to listen to my library, I was just questioning if there’s an advantage of keeping flac files on my limited storage iPhone that I mostly use with TWS , when I can have a massive opus library occupying the same space , does it make a difference if I’m listen to a flac or a Opus when using BT ? That’s basically my question, ty

I use iTunes/finder syncing to transfer music to my phone. It can be set to alutomatically transcode to compressed AAC during the transfer. I use 256kb/s AAC (the highest option)

I certainly don't notice any quality loss in use with airpods pro when out and about.

 

[Berwhale]

I just plugged in my phone an let it update. 103 new FLACs compressed to 1.5GB (so probably 6-7GB of FLACs) and it took 1 minute and 8 seconds to transcode and copy to my phone

 

[Vincent Kars]

Theoretically each lossy compression results in some generation loss. So if you do a lossy compression to Opus and send it over the Bluetooth (lets assume lossy compression using AAC) you get a cumulation of generation loss. Obvious you better stick to a lossless source.
In practice this degeneration might simply be inaudible or to marginal to bother.
At the time I had to deal with limited space on my mobile I used Musicbee to transcode to 256 MP3. BT uses SBC. On paper probably the worst possible lossy chain. In practice sound quality is decent. I do think my earbuds are the limiting factor, not the compression as I don't hear substantial artefacts.
Today I have 1 TB SD card so no transcoding anymore. Can't say I experienced an improvement listening to FLAC.

 

[Berwhale]

Today I have 1 TB SD card so no transcoding anymore

My library is over 1TB, so an additional benefit of transcoding is that I don't have to maintain a separate playlist with a subset of my library for syncing to my phone as FLAC. This would also apply to those with smaller libraries and phones that have limited internal storage only with no option to add any.

At present, the setup for my phone in MusicBee is delightfully simple... Sync my whole music library & transcode to Opus at Maximum Quality - Done

 

[bloodshoteyed]

and here i come, marching in, whistling the melody to "Life is life" (ok, the Laibach version, but nonetheless)

 

[audiophilesnack]

Theoretically each lossy compression results in some generation loss. So if you do a lossy compression to Opus and send it over the Bluetooth (lets assume lossy compression using AAC) you get a cumulation of generation loss. Obvious you better stick to a lossless source.
In practice this degeneration might simply be inaudible or to marginal to bother.
At the time I had to deal with limited space on my mobile I used Musicbee to transcode to 256 MP3. BT uses SBC. On paper probably the worst possible lossy chain. In practice sound quality is decent. I do think my earbuds are the limiting factor, not the compression as I don't hear substantial artefacts.
Today I have 1 TB SD card so no transcoding anymore. Can't say I experienced an improvement listening to FLAC.

I think you are probably right, that’s the theory behind a good hamburger, it’s only minced meat but if the original meat isn’t good it won’t taste good, nevertheless in a practical sense we are talking about music being played in a gym or some other mundane ambience where I’m not need to have the best audio experience and and I prefer to have quantity over quality, so I’m converting my flac library to Opus and to be honest it sounds very acceptable on my BT earbuds , of course this is a stupid experience since I have tidal and WiFi at the gym but I’m having some fun so it doesn’t matter

 

[bravomail]

Hi guys, does it makes sense to use Opus files exclusively for BT audio ? I was thinking and after reading this article , I could benefit and enlarge my music library on my iPhone using Opus files since I mostly use the iPhone with TWS , it seams there’s a lot of vantages over mp3 but not sure if I should maintain my flac files ? Less files better quality? , does the audio source quality makes a difference on BT, a difference that really matters ? Ty

Opus is no goo.
Quality and sound wise - Opus < MP3 < AAC.
"Opus encoder drops high and low freqs, it was designed for phone line compression, not for music" - of course, take this with a grain of salt.
It is really easy to get a guitar music track with a lot of distortion and then test codecs on it.
I used a FLAC of Deep Purple's "Hush".
You can find similar.
For encoding I used Foobar2000 - it needs external Apple Quicktime installed for AAC codec.
Then listen and decide for yourself.
Opus - like I quoted before - trash.
MP3 has a max constant bitrate of 320Kbits.
AAC can have a variable bitrate of 320Kbits, so in some challenging parts it can jump to, say, 500kbits.
AAC wins purely on VBR.
Opus has poor support in consumer electronics/players/etc.
MP3 and AAC has excellent support.
AAC is an Apple product. There is no opens source codec for it (could be wrong).

 

[masterhw]

Opus is no goo.
Quality and sound wise - Opus < MP3 < AAC.
"Opus encoder drops high and low freqs, it was designed for phone line compression, not for music" - of course, take this with a grain of salt.
It is really easy to get a guitar music track with a lot of distortion and then test codecs on it.
I used a FLAC of Deep Purple's "Hush".
You can find similar.
For encoding I used Foobar2000 - it needs external Apple Quicktime installed for AAC codec.
Then listen and decide for yourself.
Opus - like I quoted before - trash.
MP3 has a max constant bitrate of 320Kbits.
AAC can have a variable bitrate of 320Kbits, so in some challenging parts it can jump to, say, 500kbits.
AAC wins purely on VBR.
Opus has poor support in consumer electronics/players/etc.
MP3 and AAC has excellent support.
AAC is an Apple product. There is no opens source codec for it (could be wrong).

Much of that is refuted by a quick glance at Opus' wikipedia page.

Opus supports constant and variable bitrate encoding from 6 kbit/s to 510 kbit/s [...] and five sampling rates from 8 kHz (with 4 kHz bandwidth) to 48 kHz.

I agree Opus has not achieved broad support, but my understanding is with like settings it is in no way inferior to AAC. There is much on that page to suggest it is superior, at low bitrates anyhow.

 

[voodooless]

AAC is an Apple product. There is no opens source codec for it (could be wrong).

AAC is an open standard:

AAC has been standardized by ISO and IEC as part of the MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 specifications.[5][6]Part of AAC, HE-AAC ("AAC+"), is part of MPEG-4 Audio and is adopted into digital radio standards DAB+ and Digital Radio Mondiale, and mobile television standards DVB-H

There are several open source implementations, for example:

GitHub - knik0/faac: Freeware Advanced Audio Coder faac mirror

Freeware Advanced Audio Coder faac mirror. Contribute to knik0/faac development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

 

[beeface]

Opus is great, I use it at work for voice and video conference purposes.
When devices are switched from legacy G.7xx codecs (still in use in the 2020s!) it's a gamechanger.

However for some reason I've never really considered it for music purposes. If nothing else it might make sense for streaming services like Spotify to use it.

Gotta hand it to Christopher Montgomery - surely no individual has done more for audio codecs than him.

 

[Berwhale]

but I’m having some fun so it doesn’t matter

 

[Berwhale]

Opus is great, I use it at work for voice and video conference purposes.
When devices are switched from legacy G.7xx codecs (still in use in the 2020s!) it's a gamechanger.

However for some reason I've never really considered it for music purposes. If nothing else it might make sense for streaming services like Spotify to use it.

Gotta hand it to Christopher Montgomery - surely no individual has done more for audio codecs than him.

Opus achieves higher quality at a given bit rate and much lower latency than the G.7XX codecs. See the graphs here: https://opus-codec.org/comparison/

Opus is the successor to Ogg/Vorbis which Spotify use. I don't think there is a lot of difference between Ogg/Vorbis and Opus for the higher bit rates used for music, so there is probably no reason for Spotify to move to Opus.

I chose Opus because it was efficient at a wide range of bitrates and was supported by all my devices (although not our car as I found out later!).

 

[audiophilesnack]

Opus is no goo.
Quality and sound wise - Opus < MP3 < AAC.
"Opus encoder drops high and low freqs, it was designed for phone line compression, not for music" - of course, take this with a grain of salt.
It is really easy to get a guitar music track with a lot of distortion and then test codecs on it.
I used a FLAC of Deep Purple's "Hush".
You can find similar.
For encoding I used Foobar2000 - it needs external Apple Quicktime installed for AAC codec.
Then listen and decide for yourself.
Opus - like I quoted before - trash.
MP3 has a max constant bitrate of 320Kbits.
AAC can have a variable bitrate of 320Kbits, so in some challenging parts it can jump to, say, 500kbits.
AAC wins purely on VBR.
Opus has poor support in consumer electronics/players/etc.
MP3 and AAC has excellent support.
AAC is an Apple product. There is no opens source codec for it (could be wrong).

There’s some contradictory info in the internet but I can tell you it sounds great using BT, I already convert around 3000 flac files to opus and it’s very interesting, no delay, forward is instantaneous, the sound is fast and energetic, you can clear feel it, it’s a fun audio, no regrets so far, it’s like a AAC in steroids