.mp3 vs ogg

[amlucent23]

First I would like to say that I am sorry for asking such a basic question that has probably been asked a billion times before I attempted to search this forum for an answer but my query returned WAY too many posts that were unrelated and the information from Google seems very dated. So if you know of a link or a thread that answers my question please feel free to give me the link and flame me.

Two part question- sorry

1) I have a fairly large collection (to me its large around 15gb) of .mp3, .wma, and even some .ogg music and audio books. Some are very old, from the late ninety's. I am considering re-encoding (if that is the proper term for this application) them to all be .ogg as I have read (somewhere) that in addition to being free it has superior audio quality and smaller size. Is this true? if so is it a large enough gain in space to bother?

If it is enough to be worth it then see question #2

2) I will be purchasing a ipod like device soon so I can plug it into my car stereo and listen to music/audio books on the road (i drive alot). I have been looking for one that supports playing .ogg but so far I only see that players with rocksbox firmware plays .ogg. Anyone know of any others that will play .ogg and of course linux/ubuntu compatible?

[Aeph]

I don't know which has better audio quality between the two, but let's just say for the sake of argument that ogg vorbis is. Reencoding mp3 files to .ogg will not increase the quality to that of the better format. The same is true if mp3 were better. Though if you wanted to re-rip all your CDs to get better quality, you would want to put them in a lossless format. If you want a free format that would be .flac, and if you want a format that would work with iTunes, that would be .aac. As far as I know, you can either have a free format or one that works on the iPod, not both. As for the .wma files, iTunes will reencode them anyway.

[amlucent23]

I dont use itunes so the fact that it wont support them is neither here nor there. Amarok is my favorite... and I am eagerly awaiting the windows port so I can dump winamp.

I guess I am asking that even if the quality stays the same as the .mp3 it would be worth it to me if it were a noticeable file size difference as I can fit more on the audio player. Plus, the rebel in me wants to say no to proprietary .acc and .wmp

[Canis familiaris]

ogg will give same quality as mp3 in a lower bitrate. Which means you save space with ogg as compared to equivalent mp3.
However support with portable media players is a problem though.

[Canis familiaris]

1) I have a fairly large collection (to me its large around 15gb) of .mp3, .wma, and even some .ogg music and audio books. Some are very old, from the late ninety's. I am considering re-encoding (if that is the proper term for this application) them to all be .ogg as I have read (somewhere) that in addition to being free it has superior audio quality and smaller size. Is this true? if so is it a large enough gain in space to bother?

Definitely. OGG has better quality than mp3 and is as good as wma or aac if not better. However keep note that if you re-encode you may further lose quality. I suggest if you have the original CDs, then rip them to ogg again.
Also if you care only for quality and not file size then FLAC is the best because it involves losseless compression.

If it is enough to be worth it then see question #2

2) I will be purchasing a ipod like device soon so I can plug it into my car stereo and listen to music/audio books on the road (i drive alot). I have been looking for one that supports playing .ogg but so far I only see that players with rocksbox firmware plays .ogg. Anyone know of any others that will play .ogg and of course linux/ubuntu compatible?

I'm not sure but I have heard that Sandisk players sync well with Linux. I dunno whether they support ogg.

[amlucent23]

Ok I have been doing some research on Google and there are a few players that support ogg some even do flac as well if anyone else is in the market like I am...


http://wiki.xiph.org/index.php/PortablePlayers

I am really leaning towards these Cowon players they all have great reviews but unfortunately the 80gb is way out of my price range.

This one will probably work though
http://www.jetmall.net/index.asp?Pag...ROD&ProdID=424

Anyone happen to know what .ogg ums is? Here is the contex it was used

Functional Features

Format File Format Supported MP3, WMA, OGG (UMS only), JPEG, SVI, WMV, TXT