Changing from opus to aac
Quote from Dave on November 14, 2024, 3:45 pmWe are in the process of changing over our opus streams to aac.
Streams may go offline for a while and urls will be changing as well.
Thank you for your patience while we make the transition.Our main mp3 streams are unaffected.
We are in the process of changing over our opus streams to aac.
Streams may go offline for a while and urls will be changing as well.
Thank you for your patience while we make the transition.
Our main mp3 streams are unaffected.
Quote from Habano_6x54 on November 16, 2024, 9:07 pmCan I ask why you’re changing? Opus is the most efficient psychoacoustic audio codec yet developed, it’s better than AAC and unlike AAC it’s totally unencumbered by patents and royalty payments and is totally free for anyone to use.
Blind testing has also shown that Opus is transparent to the lossless PCM source material at 128 kbps, so you could save significant bandwidth cost using Opus 128 kbps instead of AAC at 192 kbps. 128 kbps streams (regardless of codec being used) are also a bit more resistant to slow/congested network conditions and buffering pauses than are 192 kbps streams.
The only advantage your AAC stream has over your prior Opus stream is artist/song titles being sent in the stream, so external players can show this information. Your Opus stream didn’t have this feature, I’m guessing because it wasn’t practical.
I’m just curious why you’re making the switch. Opus @ 128 kbps or 192 kbps, and AAC @ 192 kbps all sound fantastic and all should be pretty much impossible to tell from the lossless PCM source material, so it doesn’t really matter. Just curious about the reasons, thanks!
Can I ask why you’re changing? Opus is the most efficient psychoacoustic audio codec yet developed, it’s better than AAC and unlike AAC it’s totally unencumbered by patents and royalty payments and is totally free for anyone to use.
Blind testing has also shown that Opus is transparent to the lossless PCM source material at 128 kbps, so you could save significant bandwidth cost using Opus 128 kbps instead of AAC at 192 kbps. 128 kbps streams (regardless of codec being used) are also a bit more resistant to slow/congested network conditions and buffering pauses than are 192 kbps streams.
The only advantage your AAC stream has over your prior Opus stream is artist/song titles being sent in the stream, so external players can show this information. Your Opus stream didn’t have this feature, I’m guessing because it wasn’t practical.
I’m just curious why you’re making the switch. Opus @ 128 kbps or 192 kbps, and AAC @ 192 kbps all sound fantastic and all should be pretty much impossible to tell from the lossless PCM source material, so it doesn’t really matter. Just curious about the reasons, thanks!
Quote from Dave on November 17, 2024, 5:43 pmEDIT: Never mind below. I just got a directive from management to put opus back. lol
I hear ya, I love opus. It’s just not production-ready for radio use.
Our butt encoder with opus is a nightmare to keep up. Also, if we try to send metadata most players just crash, which is why we stopped sending metadata on it almost as soon as we started using it. As good as it sounds, it’s just not suitable for radio playout. The metadata problems should have been worked out over a decade ago, but they haven’t been. I don’t know if is a communication issue between the opus devs and player app devs, or bad documentation, or a lack of understanding needs. I don’t really care. It’s been a nightmare to work with. It’s not production ready. mp3 never crashes, aac never crashes, opus crashes on the server and client side. If the opus team ever takes radio streaming seriously, then we’ll give it another look, but I don’t see that happening if it hasn’t happened in over a decade. In short, Opus wastes money and time, it’s a hobbyist codec.
EDIT: Never mind below. I just got a directive from management to put opus back. lol
I hear ya, I love opus. It’s just not production-ready for radio use.
Our butt encoder with opus is a nightmare to keep up. Also, if we try to send metadata most players just crash, which is why we stopped sending metadata on it almost as soon as we started using it. As good as it sounds, it’s just not suitable for radio playout. The metadata problems should have been worked out over a decade ago, but they haven’t been. I don’t know if is a communication issue between the opus devs and player app devs, or bad documentation, or a lack of understanding needs. I don’t really care. It’s been a nightmare to work with. It’s not production ready. mp3 never crashes, aac never crashes, opus crashes on the server and client side. If the opus team ever takes radio streaming seriously, then we’ll give it another look, but I don’t see that happening if it hasn’t happened in over a decade. In short, Opus wastes money and time, it’s a hobbyist codec.
Quote from Habano_6x54 on November 17, 2024, 8:36 pmThanks for the detailed info, Dave. Very interesting. Other than no metadata, I had no idea of all the streaming difficulties involved.
Opus is fantastic for making static audio files though, to store and listen to locally, even if it’s not good for streaming over networks.
I also love how you guys use high bitrates (MP3 @ 320 VBR, Opus/AAC at 192). So many internet radio stations use potato or semi-potato bitrate, resulting in something that’s unlistenable on decent playback gear. WALM knows how to do it right: using enough bitrate for transparency! Bravo.
As a side note, I hope you guys can fix the Christmas Vinyl webpage not ever auto-updating the “Currently Playing” song. Whatever song is playing when you call up the page originally, it stays there forever. Classic Vinyl’s webpage, by contrast, does auto-update at song changes. I want to put this webpage full-screen on my big living room TV and good sound system for guests for the holidays (love that gorgeous background image!) and I’d rather not keep manually hitting refresh, so it’d be awesome if that could get fixed. Thanks either way though!
Thanks for the detailed info, Dave. Very interesting. Other than no metadata, I had no idea of all the streaming difficulties involved.
Opus is fantastic for making static audio files though, to store and listen to locally, even if it’s not good for streaming over networks.
I also love how you guys use high bitrates (MP3 @ 320 VBR, Opus/AAC at 192). So many internet radio stations use potato or semi-potato bitrate, resulting in something that’s unlistenable on decent playback gear. WALM knows how to do it right: using enough bitrate for transparency! Bravo.
As a side note, I hope you guys can fix the Christmas Vinyl webpage not ever auto-updating the “Currently Playing” song. Whatever song is playing when you call up the page originally, it stays there forever. Classic Vinyl’s webpage, by contrast, does auto-update at song changes. I want to put this webpage full-screen on my big living room TV and good sound system for guests for the holidays (love that gorgeous background image!) and I’d rather not keep manually hitting refresh, so it’d be awesome if that could get fixed. Thanks either way though!
Quote from Dave on November 17, 2024, 8:58 pmQuote from Habano_6x54 on November 17, 2024, 8:36 pmAs a side note, I hope you guys can fix the Christmas Vinyl webpage not ever auto-updating the “Currently Playing” song. Whatever song is playing when you call up the page originally, it stays there forever. Classic Vinyl’s webpage, by contrast, does auto-update at song changes. I want to put this webpage full-screen on my big living room TV and good sound system for guests for the holidays (love that gorgeous background image!) and I’d rather not keep manually hitting refresh, so it’d be awesome if that could get fixed. Thanks either way though!
It should be updating. I just checked it and it’s updating for me. Christmas Vinyl was re-written to use ajax for faster updates, so if you have javascript disabled or blocked by a plugin, it won’t work.
All the other pages currently do a full page reload, but they are in the process of being converted to ajax too.
If you’re in a desktop browser try doing a hard refresh <ctrl>-<shift>-R (Windows & Linux)Â or Command-Option-R on a Mac, in your browser, you might have an outdated cache.
If you’re still having troubles shoot me a Direct Message (At the top of the main forum page) and I can try to help you figure out why its not working for you.
Quote from Habano_6x54 on November 17, 2024, 8:36 pmAs a side note, I hope you guys can fix the Christmas Vinyl webpage not ever auto-updating the “Currently Playing” song. Whatever song is playing when you call up the page originally, it stays there forever. Classic Vinyl’s webpage, by contrast, does auto-update at song changes. I want to put this webpage full-screen on my big living room TV and good sound system for guests for the holidays (love that gorgeous background image!) and I’d rather not keep manually hitting refresh, so it’d be awesome if that could get fixed. Thanks either way though!
It should be updating. I just checked it and it’s updating for me. Christmas Vinyl was re-written to use ajax for faster updates, so if you have javascript disabled or blocked by a plugin, it won’t work.
All the other pages currently do a full page reload, but they are in the process of being converted to ajax too.
If you’re in a desktop browser try doing a hard refresh <ctrl>-<shift>-R (Windows & Linux)Â or Command-Option-R on a Mac, in your browser, you might have an outdated cache.
If you’re still having troubles shoot me a Direct Message (At the top of the main forum page) and I can try to help you figure out why its not working for you.