Ableton Live: Export MP3 Question

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I searched for the following question on the web and in the Live Manual to no avail. Been wondering this for awhile now...

When exporting and encoding an MP3 from the Export Audio/Video options, does Live automatically apply dithering?

MP3 must be 16-bit, so quantization definitely takes place and usually dithering should be applied, but not required, when changing bit depths, but it's not stated anywhere.

Typically, it's not a problem, but take limiters like Waves L3 or Ozone: they have options to apply their own quantize and dithering, which may be cleaner than using Ableton's (only because it's a process handled by the same software as opposed to separate).

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Mp3 is floating point internally, not 16bit. So no dithering required.
... which would be futile compared to the butchering of the signal done by the data compression. You roughy get back what's put in anyway.

I've done some measurements on mp3 compression. Output is input within 0.02dB or so. The most-significant 6 bits of your signal stay in tact. If you're lucky. So the other 10 bits are rather random. So the least significant bit of the input has no influence.

Mastering tools... Some want to offer everything. Do you think the shape of dither noise matters much after it is mastered to single-digit RMS levels? Difference of 85dB ffs
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BertKoor wrote: Sat Jul 06, 2019 6:25 am Mp3 is floating point internally, not 16bit. So no dithering required.
So that means I should be able to convert a 44.1kHz 32-bit float or a 24-bit fixed wav file to MP3 without doing anything special, right?
BertKoor wrote: Sat Jul 06, 2019 6:25 amI've done some measurements on mp3 compression. Output is input within 0.02dB or so. The most-significant 6 bits of your signal stay in tact. If you're lucky. So the other 10 bits are rather random. So the least significant bit of the input has no influence.

Mastering tools... Some want to offer everything. Do you think the shape of dither noise matters much after it is mastered to single-digit RMS levels? Difference of 85dB ffs
Most likely not, as any masking-noise is well below the squashed-yet-quietest sounds. I've always assumed dither noise shaping makes more sense in low-level audio such as classical or acoustic material and/or songs that have quite low intros, outros, breaks, or bridges. With that said, I think it's still possibly a best practice to still apply some level of dithering when converting bit depth.

On a side note, how many of you actually use the MP3 output in Live vs. use another program to convert? While I think it's convenient, at the same time, it's really not. :hihi: I think an improvement would be to include the option to export to other bit rates (e.g. 256kbps, 192kbps, etc.).

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I never export to mp3 as it's not a good format to master. I export to the best quality stereo that I can, and use my saved master to export to whatever format I'm exporting to.

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Yeah, but MP3 is a lot handier when you just want to check the basics on a car stereo or phone. I don’t think the OP mentioned mastering which would be nuts.

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Correct, I am not mastering the MP3. That would just be goofy.

My process that I use is to first export my MIX as a 32-bit wav file. Then, I pull that MIX into my mastering session/project, perform the mastering, then dither/quantize down to a 24-bit wav file as the final, MASTER file. From there I can either choose to also export at 320kbps MP3 via Ableton Live, which is actually a top-notch, almost-archival quality of MP3, but the file size is pretty large for general distribution. Therefore, it would be cool to have the option of 256k, 192k, or even--gasp!--160kbps. I think Cakewalk Sonar had this option a long time ago, but it was a paid upgrade to Sonar.

As of now, however, using my copy of SoundForge Studio 10 to export MP3, to whatever bitrate I desire as all options are available, is much much faster.

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