SonicStage 3.3 Arrives -- a Reformed ATRAC is Born

[simon.giesen]

Looks like that not everything is clear about the new Bitrates/Codec-variants offered by SS3.3.

Since possibly not everyone has read the sister thread over at minidisc.org, some notes from that:

Atrac Lossless: It contains actually two parts, one lossy file, one lossless.

Comparisons/calculations made by Rombuster revealed it, a WMA lossless + a WMA@64k file together roughly equal an AtracLossless file tagged with 64k in size, having the same cd-track as source.

See: here, Post #106.

Plus, when converting/transferring, only the lossy part is used.

So using AtracLossless as a source for 352k is rather pointless.

See Post #34, same thread.

Best quality from 352k: Import the CD as WAV( PCM ), then go into the album, mark all tracks, do a rightclick on one of the tracks, select Convert Format, select Atrac3Plus and 352k from that dropdown.

Make sure, that the 'Add Copyprotection after Convert'-Checkbox is unchecked.

Click on Convert.

When that is done, remove the WAV-file in the properties-dialogue of each track to recover the disc space.

I know, it is a bit tedious, but is currently the only way to make full use of the 352k without filling the HDD with PCM-files(10MByte/min).

I hope, we'll see a SS3.4, where 352k is offered on CD-Import and the lossless part is used for conversion, when AtracLossless is used as a source.

I hope, that clears it up a bit.

←

Well, you are right.

Shame on me.

Yes, I tested it and it Sonic Stage really does some upconverting of the pre-ripped-lossless-256K sound. BULLSHIT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So, again, I imported some of my favourite CDs again by using WAV file format and I checked the sound with the Sony MDR-V700 DJ headphones and with my Grado Reference Series RS1 headphones. Now it's perfect, it's different from anything before - this is HiFi

but - funny how one (me) can be blamed... (by Sony blaming us as silly users)

AND NOW PLEASE EXPLAIN ME THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN "HIGH" AND "NORMAL" QUALITY RIPPING!

[Dinko]

I just hooked up an HD1 to SonicStage 3. It told me to initialize it.

I had tracks on the player which were no longer on my PC. So instead of losing everything, I dragged the files off the HD1 using Windows Explorer and dropped them in a folder on the PC hard drive, then imported the OMA files in SonicStage.

Took about two hours for the whole operation, but it sure beats initializing the drive and then ripping all the CDs again.