>"In my non-professional opinion, there is no standard format." Yea...that's pretty much what I figured. I've been researching standards for months now and it's becoming painfully clear that there is no general consensus. In a way, I think this is good. There's a ton of options out there and they all serve different purposes. I was just putting the feelers out to get an idea what most of you thought on the matter; mostly because one of my co-workers asked me this question earlier today and, as much as I like to think I know what's going on, I wasn't sure what to tell him. Things seem to change by the hour...... More than anything I was interested to see if there was something I was missing regarding WAV v. AIFF. I was unaware of AIFF's waning popularity so I guess that's a factor that I wasn't considering. Nice to know. Regardless, it seems like we're all on the same page here. Again, I appreciate the replies. Brandon Brandon Burke Graduate Research Assistant Digital Library Services University of Texas at Austin Austin, TX phone: (512) 495-4439 email: [log in to unmask] ********************************************************************* * "Stand up and face the full force of a dissonance like a man." * * * * -- Charles Ives * ********************************************************************* On Mar 24, 2004, at 5:43 PM, Mike Richter wrote: > At 03:37 PM 3/24/2004 -0600, Brandon Burke wrote: >> I know this is a loaded question but... >> >> Is there an accepted standard format for audio files that are to be >> digitaly >> archived on a server of some sort? By this I mean a format that does >> not >> entail >> condensing and/or any other manipulations that would in any way >> affect my >> ability to go back, open up, and have access to "the whole thing". >> I'm not >> talking about simply saving, let's say, a Pro Tools session en masse >> but >> rather >> a file format that retains as much of the "sound" information as >> possible. Not >> the session itself. I'm asuming that these are completed sessions. >> Also, I'm >> not concerned with things like CD-Rs, etc; though I obviously would >> like to >> preserve the ability to make them again later. >> >> My guess is that we're talking about either a WAV or AIFF files, no? > > In my non-professional opinion, there is no standard format. > > There are three parameters of interest for a digital file with audio > information: sample rate, bit depth, number of channels. A CD uses 44.1 > ksps, 16 bits, two channels. The highest quality at moderate cost > today is > 96 ksps, 24 bits, two channels. Purists will argue that information is > still lost with those parameters - and that is certainly true in > theory. In > the other direction, spoken word is generally considered fully > intelligible > at 16 ksps, 8 bits, one channel - my approximation to the target for > telephone quality. Somewhere in that 36:1 range, you are likely to find > your preferred operating point. > > AIFF has lost popularity in modern times; it offers no advantage over > WAV > and has been pretty much superseded even on the Apple computers which > were > its 'home' in decades past. Depending on the operating parameters you > choose and on your considerations of storage space and convenience, you > should look into lossless compression. Both Shorten and Monkeys Audio > provide lossless compression. If the parameters you have chosen for > WAV are > substantially used by your signal, compression of the order of 2:1 is > routine. If you have much wider bandwidth than is used for the bulk of > the > audio (including noise), substantially higher compression is routine. > Since > the compression is lossless, the decompressed file is identical with > the > original. > > > Mike > -- > [log in to unmask] > http://www.mrichter.com/ >