AAC 320kbps CBR Not Available

i wondered why 320kbps is not available in the AAC LC encoder. It’s standard in other encoders I’ve found. Is that something that could be added?

:confused: Strange. I have 320kbps here. Normally, you should have the full range of bit rates.

Thanks Stingray. Are you on Mac?

It’s missing in WL 9.0.35 -32b Windows 10. It goes from 256k straight to 448k, then 512k. And while it’s nice to have 448 and 512, it seems strange 320 is missing, when that’s probably much more standard. Makes it hard to compare 320 MP3 to 320 AAC. 320 AAC is in iTunes and other AAC encoders I’ve seen.

The available bps depend on the sample rate and number of channels.
320 is available for 48kHz sample rate.

Oh right! That explains it. I was working with 48kHz files.

It’s strange. I got it for a minute at 44.1 (which is what I’m going for) and 48, after toggling Channels and Sample Rate from Match Input Stream to Fixed. But I’m not able to get back to it now. Something odd going on, but I’ll keep trying.
AAC CBR No 320.png

Scratch that. I don’t think I got it at 44.1.

320 + 44100 is not meant to be supported by the encoder.

Thanks PG, but why is that? Apple AAC, Nero AAC, and Sonnox Fraunhofer AAC all do 44.1 320k CBR. Can Wavelab Fraunhofer not be made to do it? It would be nice if it could.

Well, the Fraunhofer AAC documentation that I have in front of my eyes, say it is not supported.
Now, maybe this is work anyhow in practise. But WaveLab excludes this attempt.
I would need to try. But 256 vs 320 in AAC must not do a big difference!

If you need more than 256kbps, just use VBR set to “Highest Bit Rate”. The encoder will use more than 256kbps as needed.

Note that the closed source Fraunhofer AAC encoder is pretty good and anything over 192kbps should sound pretty much the same as lossless.

Thanks PG and Romantique Tp. I’m not looking for big differences, but small ones. And I know 320 cbr compares closer technically to the source than 256 cbr because I’ve done it. Whether I can tell blind I’m not really concerned with.

And all the other programs have 320 cbr, Sonnox did it somehow. And i’d like to compare 320 AAC to 320 MP3 because it’s a very standard bitrate, and 44.1 is a very standard sampling rate.