Can someone look at this mp3 and tell me what is wrong?

[jimdagys]

Can someone look at this mp3 and tell me what is wrong? Is there a way to "fix" it? I got it as a real time recording from TuneIn radio player/recorder for Android. The file plays in Windows Media Player (with warning message). Doesn't play at all with VLC1.0.5 or Media Player Classic Home Cinema 1.5.2.3456. EDIT:
Plays intermittently with MPC and also plays the wrong speed with MPC.

[transporterfan]

I had a look. There are 27 errors in the file all relating to missing header information. Have fixed it. Will upload if you like, or you can do it yourself with Pazera Audio Extractor. May i ask what software you used to record it? Fixing it will lose about 6 seconds.

http://www102.zippyshare.com/v/6B55bGiZ/file.html

Listen to it here and/or download

[jimdagys]

Thank you very much for the response. I used TuneIn Radio 7.1 (for Android) which seems to be available free if you search for that exact thing on Google. The software seems to download from Google Docs (I don't understand that but I'm not going to question that). The recorded music files are in the TuneIn folder. If you just want to listen to the recorded files, you don't need to go to the TuneIn folder. You can listen to the recorded files from the TuneIn software interface. The only reason you would go to the TuneIn folder is to get the recorded file transferred out of the Android device. File in the TuneIn folder doesn't have an extension, so you will have to add the extension (like .mp3, .aac) yourself.
Also, you might have to copy the recorded music file to another part of the Android (like storage location) before you can transfer the file to Windows.
Could you tell me a little bit about Pazera Audio Extractor (what version did you use?) and give me a brief outline of how you used the software to fix the mp3 file. A screenshot would be useful.

[transporterfan]

http://www.pazera-software.com/products/audio-extractor/

Just download portable version. it's all a one screen interface. Drag 'n drop your file and adjust settings as you please.
Your original file was 128kb, I adjusted to 160kb. It actually makes little difference for these files. If you value the quality
record at minimum 160kb if you have the choice.

[jimdagys]

OK, I got it. I used the Pazera Audio Extractor and left all the settings as default. I got a 128kbps output that played fine in the above media players. I'm not sure what the software is doing, but it must be doing some kind of recoding because it took a few minutes to "fix" the file. Where did you get the info about 27 errors in the file all relating to missing header information?

[transporterfan]

it gives an error report after conversion, as a generated text file.
Any errors are reported.

[jimdagys]

It seems that if I choose "try extract original audio stream" (see screenshot, red circle), the software will "fix" the mp3 file in 2 seconds. Obviously no recoding going on in this case.

[hello_hello]

I tried the Pazera Audio Extractor as I'd not heard of it and thought I'd have a look. There still seems to be some junk data left in the MP3 after it's extracted, and MediaInfo displays this:



There's also still a small glitch at the start when I play it with MPC-HC.

In what will remain for the moment, one of life's mysteries, if I open the MP3 extracted by Pazera Audio Extractor with Mp3DirectCut and use the "File/Save Complete Audio" menu, the new MP3 is exactly the same. If I open the original MP3 with Mp3DirectCut and resave it though, the file size is reduced a little, the glitch goes away, and MediaInfo says this:



Adding the MP3 to a foobar2000 playlist and using it's "Utilities/Rebuild MP3 Stream" and "Utilities/Fix VBR MP3 Header" menus in that order also makes a happy MP3 out of it.

[jimdagys]

Thank you for the info about Foobar2000, however I have a problem.
I inputted the defective mp3 music file into Foobar2000 ( file>open>add files) and performed the 2 operations (one by one) like you said ( see screenshot). However, I can't seem to find any way to save the resulting file. Usually there is some kind of "file> save" but I couldn't find it. Can you tell me how to save the repaired mp3 file?

[hello_hello]

Foobar2000 performs those operations on the existing MP3s. When you select one of those options it should display a warning first. If you don't want to apply the changes to the original files, you need to make a copy first yourself, but if you've already run them, they've been applied.

And I assume you've run them. I don't know why, but foobar2000 wasn't displaying the duration as 12.56 until I ran the "fix VBR header" function. It'd display 12.54 instead. Some programs displayed 12.56 though. Mp3DirectCut and Mp3Tag.
Foobar2000, MediaInfo and MPC-HC display 12.54 until the "fix VBR header function" is applied, then everyone agrees it's 12.56.
It's no big deal, but I've noticed that sort of discrepancy before and I'm curious as to why but I haven't been able to work it out. Being CBR you wouldn't think there'd be any ambiguity.

[hello_hello]

I'm still not 100% sure about the duration discrepancy but I got ffmpeg to convert the MP3 to a wave file before and after foobar2000 fixed the VBR header, and both wave files were 12:56. The only real differences between the two log files were:

Skipping 0 bytes of junk at 0.
Estimating duration from bitrate, this may be inaccurate
Duration: 00:12:54.37, start: 0.000000, bitrate: 128 kb/s
Stream #0:0, 50, 1/14112000: Audio: mp3, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16p, 128 kb/s

And after VBR header repair:

Skipping 0 bytes of junk at 417.
Duration: 00:12:56.15, start: 0.000000, bitrate: 127 kb/s
Stream #0:0, 50, 1/14112000: Audio: mp3, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16p, 128 kb/s

I can only assume the first MP3 has no VBR header and without it some programs check the MP3 more thoroughly than others to determine the duration, and because MP3 uses a "bit reservoir" it's a little variable bitrate even when it's constant bitrate, so it's not necessarily exact.

As it turns out, I noticed MediaInfo bets both ways.



Not that I really achieved anything with any of that, except maybe to satisfy my curiosity a little, assuming my assumptions are correct.

[jimdagys]

Foobar2000 performs those operations on the existing MP3s. When you select one of those options it should display a warning first. If you don't want to apply the changes to the original files, you need to make a copy first yourself, but if you've already run them, they've been applied.

I got it about how to save repaired mp3 file in Foobar2000. I find that very strange that the changes are automatically applied without doing a "file>save" operation. I'm glad I first copied the original (defective) mp3 for test purposes. Otherwise it would be lost forever.

[jimdagys]

New Info:
I seems that if I use Pazera Audio Extractor
and choose
"try extract original audio stream" (no recoding)
to repair the original mp3 file, the resulting mp3 file will not play in a portable Sandisk mp3 player. Also original defective mp3 file will not play in Sandisk mp3 player.
However if I use Foobar2000 to repair the original defective mp3 file (by method you outlined above), the resulting mp3 file plays fine in Sandisk mp3 player. At this point I think the problem is solved. Thank you.

[hello_hello]

I got it about how to save repaired mp3 file in Foobar2000. I find that very strange that the changes are automatically applied without doing a "file>save" operation. I'm glad I first copied the original (defective) mp3 for test purposes. Otherwise it would be lost forever.

I guess foobar2000 doesn't have a File/Save menu as it doesn't open files as such (despite the File/Open menu). It creates playlists but in that respect it's more like Windows Explorer for audio files. I'm used to it so the way it works seems normal to me, although in foobar2000's defence if it's going to alter a file in some way it always warns you first so you can tell it not to. I can't think of a situation where it doesn't ask/warn first.
Well maybe with the exception of tagging files, but if you change something like artist or album info and click okay I think expected behaviour would be for the tags to be updated.