MP3 (LAME), AAC (FAAC) and AC3. Can we rank them?

[moiz]

While changing the audio settings of an AVI (Xvid) to decrease the file size in Avidemux, I selected 4 different compressors one-by-one.

MP3 (LAME)
AAC (FAAC)
AC3 (Aften)
AC3 (lavc)

All @ 192 kb/s, stereo and 48000 Hz.

But, according to the Avidemux's calculator, the output file size from all 4 compressors would be 115 MB in my file (original size was 231 MB).

Different compressors at same bitrate are giving same file size.

Whose quality would be better?
Can we rank them?

[guns1inger]

Bitrate X Running Time = File Size, so yes, all three will give the same file size.

Ranking by quality I would probablu go AAC, AC3 (Aften), AC3 (lavc), MP3(LAME), although I suspect you will be hard placed to tell the difference between AC3 and MP3 at those bitrates on most kit.

This issue with AAC is playability. Most standalone players will happily play back MP3 and AC3. Few will playback AAC.

[Delta2]

Between AAC 5.1 and AC3 5.1, it all depends on what bitrate is used in both formats.

AAC is more advanced lossy audio format than AC3, it will produce better audio quality than AC3 with same bitrate, especialy on low bitrates.

You can't compare low bitrate ACC against high bitrate AC3, in which the latest will produce higher quality audio in that case, of course.

With DTS, For example a DTS-HD Master Audio, lossless 24-bit 96 kHz with 1.5 Mbit/s bitrate will produce superb audio quality, superior than ACC or AC3 at any bitrate.

Unfortunately not all players plays DTS, or AAC

I usually keep DTS as possible, because there is players that can play DTS but not DTS-ES, etc....the same with AAC which I convert always to AC3

[moiz]

OK, thank you!