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Music Media Technology

AAC Chosen For DVD-ROM Section Of DVD Audio Discs 432

Posted by simoniker from the head-spinning-around dept.
sootman writes "According to a news post at HighFidelityReview.com: 'The DVD Forum has chosen AAC for the DVD-ROM zone of DVD-Audio discs - the inclusion of a low-resolution (lossy) track suitable for solid-state and portable devices has long been championed by DVD-Audio figureheads such as Dolby's John Kellogg as a way of enhancing the value of the format to all listeners, not just those interested in its high-resolution potential. The selection of AAC came after a number of competing formats were proposed; they included MP3, ATRAC and Microsoft's WMA. Additional formats, such as [Ogg Vorbis] for example, were not put forward for consideration.'"
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AAC Chosen For DVD-ROM Section Of DVD Audio Discs More

AAC Chosen For DVD-ROM Section Of DVD Audio Discs

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  • *crickets* (Score:5, Funny)

    by jpellino ( 202698 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @12:43PM (#8635867)
    the sound of all those people who told apple they were nuts for choosing it...

  • No Ogg? Uh-oh... (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 22, 2004 @12:44PM (#8635879)
    I think we're going to be hearing quite a bit of hilarious whining from the four people that actually use and enjoy OGG.....

  • anything about CSS (Score:2, Interesting)

    by anandpur ( 303114 )
    will it be protected by Region Code and CSS??
    • "Finally DVD-Audio offers CPPM, which is much stronger than CSS for DVD-Video."

      IIRC, region codes against the newer EU directives, so I don't think they will make it into Dvd-Audio specs.
      • IIRC, region codes against the newer EU directives

        That's what I thought also. Up until I talked with a friend down there that told me that these things have been more and more strict in the past few years. When I still lived in France, I remember you could just go to the store (Good Guys equivalent) and buy a region-free DVD player. It was just more expensive. This is not possible anymore apparently.

  • tantrum (Score:4, Funny)

    by EaterOfDog ( 759681 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @12:46PM (#8635899)
    Okay, this is your cue to roll around on the floor with froth coming from your mouth and blood pouring from your eyes screaming "Ogg Vorbis, Ogg Vorbis!"

  • What does this mean for existing equipment? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Scott Lockwood ( 218839 ) * on Monday March 22, 2004 @12:46PM (#8635901) Homepage Journal
    Is this just a matter of updating the firmware and drivers, or do I yet AGAIN have to buy new equipment?

  • What the? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Viceice ( 462967 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @12:46PM (#8635904)
    So exactly how are we supposed to go about ripping now?

    Do we rip the DVD-A into an mp3 or do we crack the AAC into an mp3?

    • I have a horrible feeling that you won't be able to rip dvd-audio. That's why I won't purchase it. Makes owning a person mp3 player pointless.

      • Re:What the? (Score:2, Informative)

        by lowmagnet ( 646428 )
        Well since your MP3 player has neither >2 channel audio or 96KHz+ sample rate, I can see how MP3 players are useless. If you rip a high resolution source into a low resolution source, you'll get exactly what the article/release is intending to give you: a lower quality version of the tracks on disc.
    • I think you're supposed to drag and drop into iTunes, now :)

    • Re:What the? (Score:5, Informative)

      by wankledot ( 712148 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @12:56PM (#8636036)
      crack AAC?

      AAC itself does not have DRM, so unless additional DRM has been added, there is no need to "crack" it.

      Apple's implementation does not use any "AAC DRM", they have their own scheme.

      Hopefully in this case, you can simply copy the AAC on to your machine, because any transcoding will affect the quality.

      • Re:What the? (Score:5, Funny)

        by mkro ( 644055 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @01:47PM (#8636561)
        Hopefully in this case, you can simply copy the AAC on to your machine, because any transcoding will affect the quality.

        DVD Forum member 1 (DIS): Guys? I was thinking... What if we skip the DRM this time? Let people make their own moral choices, and let the law handle those who can't?
        DVD Forum member 2 (MGM): Hmm, you're onto something there. After all, we are not here to judge people. Respecting people and treating them like law-abiding citizens until they actually break a law might actually make us look good.
        DVD Forum member 3 (VIAb): Yeah, we must make sure to let the press releases focus on that we are more open than our competitiors.
        DVD Forum member 3 (BMG): ...we don't have any competition?
        *silence*
        DVD Forum member in unison: DRM IT IS!

  • The main reasons: (Score:5, Insightful)

    by bc90021 ( 43730 ) * <bc90021@NOSpaM.bc90021.net> on Monday March 22, 2004 @12:46PM (#8635905) Homepage
    From the article:

    "High Fidelity Review has learnt that AAC was chosen for a number of reasons, a Forum member told us that it was clear from the outset that it was "...sounded much better than the others," although WMA was not included in the early stages of testing. ... AAC can also deliver multi-channel content."

    "Another positive factor was that AAC is perceived favourably by the music industry because of its associated copyright protection measures and a history of use by legitimate, paid download organisations such as Apple. Conversely, content providers shudder at the very mention of MP3, it is seen as being the root of all evils where piracy activities are concerned. But as reader Mitchell Burt pointed out to us, AAC itself does not provide any rights management functions; the Apple iTunes implementation via their on-line store uses a proprietary DRM package named FairPlay."

    I would also suspect that licensing AAC from Apple is an easier process than licensing MP3 would be from Thompson.

    • Re:The main reasons: (Score:5, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 22, 2004 @12:50PM (#8635958)
      But Apple doesn't own AAC and you don't license it from them. It's licensed from these guys:
      http://www.vialicensing.com/products/mpeg4a ac/stan dard.html

    • Re:The main reasons: (Score:2, Informative)

      by lotsofno ( 733224 )
      "I would also suspect that licensing AAC from Apple is an easier process than licensing MP3 would be from Thompson."

      Interestingly enough, I found these quotes off a recent AAC/WMA article [extremetech.com]:

      "Several readers wrote to me from .mac addresses, and one of them actually looked into this. He wrote to an Apple representative and asked, "Is Apple willing to license FairPlay to other hardware vendors and/or other online download providers? If so, can you send me details about the licensing agreement?" The short

      • Re:The main reasons: (Score:3, Informative)

        by gordguide ( 307383 )
        AAC with FairPlay is different than AAC alone.

        Apple uses the Fairplay DRM to support iTunes and the iPod together. Therefore it fails to meet the business model if you license Fairplay to other mp3 hardware vendors. If things change, then that might change. For now, that's the way it is.

        What I don't understand is why Apple doesn't make the iPod capable of playing WMA files
        I don't see much criticism of other mp3 players, but their own controllers also support AAC. Similarly, they do not enable AAC suppor

  • Much as I like Ogg Vorbis... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by 0x0d0a ( 568518 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @12:47PM (#8635908) Journal
    Much as I like and appreciate Ogg Vorbis, was there any real expectation of them putting it on the DVD? Many home users probably still have old boxes, have never *heard* of WinAMP, much less consider installing something on their computer, and there is only one or two hardware ogg vorbis players out there.

    Though I am a bit surprised that they didn't go with MP3 -- it seems that hardware player compatibility would have been an overriding goal, but who knows.
    • This post is insightful, I guess, but it doesn't show a real understanding of the formats involved.

      AAC isn't some out-of-the-blue format popularized by Apple. It's part of the MPEG-4 multimedia standard. It can be considered in some ways the phiolsophical child of MP3, or at least the next step down the path.

      MPEG-4 is a massive, far reaching set of standards that do pretty much anything you could want to. And because they're set by the same standard group that worked out the technology behind MP3, DVD

  • That's nice (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Effugas ( 2378 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @12:49PM (#8635939) Homepage
    DVD-Audio is dead, AC3 w/ normal, copyable DVD's has won the day.

    Something about that whole "anyone can master it" thing really excites the hordes of audio engineers that I know. "Hi, ten people will be allowed to work with this" technology tends only to be worked with by ten people.

    --Dan

    • DVD-A is dead for more than just that (Score:5, Insightful)

      by LeninZhiv ( 464864 ) * on Monday March 22, 2004 @01:37PM (#8636456)
      The whole format (along with SACD) offers consumers nothing except a more expensive alternative with "stronger" DRM. As people realise this, there's no chance of it catching on.

      DVD-Audio players are required to have analog outputs only, which for multi channel music means you have to run 6 RCA cables (!) from your DVD-A player to your receiver (plus the digital audio and video cables you need for playing DVD videos). And the "superior sound quality" of both DVD-A and SACD is well outside the range of human hearing. At least AAC, DTS, and CD's can be sent to your receiver digitally. (A few companies offer player-receiver pairs that use a proprietary firewire type link to cut down on the cables, but all of a sudden you're in the $5,000+ range and you suddenly become locked out of switching players or receivers to a different brand.)

      Whereas if you by a DTS audio disc, for example, you don't need any new equipment, the signals are sent to the receiver in digital form, and you have full multichannel audio. But those don't seem to be getting much support from the publishers. Meanwhile most people (myself included) are likely to be content with DPLII and its cousins like CS2, Logic 7 and the like that do quite a good job rendering stereo sources into multichannel.

      • Re:DVD-A is dead for more than just that (Score:4, Insightful)

        by angle_slam ( 623817 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @01:53PM (#8636616)
        I agree that it has no chance of catching on but not for your reasons. You imply that SACD and DVD-A are only for stronger DRM. That is false for one simple reason, there are no releases on SACD or DVD-A that aren't also available in CD format. The sole selling point of SACD and DVD-A is the superior sound quality. The reason it will fail is because CD quality is "good enough" for most people. Judging by the popularity of P2P, 128 kbps is "good enough" for a lot of people also.

      • Re:DVD-A is dead for more than just that (Score:5, Interesting)

        by ikewillis ( 586793 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @04:26PM (#8638221) Homepage
        And the "superior sound quality" of both DVD-A and SACD is well outside the range of human hearing.

        Okay, before we talk frequency response let's talk sample precision. The biggest limitation of 16-bit samples is an effective 98dB of dynamic range. Today's audio engineers aren't making effective use of the CD's dynamic range, and the reality is that compressors are still being utilized despite the CD being the supposed answer to this problem, which was of course much more pronounced in the days of vinyl. I'd say the fact that compressors are still being utilized is indicative that 98dB is simply not enough for the way all music is currently being engineered, not just for orchestral recordings but for rock and other genres as well. The two solutions to this problem are a better audio engineering process (i.e. better training for audio engineers), or updating the technology to resolve the issue. I'll tell you now... the former is simply not going to happen, and I see the latter as the only practical solution.

        A 24-bit system offers 146 dB of dynamic range. While this seems like something which would only appeal to audiophiles who insist on absolute perfection in their orchestral recordings, the truth is that audiophiles tend to prefer vinyl even though any vinyl, even a 78 RPM record (which has a dynamic range of ~75dB) will actually have worse dynamic range than a CD due to compromises made in the vinyl engineering/cutting process. So who then benefits from greater dynamic range? The answer is everyone... 146 dB of dynamic range is more than enough to eliminate an audio engineer's need to use compressors except in the case of the extraordinarly inept. While yes, 98 dB should've been enough as well, today's audio engineers are simply failing to make use of it properly. It's sad that a technological problem is needed to address the ineptitude of today's audio engineers, but the ultimate argument is that it's ridiculous to impose unnecessary constraints on audio engineering if better technology is capable of removing them.

        This is all covered quite well in this article [nagrausa.com]. And here is another article [georgegraham.com] which provides support for a simple claim: uncompressed recordings sound better.

        In terms of frequency response, yes, human hearing extends only to 20kHz, and the Red Book stipulates that the glass masters of all CDs should be produced by passing the final cut through a 20kHz lowpass filter (the theoretical maximum frequency response of a CD is ~22kHz). What this process ignores, however, is that higher frequencies, while inaudible, are still tangible. While this area hasn't been extensively studied and is much harder to quantify, the tangibility of a live performance versus a recorded one is one of the key distinguishing characteristics, and while most of this tangibility typically comes from the bass side of things and not the treble, simply approaching the audio engineering process from an entirely psychoacoustic perspective will leave you with sound drastically different from the live performance regardless...

        • I'd say the fact that compressors are still being utilized is indicative that 98dB is simply not enough for the way all music is currently being engineered

          I call BS, for several reasons:

          First of all, audiologists have demonstrated an illusion of "louder == better" in double-blind tests on human listeners. A record that's 3 dB louder than the competition's may "sound better" to the listener even though the rest of the mastering process may have introduced more noise. Apparently, the record labels may

  • I've been using it for years since it comes as the standard in my minidisc player. It sounds decent, gets good compression and now the CODEC is even available for use on PCs (which it wasn't when I got my minidisc player). Sure, Ogg sounds better and compresses better, but AAC is nothing to sniff at either.

  • Summary (Score:5, Funny)

    by jdreed1024 ( 443938 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @12:52PM (#8635978)
    I offer you a brief threaded summary of this discussion:

    -AAC sucks, they should have gone with Ogg

    -You're just saying that because Ogg is l33t
    -They should have gone with MP3
    -No, MP3 sucks because of $foo
    -$foo is irrelevant because of $bar
    -WMA isn't so bad, it should have won
    -Troll!!!
    -Great, more Apple lock-in
    -It's not Apple lock-in, it's an ISO standard
    -No it's not -Yes it is
    -Apple's dead anyway
    -When I was a kid, DVD-ROM tracks where in uLaw raw format and we liked it.

    -I don't have a DVD player, you insensitive clod.

  • It's better then WMA (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Chairboy ( 88841 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @12:53PM (#8635989) Homepage
    I know there'll be a lot of hurt looks out there because OGG wasn't chosen, but let's look at this from a different perspective:

    It's not WMA.

    The competition for this was legitametely between AAC and WMA because those are two proven technologies that happen to include DRM. If the alternative to AAC is WMA, then I'm all in favor of (as if I have a vote) this decision because this is another niche that Microsoft has not filled.

    Microsoft's vision of the future paints a picture where every media device is running MS licensed technology. Microsoft knows that operating systems and software are quickly reaching a point where the existing solutions work, meaning that the real money is in things that keep changing. Look at Caterpillar and their dirt movers. When they released their first model, the next 10 years were filled with constant innovation, but they eventually reached a point where the basic design was so solid, your basic earthmover looks the same as it did 20 years ago.

    Software is going to reach the same point, and Microsoft knows this and wants to control something that keeps changing, and derivative stories aside, that'll be content.

    Cheer this decision, it's another pie that Microsoft's finger has been slapped away from.
    • Cheer Microsoft's loss, but the decision is still a loss for people in general. OGG is open and it works. And DRM can always be layered on top so that when you manage to remove it :) then you can more easily operate without it. Just like CSS :)

    • Re:It's better then WMA (Score:4, Informative)

      by DavidLeblond ( 267211 ) <me@d[ ]dleblond.com ['avi' in gap]> on Monday March 22, 2004 @01:19PM (#8636287) Homepage
      AAC doesn't include DRM.

    • Re:It's better then WMA (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Animats ( 122034 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @02:01PM (#8636679) Homepage
      When they (Caterpillar) released their first model, the next 10 years were filled with constant innovation, but they eventually reached a point where the basic design was so solid, your basic earthmover looks the same as it did 20 years ago.

      Actually, no. Caterpillar's line has changed drastically in recent years. The big earthmoving tractors even look different, with elevated drive sprockets. The rubber-tracked Challenger agricultural tractor looks like nothing ever seen on a farm. Most new Caterpillar machines have computers on board, and they play a much more active role in driving than car computers. Joystick control of multiple axes is common (although many machines have a hydraulic joystick system, not a computer-controlled one). GPS-based automatic driving is available for farm tractors.

      There's continuous progress in heavy equipment. The field has not stagnated. "High tech" now works well enough to be trusted in tough environments like mining and construction. Everything there has been powered for decades, but now there's more smarts behind the power.

      Even "mature technologies" like locomotives continue to improve. The latest generation of locomotives have servomotor-type control of all the traction motors, so they all stay in sync and there is no wheel slip. Multiple engines synch up, so they all pull evenly. Helps get all those imported products from the Port of Los Angeles over the Sierras.

  • Foaming Ogg Vorbis freaks! (Score:3, Informative)

    by Stonent1 ( 594886 ) <stonent@noSpaM.stonent.pointclark.net> on Monday March 22, 2004 @12:53PM (#8636000) Journal
    FLAC is where it is at! I have very discerning ears and even at the highest bit rates, I can still hear audio artifacts with pretty much any codec. However, I do use Ogg Vorbis on my portable audio device because it is the only free(dom) codec that it supports.
    • I have very discerning ears and even at the highest bit rates, I can still hear audio artifacts with pretty much any codec.

      And I'm sure you've actually done a well-controlled blind test with a significant number of trials, to rule out the possibility that you're just hearing what you want to hear...

    • Re:Foaming Ogg Vorbis freaks! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Daniel Boisvert ( 143499 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @01:25PM (#8636344)
      You're not the only one. Has anybody else noticed that the trend lately has been for making everything smaller and faster, and everybody seems to be ignoring the quality?

      This has happened with lossy compression for music; it's happened with cellular technology that only has to be good enough for you to barely make out what the caller is saying; it's happened with parts that are now designed to break way sooner than they ever used to (printers are a fabulous example).

      Is there somebody out there who's still making things with serious quality? I want a cellphone that sounds as pristine as a voice call over ISDN. I want lossless compression for my music (yes, I use FLAC) that I'd like to purchase online. I want a printer that lasts like an HP LaserJet 4 that was made this year.

      Somebody please tell me I'm just looking in the wrong places...

      Dan
      • You aren't looking in the wrong places...you're just not willing to pay to get to the right ones.

        There are, for example, hard disc based players which allow you to store your CDs in uncompressed formats like FLAC. They're well over $1000, but they're out there and they often have really cool interfaces. Some of your "network" players support FLAC for much less. Check out a Hi-fi mag, they'll have a shoot out every few months on component digital audio players. The iPod will let you store your music unc
  • How thoughtful of them to support solid state devices. I was afraid I'd have to buy one of those vacuum tube-based DVD-Audio players.

    (Watch, some audiophile's going to go post a link to a player that really DOES use tubes. *sigh*)

  • DVD-A is dead (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 22, 2004 @12:55PM (#8636015)
    The format was useless the second it was finished thanks to the analog out requirements.

    Too bad...

  • Codec cracking (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Stonent1 ( 594886 ) <stonent@noSpaM.stonent.pointclark.net> on Monday March 22, 2004 @12:59PM (#8636080) Journal
    Well assuming that you will be playing this audio under windows, what stops someone from writing a "fake" audio card driver that does nothing but dump audio into a wav file?

    • Re:Codec cracking (Score:4, Interesting)

      by NotoriousQ ( 457789 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @01:13PM (#8636234) Homepage
      signed driver requirement?

    • Re:Codec cracking (Score:5, Informative)

      by StarDrifter ( 144026 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @01:48PM (#8636569)
      what stops someone from writing a "fake" audio card driver that does nothing but dump audio into a wav file?

      Microsoft's solution to this is called Secure Audio Path [microsoft.com]. It requires that the sound card drivers be signed by Microsoft if you want to play protected content. And they would presumably refuse to sign any driver which did as you suggested.

      • simple (Score:3, Informative)

        by SanityInAnarchy ( 655584 )

        Lots of solutions have been suggested -- VMWare, a self-signed root certificate, various driver hacks, and hardware hacks all the way down to a quality microphone.

        For that matter, what about ReactOS [reactos.org]? And what about user feedback?

        Most users would not buy a DVD that required them to play it on a computer. Somehow, I'm guessing the hardware on any "trusted" DVD player will be _very_ easy to hack -- something like a modchip? Add to that the fact that we already have non-compliant DVD players, and most of

    • Re:Codec cracking (Score:3, Interesting)

      by pla ( 258480 )
      Well assuming that you will be playing this audio under windows, what stops someone from writing a "fake" audio card driver that does nothing but dump audio into a wav file?

      I don't think you "get" it...

      Thanks to the Big Boys involved here doing their best to lock out the actual consumers, your PC will never even see the raw DVD-A data, only the lossy-and-DRM'd AAC track.

      However, even if you can get to the "real" audio tracks, you'll need signed drivers to decode them. Still theoretically spoofable,

      • Re:Codec cracking (Score:4, Informative)

        by Walkiry ( 698192 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @02:45PM (#8637074) Homepage
        Buy a pair of cheap soundcards (the ADC and DAC quality don't matter in the least). Tap the digital input off card #1's DAC, and send it to the output of card #2's ADC

        You really thing the "trusted" driver will let the card play a digital output from the "trusted DVD"? Analog hole is all there is.

        Actually, any local band that plays live is where I'll be, I'll be reading instead of listening to music when idling at home.

  • Why? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by cubic6 ( 650758 ) <tom&losthalo,org> on Monday March 22, 2004 @01:02PM (#8636126) Homepage
    Maybe I'm not getting something about DVD-Audio, but why put a sub-cd-quality copy of the music on the disc?

    First, is DVD-Audio DRM'ed so you can't rip and encode? Second, if somebody's going to spend the extra $$ to buy a disc with super extra high quality, are they going to care about a lossy stereo encoding?

    • Re:Why? (Score:3, Insightful)

      by amyhughes ( 569088 ) *

      if somebody's going to spend the extra $$ to buy a disc with super extra high quality, are they going to care about a lossy stereo encoding?

      That was addressed in the article you and at least a couple moderators didn't read.

      From the article:

      The inclusion of a DVD-ROM zone upon a DVD-Audio disc is the choice of the label concerned and is likely to be based upon whether or not they believe the addition will behove the title. In other words, we're probably going to see lossy content for the likes of mus

    • Re:Why? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by lfourrier ( 209630 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @01:19PM (#8636286)
      Second, if somebody's going to spend the extra $$ to buy a disc with super extra high quality

      If history is a teacher we want to hear, very soon, you will have one and only one choice : to buy the more expensive audio dvd with "super high quality", even when made from 60's and 70's magnetic bands, or from the audioo CD of last year.

      For the vast majority of user, audio quality is no concern. And I don't even want to discuss artistic quality.

  • A quick AAC primer. (Score:3, Informative)

    by E-Lad ( 1262 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @01:04PM (#8636145)

    What is AAC?

    AAC is the audio codec used in the MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 standard. Yes, AAC is the same codec used for audio on those DVD movies you own.

    MPEG-4's AAC is essentially the same as the AAC defined in MPEG-2, but with some extra capabilities added to make it more useable in the mobile world (such as the 3GPP multimedia format for mobiles phones)

    AAC has been with us for a good while... it's nothing new... and it's good to see that it's going to be around for a good while more and has edged out WMA.

  • Ogg not considered (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Air-conditioned cowh ( 552882 ) on Monday March 22, 2004 @01:26PM (#8636355)
    Much as I would like to see more widespread acceptance of Ogg I can see why it doesn't get considered in these sort of situations.

    Imagine all the other formats have big organisations backing them. Each will have skilled sales people, glossy presentations showing the features and benefits of their format and resources to plant "incentives" to the right people. Presentation is important.

    Contrast and compare with Vorbis. The team have enough resources to code, but what about the money, sales reps, glossy presentations? No chance.

    I am sure Vorbis really does sound better than other codecs but I think the final choice is based on a numnber of factors, sound quality only being one of them.

    Also there is the question of DRM. That was probably a requirement, not just icing on the cake. That would certainly exclude Ogg Vorbis from the start.

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