Simply, the best quality audio file converter... I need to change these type of file
Lossless (wav) 32 bit to lossless (wav/aiff) 24/16 bit
Lossless (wav, aiff) 16 bit to mp3/aac

Any ideas?

 

First one is just about dithering (if anything). If you don't have "clipping" in 32-bit, you just truncate it to 24-bit. For 16-bit you might consider dithering.
Second are basically the specific encoders. I guess for AAC the reference is Apple's own and integrated in macOS. For MP3 this would be LAME. So any tool using LAME should be fine. There is the great dBpoweramp, that can do a lot more, and has one of the best SRC algorithms (comparisons). I believe the free version should be sufficient in your case.

 

Sounds great, thanks for comparisons! So with that I can also truncate 32 bit file, isn't it?

 

Saracon by Weiss is amazing,it wont convert to mp3,but for wav to aiff 16/24/32 bit.its probably the best out there,lots of POW dithering options too

http://www.weiss.ch/products/saracon

 

Last edited: Jan 5, 2017

XLD
http://tmkk.undo.jp/xld/index_e.html

Xact
http://xact.scottcbrown.org/

not sure about the 32/24 conversion tho

 

Hello.
Best audio converter for mac... Sony Soundforge (for Mac, obviously).
First, change bit depth, with mbit+, noise shaping: high, dither amount: high.
Then, resample with src, highest quality.
And export (render as) in any format.
For mp3, lower the volume by 1dB before exporting.

 

Last edited: Jan 5, 2017

No, after dithering you shouldn't do anything else. It's always the last link in the chain.

 

Olaf, I know that. I tried it the 'correct' way first, to keep the dithering untouched. But it sounds better this way in Soundforge. It's empirical, but it works.
I may add that I' m not a big fan of dithering, I use it only when it improves sound quality and if it doesn't dull the sound. Mbit+ sounds cleaner than Idr, but I prefer to avoid dithering - it colors the sound. If there are no audible artifacts at low intensity, I simply don't use it.

 

I was searching for myself and found this thread, thought i'd share what i found.

Really good file converter for OSX and its free :

SoundConverter by Steve Dekorte

 

Nope, it will work in a bad way, opposite.
First src. Then dither.
Mbit dithering between different sample rate is different, so first don't do anything with bit depth, so render, then src. After Src save 32 bit fixed or float, then dither to 16 or 24, because truncation from higher bit depth is worse, than preserving details on dither noise with(out) noise shaping.
If you dither to 16, then src, so after conversion doesn't save any detailing dithered noise, because dithering after src is changed. So it is just noise and truncation.
Yes you can 24bit dither before src if you render 24bit master, but why do you need it if you can simply render undithered 32 bit float or fixed, then dither to 16.
Src for mac with steep brickwall linear phase filter and aliasing less than -180 is SRC called BRICK. It is free and latest version performs better than earliest one presented on src.infinitewave.ca/
So, best as well are finalcd with sharp filter, sox, dbpoweramp src, izotope rx.
Recommend to src first before limiter, then dither after limiter. Src after limiter may cause overs. Limiting on higher samplerates makes no less distortion or aliasing. Built in limiter stuff like lookahead, isp, oversampling do all the job you need.

 

Last edited: Feb 10, 2017

I bet a true ABX blind test would prove all of these audiophile gnat farts don't mean squat in the end...

 

I'm not sure if it handles 32 bit files but to me Audiophile Engineering Sample Manager with Lame framework is a good one

 

It's not an audiophile gnat farts.. Just to keep more details and introduce less shit. All the time we are trying to achieve the maximum quality and less shit happened with sound. If we start to ignore this because we don't hear it, in the we will get worse sound.
Better one small move to save a bit more quality than ignore and get worse sound if we even don't hear it. Much worse to work further with a bit spoiled material.
Simple.

 

it's only suggested to dither when reducing bitdepth to lossless , as lossy will axe the dither noise anyway.

But ALSO, recordings have noise on top of, reduced DR so really, you can't hear much difference with dither off.

So XLD , or free utilities that don't dither are fine. Yeah Saracon looks really good on http://src.infinitewave.ca/, but any aliasing >60dB will be buried by the music, and anything >120dB will be chopped off in 16bit.

http://ethanwiner.com/dither.html
http://wiki.hydrogenaud.io/index.php?title=Dither

 

As it's been mentioned already I'll mention it again, http://www.weiss.ch/old/p2d/p2d.html, It's got you covered on all angles:
Sampling Rates In & out: 44.1k, 48k, 88.2k, 96k, 176.4k, 192k, 352.8k, 384k, DXD, DSD. Wordlengths In & out: 16/20/24/32 bit fixed point, 32/64 IEEE float, DSD. File Formats In & out: WAV, AIFF, AU, BWF, SD2, CAF, PAF, MAT, RAW, DSDIFF, FLAC, Ogg/Vorbis. Wordlength Reduction Methods: Flat TPDF dither, POW-r 1, POW-r 2, POW-r 3. THD+N PCM to PCM: better than –180dB for 32 bit fixed point In/Out, Unweighted. THD+N PCM to DSD: better than –147dB for 32 bit fixed point In, Unweighted. # of Channels: PCM to PCM: unlimited, DSD to PCM: unlimited, PCM to DSD: up to 6 (5.1). "Weiss quality conversion algorithms" and that definitely isn't just some audiophile/audiophoolery as is often the case, Weiss do a hardware SRC and it is excellent, Genuine mastering engineer grade quality and staples in many mastering houses.

I won't knock SoundForge though as it is great, I use it for so many audio editing tasks along with it being what I've always used for cataloguing my music collection to disk. illustrated's dbPoweramp is good, I've been using it for along time also for tagging everything, The way it integrates into window's shell is extremely handy, Then I use foobar2000 to listen.
Another couple off of the top of my head would be SEQUOIA (also by MAGIX like SoundForge is nowadays) and iZotope's RX Advanced the other, Although I wouldn't say buying a license for SEQUOIA or RX Advanced solely for the SRC is a wise way to spend your money unless much of the other features and functions each offer appeal and would see a lot of use of course!

My extremely humble opinion/2 pence FWIW. All the best to all as always

Dean

 

FLAC is the best lossless audio format, it has a real place in the digital audio world that should not be overlooked.
You probably know of one other lossless audio format called.WAV. Yep, that same, good ‘ol format that your Windows system sounds are encoded in (though that’s 8-bit and usually mono). WAV preserves 100% of audio information in 16-bit 44.1KHz stereo format when ripping audio from a CD.
FLAC is better than WAV sometimes. First, it does everything WAV does (lossless audio), but in a much smaller package (WAV is extremely inefficient in its use of space). Second, it allows the use of more tags (including “illegal” tags in Windows) for marking files. That’s it. Otherwise, same juice, different label. WAV does have the advantage of being more editing / DJ-friendly (also less work for the CPU since it’s hardware decoded), but that’s not really relevant to what we’re talking about here.
As for M4A, M4A is a file extension for an audio file encoded with advanced audio coding (AAC) which is a lossy compression. M4A was generally intended as the successor to MP3, which had not been originally designed for audio only but was layer III in a MPEG 1 or 2 video files. So i'd like to recommend U choose WAV or FLAC as the final format for iPhone or any other Apple devices, and they can convert to each other via this program http://www.videoconverterfactory.com/tips/m4a-to-wav.html hope my idea will be welcomed