What audio file formats do you use if ........

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What audio file formats do you use if ........ if your
first recording is a band and you know that the
music file produced will be open, edited and
saved many many times before finally being
made available in the MP3 format.
I mean, how do you avoid gradual signal
degradation with each edit/save operation?
Advise appreciated....... thnx!

Archived from groups: rec.audio.pro (More info?)

In article <9dukc1h6gqctujob7qnh3oc5q97dqb226j@4ax.com> racer007@tm.net.my writes:

> What audio file formats do you use if ........ if your
> first recording is a band and you know that the
> music file produced will be open, edited and
> saved many many times before finally being
> made available in the MP3 format.
> I mean, how do you avoid gradual signal
> degradation with each edit/save operation?

The only degradation you'll suffer as long as you stay in the
uncompressed format (WAV or AIFF) is what you do with your editing or
processing. There is no equivalent to "generation loss" when saving
and re-opening a file.

It's pretty much a given that you'll be working with uncompressed
files, since MP3 editors and processors are somewhat limited.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers (mrivers@d-and-d.com)
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Archived from groups: rec.audio.pro (More info?)

On Tue, 05 Jul 2005 18:33:42 +0100, Laurence Payne
<lpayne1NOSPAM@dsl.pipexSPAMTRAP.com> wrote:

>On Tue, 05 Jul 2005 20:14:37 +0800, Racer <racer007@tm.net.my> wrote:
>
>>
>>What audio file formats do you use if ........ if your
>>first recording is a band and you know that the
>>music file produced will be open, edited and
>>saved many many times before finally being
>>made available in the MP3 format.
>>I mean, how do you avoid gradual signal
>>degradation with each edit/save operation?
>
>By not using a compressed file format.
>One normally records wav files. Were you considering something else?

I wasn't sure but thanks to you all for the info
that I should stick to uncompressed formats
like 'wav' until all editing is finished and only
then, convert it finally to 'mp3'.
thnx!

Archived from groups: rec.audio.pro (More info?)

Racer wrote:

> On Tue, 05 Jul 2005 18:33:42 +0100, Laurence Payne
> <lpayne1NOSPAM@dsl.pipexSPAMTRAP.com> wrote:
>
> >On Tue, 05 Jul 2005 20:14:37 +0800, Racer <racer007@tm.net.my> wrote:
> >
> >>
> >>What audio file formats do you use if ........ if your
> >>first recording is a band and you know that the
> >>music file produced will be open, edited and
> >>saved many many times before finally being
> >>made available in the MP3 format.
> >>I mean, how do you avoid gradual signal
> >>degradation with each edit/save operation?
> >
> >By not using a compressed file format.
> >One normally records wav files. Were you considering something else?
>
> I wasn't sure but thanks to you all for the info
> that I should stick to uncompressed formats
> like 'wav' until all editing is finished and only
> then, convert it finally to 'mp3'.
> thnx!

The primary concerns in avoiding any degradation
is to avoid any unneeded sample-rate conversions
and bit-depth reductions, particularly truncation.
If your final format is a CD (or a 44.1/16 MP3)
then start and stay at 44.1kHz.
Use 24 bit all the way through and dither to 16bit
just before making a CD and ruining (converting)
to MP3 ;-]
Edits and other processing will be more accurate
at 24Bit.
These points are well debated in these threads
but any degradation will be minimal with this approach.

good luck
rd