Winamp MP3 Audio Compression in a Nutshell Forrest Stroud
MP3 Audio Compression in a Nutshell
Audio files encoded with MP3 can have their original sound data compressed by a factor of 12 without noticeable degradation in sound quality. As with any 'lossy' compression scheme there is some degeneration in quality with MP3, but in this case the loss is unnoticeable to the human ears.
Without getting too technological, the effects of MP3 are made possible by "perceptual coding" techniques that address the perception of sound waves by the human ear, so that even though some information has been lost through the compression process, you won't be able to notice it upon playback. The result is high-quality stereo audio that sounds as good on your computer as it would on your CD player -- and without the need for a 20+ Gigabyte hard drive.
