Fit more tunes on your card!

[gavinguinness]

I came across this site... ShrinkMyTunes - more music on your iPod, MP3 player or mobile phone

It claims to run a fancy algorythm over your MP3's and hugely reduce the size of them with no loss of quality! £20

Not for everyone, I appreciate, but my Music folder is 2.6gb presently, so the chance to potentially 1/4 that was quite appealing, at least, until 16gb cards appear...

So I've purchased it and I am presently shrinking the music folder. It takes a while, it's done about 800mb in the last 35 minutes, May be quicker from local HDD... But for the tunes it's done so far - it does what it says on the tin! Most tunes are a quarter of the size! All are significantly smaller.

Quality? Well, I would be lying if I said I couldn't tell the difference directly comparing the original to shrunk, but you do have to listen very hard and it depends on the style of music too - but it's ever so slight and an acceptable trade off for the space gained IMHO.

Also, I may rip tunes at a better bit rate from now to see if the smaller shrunk MP3 is better than my 128 original MP3... You never know.

I've not tried playing through the phone yet. But the makers say the conversion process retains all tags etc... I shall report back once I've finished converting...

[n8flight]

make a lossy sound format more lossy??

Why not converting the files to a lower bitrate. That will have the same result and costs nothing!

Sorry but they are selling this software for 20 pound - thats really a rip-off.

[gavinguinness]

Just take a sec to read my post fully. ;) Like I said I'm trying it out, I'll let you know how it works out, before you have to spend your money.

My latter idea is to convert at a higher bitrate, then shrink... The shrunk 128 files sound fine and are 1/4 the size. It's music on the move... Trust me, I expect better, and get better quality from my Bose Direct Reflecting boxes - I know good sound... I appreciate... Bored, I'm going to bed...

So far - My loss. Chill and wait for the verdict.

[darthtrader]

shrinkmytunes just had a favourable review from the UK's biggest gadget mag "T3". They said "loss of sound was negligible....it’s difficult to notice"

Here is the link:


[2007-07-26]
Teeny tunes
ShrinkMyTunes puts the squeeze on your music library.
Click to enlarge 1 of 3
Go to ShrinkMyTunes - more music on your iPod, MP3 player or mobile phone [more images]Zoning out to your MP3 player en route to another day at the coalface is as normal as delayed trains and constant drizzle in summer. Finding the right track from your pretty, but poorly endowed Shuffle, Stone or Walkman, is, annoyingly, right up there too.

Step up then, ShrinkMyTunes. A new service, launched today, it compresses your MP3s to up to a quarter of their size, turning Nanos into fully fledged monster ‘Pods.

The initial download will hit you for a penny shy of £20. Once you’ve got it though, you can simply click on shrink and it’ll take care of business, squishing down your MP3s and WAV files. You can either replace original tracks, or save smaller ones to a new folder.

T3 put it to the test with its bat-like ears, and loss of sound was negligible. If you’re powering along on the way to work, it’s difficult to notice.

Boost over to ShrinkMyTunes - more music on your iPod, MP3 player or mobile phone to download and get more bang for your iPod buck


-=Post approved by Moderator=-

[timo_w2s]

Would it have been better to convert the MP3 files to AAC if you wanted more space for similar quality?

[gavinguinness]

I don't think you get the same space saving with AAC... (I'll try it) For example, my tunes folder way 2.6gb, it's now less than 1gb - I've been listening to tunes most of the morning and listening for the classic compression sounds you associate with low bitrate files - it's not there. I would say the tunes lack a little trebble compared to the originals if I was trying to be critical. But so far, so good.

[timo_w2s]

Let us know how you get on. I've thought about using AAC but can never be bothered to sort it out...

[Homer]

Can't see what this software does which simply recoding the files at a lower bitrate wouldn't. Anything other than MP3 encoding would make them unplayable on many players.

Do you mind opening one of the compressed files and seeing what bitrate they are encoded at?

[gavinguinness]

Sure - Dizzee Rascal's new Album: They range from 112 to 160, each track is different and all 14 tracks now add up to 19mb.

I'm going to try and post up some snippets on my web space, if there's enough free space. So you can all have a listen for yourself.

I do think they are doing something different than just reducing bitrate though. They quality is better than you would expect from low bitrate files...

Have a look at their FAQ's.

[Homer]

Originally Posted by gavinguinness

I do think they are doing something different than just reducing bitrate though. They quality is better than you would expect from low bitrate files...

Possibly using variable bitrate, not sure if that's possible with MP3 though.

Have a look at their FAQ's.

I did, it doesn't really answer anything.