FFDshow guide to improve your audio files quality
By Reaper-X on Jul 13, 2006 in Codecs, Computer, Freeware, Multimedia, Open Source, Software, Tutorials, Windows
Here’s my guide on how to improve the sound quality of your audio files on the fly without converting it into another format with just using FFDshow ;)
- First download ffdshow from its official site if you don’t have sse capable processor, but if you’re using sse capable processour download ffdshow cvs build by videomixer to improve the overall performance of ffdshow
- After downloading and installing it, run the ffdshow audio decoder configuration from the start menu, and set the codecs tab like this (you can customize it later, but for now try to follow this guide ;) )
- and don’t forget to resample the audio stream into 48.000 Hz like screenshow below
- this setting can be different depending on your computer speaker, for example if you’re using 5.1 / 6.1 / 7.1 / etc set it like this (im using Creative Inspire 6.1 6600 Speaker)
Note : if your soundcard doesnt support 24 Bit Integer sample use 16 Bit Integer instead
- And for the next step open Winamp and set it like screenshot below. But if don’t use Winamp to play your audio files you’ll need to figure it out by yourself. Actually as long as the audio player support DirectShow this method can be used as well on that player
If you do the above step correctly when you play mp3 files / other audio files on winamp it'll show like on my previous post about FFDshow. So what are you waiting for? try playing some of your mp3 / audio files and hear the difference without enabling equalizer, changing your computer speaker volume, using dsp, etc ;) Note : by doing this every supported audio format in your computer, no matter is it MP3 from Divx / XVid encoded Movie, etc. Will get boosted in your media player as long as the media player itself is DirectX / DirectShow Compliant (for example Zoom Player, Media Player Classic from Gabest, etc)
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hello hi,
hello hi too
Those are sweet tips, thanx man, this makes a huge difference!
You're welcome ;) glad you like it :)
hi
i _exactly_ followed your guide, but winamp is not working as it should.
with your guide applied, all i notice is just a longer delay before winamp starts playing the songs... theres some hdd-seek as well. sounds like winamp is trying to load ffdshow, because if i remove mp3 from the extensions list, the delay normalizes and the hdd-seek vanishes.
nevertheless, ffdshow is never ever being loaded by winamp.
when should ffdshow be loaded? by the time winamp starts up or just before youre playing your first mp3?
i'm using winamp 5.24 with videomixers newest ffdshow-build (by the time of writing, this was 20060722)
maybe you, or someonne else, could give me some clues as to what i may have done wrong. id also appreciate some tips to resolve my issue :)
regards
actually there'll be short delay (depending on your computer specs, mainly your processor) when loading audio files on Winamp. Btw did you install Aud-X or other MP3 decoders ? because if you're using/installing Aud-X on your computer and configure aud-x to decode MP3, ffdshow cant decode audio files properly. So try disabling Aud-X first or other MP3 Decoder installed on your system before using FFDshow
thats what i wanted all this time ^^ thx. im big fan of ffdshow, and its my only media codec i use on my pc. noticed lil bug with winamp 2.95 (im also big fan of winamp 2.xx) when i play mp3 it doesnt show bitrate in main window. kHz is showen correctly tho.. well, i guess its lil price to pay ^^
Actually if you're using Winamp 5 or any other version of Winamp and using this method, the audio bitrate will not be displayed (always showing 0 bitrate), in order to show the audio bitrate you must disable the ffdshow by restoring the default DirectShow Decoder on Winamp (actually if you want to take a look at the real audio bitrate, you can see the ffdshow audio decoder information) ... if its for me ... i'd rather not see the winamp bitrate rather than losing the audio quality :D ... lol
ow yeah - and another 'feature' is mp3 length time is not displayed until it starts playin' .. but again ^^ ill sucrifice this for quality (actualy its not quality - its the way dealing with audio. personaly i like Volume section, normalization, also Equalizer whitch can modify any band, not just those preset in winamp or other players. and ofcourse - Mixer ^^ rules)
Unfortunately if you want to see the audio length, you'll need to use Winamp 5 that support Media library function, so all the audio files can be recognized by Winamp first ;)
just a note: don't forget to set winamp into using its own decoder before adding media files into your Winamp Media Library, if you forget to set that, Winamp will recognize all the audio files as Video files :)
it works now, i tried to remove the additional input plugins and in_mp3pro.dll was the one which made ffdshow not to load when an mp3 was played in winamp5. btw thanks a lot for the guide.
your welcome, and im very glad that you've found the solution by yourself ;) ... btw as long the ffdshow support its audio format, you can add more extension in the Directshow configuration screen of winamp, so you can use FFDshow to decode all audio files from Winamp
plz, how to force ffdshow to decode the audio in every VIDEO files, lilke AVI files?
I went to the window of Audio Decoder and made the mp3 decoder to lbamad and other decoders but , the icon which indicate that ffdshow is decooding the audio in the tray of taskbar didn't appeared, (Only the icon of Video decoding)
I like ffdshow decodes all my Integratede audio in video files
Actually that's depend on your audio software / player too, for example if you're using Winamp and didnt set the in_dshow to play specific audio files and winamp already has a decoder for it, then FFDshow will be ignored so it'd be best if you tell me what player you're using to play your audio files ;)
as a side note, your audio player software must be able to use DirectShow or Direct X compatible player :)
thanx for replying
I'm using Winamp , and installed K-Lite Mega Codec 1.59
my problem still I can't decode the audio of my video files with ffdshow audio decoder although I set the Mp3 decoder
check this out:
[img]http://img85.imageshack.us/img85/6307/ffdshow1lj3.jpg[/img]
[img]http://img181.imageshack.us/img181/1018/ffdshow2bx1.jpg[/img]
Sorry for late reply because i forgot about your question :)
btw have you tried setting preference for external filter on MPC ?
After adding ;MP3 to the DirectShow Decoder config, I am unable to play shoutcast streams in Winamp. I was hoping to upmix my shoutcast streams to 5.1 as well as my mp3's, but shoutcast stations won't play at all.
How can I configure winamp so that it plays mp3's through ffdshow audio decoder and still play shoutcast links? Or if possible, how can I play both mp3's and shoutcast streams through ffdshow?
Great guide by the way.
Im sorry because i never play Shoutcast on Winamp (actually i never play streaming files *video/audio* on my computer because i dont have unlimited internet connection) i dont know much about it .. i think the best way to play shoutcast is by temporarily disabling mp3 decoding through directshow or in the other words use the built in mp3 decoder from Winamp :)
Thanks but thats too much of a pain. After much googling and downloading of directshow shoutcast filters, I ended up switching to Zoom Player. It has the best directshow support i've ever seen in a media player, including Media player classic. It shows you the whole detailed filter graph and everything. If you really want the most control over what filters you want to use for all your media, i would highly suggest switching to this player. Shoutcast and mp3's both played through ffdshow and ac3filter by default.. had no problems.
um .. actually im using ZoomPlayer to play all video files because i can set different filter for each type, because i dont really like the playlist option of ZP or MPC i only use it to play video files. But when it comes to audio files, i choose winamp :)
anyway thanks a lot yook :)
This is great o_o
This is almost Izotope Ozone sound-buffing-niveau.
But I've a problem ._.
When I'm enabling MP3 via DirectShow on WinAmp, the ID3-Tags get fucked up and only the filename is shown =(
Any idea how to fix this problem ? >.
aah .. yes of course that's one of the problem if you're trying to edit the ID3 tags while the directshow filter is not using the default mp3 decoder from Winamp ..
The only solution is by temporarily use the internet mp3 decoder from winamp when you want to edit the ID3 tags :) (i did this too)
sorry forget to tell you this, if you're constantly use the winamp media library like me ( see this post )
then dont forget to use the internal mp3 decoder from winamp before adding the audio files, or all of your audio files will be treated as video :)
and thanks for visiting this site :)
I tried it and it actually killed my bass T-T I'm sure the sound is better if I can get my bass back.
Killed your bass ? wow .. that's really strange, what is your computer speaker setup ? 5.1 / 6.1 / etc ? because by using this i get full bass
I have a 5.1 setup and used 3/2 - 5 channels with LFE checked. What is LFE anyways? I also noticed you checked reverb, crystality, and LFE crossover. What settings do you use on those three? I messed around with them and left the tabs in the guide plus LFE crossover and the bass was back =D. I moved the gain slider right and got a huge boost. I have a couple of questions though. What does the Lowpass frequency option under LFE crossover for? Under resample tab would it be better set the mode to 'libavcodec highest quality' and resample to 96KHz instead of high quality and 48KHz? Under output tab what is the difference between 24 bit integer, 32 bit integer, and 32 bit floating point?
LFE = Low Frequency Effect :) btw if you disable LFE then you're not going to experience the full audio effect from ffdshow especially the bass :D
As for LFE Crossover, that's depend on your computer speaker :) .. if your computer speaker can handle low frequencies without problem you can play around with it :D
hm .. about the setting on Reverb, Crystality, etc that depends on your preference and the songs itself (if its badly encoded, then you can be sure the final result is not that great) ;)
but if you want greater sound, you should play around at Crystality, and Freeverb (that's it)
as for Volume, you can use it in various case, for example to increase the total volume output
about Resample to highest quality and 96KHz, that's depend on your processor speed (higher resampling requires fast processor because it takes your system resources, and if you're running other apps while using it, it may slow down your system) .. but if you're using a really fast processor, then you can use it without problem ;)
and about 24 bit / 32 bit integer, thats depend on your soundcard. If its for me because im using Audigy 2 soundcard which is capable of outputting 24 bit sound (not 16 bit like usual), then i can use it without problem
that's it :D
Thanks a bunch! :D Just one question you didn't answer. What does the Lowpass frequency slider under LFE crossover for? What does it do if you move if left or right? Sorry for asking again.
Dont worry about it ;)
if you move Crossover slider to the left or right that means you passthrough (dunno if i say this correctly because im cant speak english well) lol .. the low frequency signal below that value to your subwoofer directly (because most computer speaker *satelite / small speaker* cant handle that frequency, so to be safe it'll goes to your subwoofer directly, btw most used value is 80 / 100 / 120 depend on your speaker)
ooh yeah i forgot to tell you this before .. thanks for visiting :D
"just a note: don’t forget to set winamp into using its own decoder before adding media files into your Winamp Media Library, if you forget to set that, Winamp will recognize all the audio files as Video files" - Reaper-X
How do I do that?
Ah .. you can do it by changing the DirectShow Decoder option in winamp (Preferences -> Input -> DirectShow Decoder) and remove the MP3 file extension before adding new audio so winamp can detect it properly :)
Ohh ok..what if I use the 'add files when played option'? Will it be added as video files?
nevermind I tried it and it did T-T oh wells
Hahahaha .. that's why you should remove the MP3 extension from the directshow decoder first before adding your audio files into winamp library ;)
i'd rather use enhancer 0.17 when it comes to winamp, it appears to do the same thing just slightly better.
search the winamp plugin library for it under audio dsp.
When I set the directshow filter to play MP3's, it only plays some of my MP3's with ffdshow. Other times it will not play at all. I see the tray icon for my OGG/Vorbis decoder for a brief moment before it goes away. Any ideas on how to fix this?
hm ... that's strange because all mp3 files in winamp should be decoded by ffdshow unless there's a conflict somewhere
could you tell me other codec you've installed on your system ?
Hi, im having a problem getting ffdshow to decode my mp3 files. Im using Windows Media Center Edition 2005 to play the files, but ffdshow does not react when playing them. If I start a movie, ffdshow fires ut right away. Do you have any suggustions? Its more or less a clean OS install. Ive installed TheaterTek DVD software and AC3 filter, in addition to ffdshow.
What is your media player ? is it Windows Media Player or ... ? and could you tell me which FFDshow version you're using ?
I play the mp3 files thru Windows MCE 2005, which I suppose is just another front-end for Windows Media Player. Im using ffdshow tryouts rev 1085 (22 march 2007). Any ideas why ffdshow audio decoder doesnt start?
i'd suggest you to grab the newer FFDShow release from here
and make sure that :
1. You've configured FFDshow to decode MP3, or any other audio format you choose from the Codecs Tab in FFDshow
2. If you only allowed ffdshow to run in specific application only, make sure you've put the media player executable name in there, for example if you want to allow Windows Media Player then you should make sure that wmplayer.exe is listed there
3. If its still not working, try setting the FFDshow Merit to high (if its for me i just ran it in FFDshow default merit without problem) at the DirectShow Control Tab
Hi.
I have an onboard soundcard SoundMAX, compatible with sound to 5.1 and only it supports 16 BIT integer. Unluckily only I have two stereo speakers, with control of incorporated BASS. Also I see that one of these has output to incorporate a subwoofer, but I do not have subwoofer :(
I have some doubts.
- FDshow's LFE work in the BASS of the speakers?
- Are my speakers considered sound 2.0 or 2.1 ?
- A subwoofer is necessary to make good use of the FFDshow's LFE, or with the speakers than I possess is it sufficient?
Greetings and many thanks! Very good tutorial!
Hi! I followed your tutorial and i could configure winamp with ffdshow but when I want to add new albums/tracks winamp with ffdshow decoder interprets them as video (?) That's the exact problem as Shaher's... the link you posted to see is not good anymore :( so any suggestions how to have id3 tags as before and ffdsow at the same time? because it is really annoying to have go through the trouble of changing codec input every time i want to add new stuff in media library
thanks! and great job with the tutorial!! cheers!
Hi i used ffdshow decoder and i had a strange problem with my auto tagger in winamp 5.1.The tags are not shown at all!!