[vorbis] Why 64kbps is important

[Gregory Maxwell]

On Tue, Aug 07, 2001 at 03:38:55PM -0700, Michael Paine wrote:
> Incorrect.  The idea is to make telephone sound better, so stereo mics
> (perhaps even Ambisonic mics) or mono-mics with positioning information
> (good for teleconferences).  

Positioning might be useful for teleconferencing, but really thats about it
for stereo voice.

> Back in the day (before transistors), 8KHz was
> perfect for voice -- 8KHz just doesn't cut it anymore when better sounding
> codecs exist within the same bandwidth.

At the same time, if we're talking voice, you can do a lot better then
vorbis. A wide-band-residual celp codec sounds pretty good with 16k voice,
but not that much better.

I can't tell 8khz bandpassed voice from a 44.1k original providing the
background is quiet enough to not hear the difference in background noise.

> I think the drive is that 8khz has been the standard for too long with
> budgets and prices for equipment having a solid/fundemental assumption on
> 64kbps for voice.  I'm sure music is part of the softphone/Docsys
> consideration; otherwise, they would only be interested in G.711 still.

The interest in non G.711 is to lower bitrate requirements so you can share
more users on the same CMTS upstream pipe and so you can throw in more FEC
to overcome errors.

> Time for Ogg Vorbis to step up to the telecom plate!

Sounds like you might have a financial interest. :) I'm sure Xiph is willing to
accept sponsorship in further, low-bitrate development. :)

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