.wav data storage inquiry

M

Mew Sick

New member
Greetings everyone.

Is it a "sound" idea to convert .wav files into .zip files in order to conserve space on the hard drive or for backup data cd's? I just wonder if there will be any change to the integrity of the original data when converting back to .wav files. If anyone has tried this, or has an opinion as to this idea's pro's, con's, and practicality, I would be much obliged.

In addition, may I give a hearty THANK YOU to everyone who participates in this information exchange forum. I have been reading these posts for some time now, and I am very grateful -- to you all -- for sharing your knowledge, experience, ideas, insights, and speculations about home recording procedures.

Since this is my first post, please forgive me if this topic has previously been covered. I look forward to your response(s).
 
Hmmmmmm...

I don't think that you are going to realize significant file size reduction converting .wav files to .zip files to make the process of doing so worthwhile.

.zip files typically are used to combine several files together into one file to ease transmission over ftp protocols and networks and what not. I forget what actually gets compressed to make the .zip a bit smaller in size then all the combined files contained within, but I don't beleive it is anything pertinent to the contained files.

Slackmaster, you have something to add here?

Ed
 
Yeah zipping up waves isn't such a bad idea. Zip files can contain one or more other files, and it uses a decent compression algorithm (good enough to pretty much become the standard on PC's).

I conducted a little experiment on a 53.4MB wave file.

WinZip 8.0 using Standard Compression - Reduced file size by 19%. Took about 20 seconds on a PIII 500.

WinZip 8.0 using Maximum Compression - Reduced file size by 19%. Took about 20 seconds.

WaveZip 1.15T - Reduced file size by 28%. Took about 10 seconds.

Clearly WaveZip is the winner here. However, there are some serious drawbacks. First of all WaveZip isn't free. I should mention that WinZip isn't free either, but it doesn't expire. WaveZip expires after 15 days.

I also found WaveZip to be extremely unintuitive. Clearly the user interface was designed by an amature.

So you should really try both and decide what you want to do. Also note that the contents of the wave will determine how well it can be compressed.

Thanks for bringing this up BTW. It never really occurred to me to zip up waves before archiving projects. You could combine all of the files in a project into one or two large zip files (at a reduced size of course) and burn them to CD for storage...this would be a lot handier than saving all the raw files, though it would take longer to get at individual files in the future.

(BTW, any compression routine that can be used on data files can be used for lossless audio compression. You might just do a search and try out several)

Slackmaster 2000
 
Gentlemen, (and Ladies),

I am almost ablush at the hospitality you have shown me by responding so quickly, and concisely. I am also humbled that my very first post received advice from such esteemed members of this forum (sonusman, Emeric, Slackmaster2K, gidman, regebro). --> The content of your posts/responses/counter-points, in particular, have continually added to my perspective and methodology (and decorum). I appreciate the fact that I can investigate the validity of your opinions, and make my own choice as to how to proceed with recording my stuff to the best of my ability (factoring in equipment limitations and my growing skill level). AND, I dig the scientific and technical research (and links) you folks share.

I must admit that I felt shy about posting anything, because of some in-flaming-atory content I've observed from afar -- so I thank you for your warm welcome, and look forward to maintaining a positive cyber-friendship with you all. It's nice to be involved in a community that exhibits such passion for this art, and promotes the pursuit of theoretical + practical knowledge.
=====

Back on topic...

1.
(And may I say that my intent is not to purposefully fuel any possible discontent that may have arisen in other threads.)

If -- it is a worthwhile endeavor to keep (possibly unavoidable to a certain degree using optical burners) digital transfer errors to a minimum when copying data between mediums such as hard drives and cdrs...

Then, -- would zipping up the .wav file whenever storing back up data on a cdr help minimize any (possibly avoidable)transfer errors SINCE there may be differences between CD audio 'digital data' and other forms of digital data?

Would that be a practical (although possibly tedious) way to help maintain the original .wav data's integrity? -- up to the point of creating an audio cd which one may send to a mastering facility.

And would it be worth the time to do this?

2.
When using more than one .wav editing program or multitracking software for recorded tracks, it seems that some programs create additional files with unique extentions that help that program refer to specific user-defined markers and parameters.

In reference to the proposal of zipping together all files for a project, what would be the best way to organize such files for optimal ease of reference -- for the user -- and for the software's ease of operation when referring to stored audio data?

If I am not making any sense, or if I've interpreted something incorrectly and have made false assertions, I humbly (sp?) ask for your help to rephrase or clarify the ideas I have put forth for discussion. If my ignorance has put me way off base, I would appreciate any helpful links to previously discussed threads so I can get my knowlege more 'up-to-snuff'. I really don't mean to tax your brains to do my thinking for me, yet I do appreciate your intellectual input/perspectives.

If I should have started a new thread for some of this babble, please feel free to link this to a more appropriate thread.
====

I will try to be less (of a) verbose (turd)--and more on topic-- in future posts, if I have any input. Thanks for reading this.
 
WHEW

Mew are you a woman?
I was a woman in a previous life.
I was a lesbian. I have returned as a man, but I still have those lesbian tendacies...I am tired, I have been up all night and Its time for the gidman to contact the sandman, for some much needed rest...Amongst all that you have said...would it be easier to get a new large hard drive or an external drive?...how much do 30 gig hd's cost these days? Tiger Direct has a 40 gig for
$200.... http://www.tigerdirect.com
A little headache and a little cash now...
or a pain in the ass zipping and unzipping or worrying about cd integrity?
I worry about my hard drive crashing and I use cd backups...Just as a precaution...at 39 cents a cd its worth it weight for insurance.File it for future reference or trash it and replace with the new session added.
I will attempt to focus later on your above mentioned inquiries.
PEACE
gidman
 
Thank you for replying, gidman. No, I ain't a chick. (When I said 'gentlemen and ladies...' I just wanted to acknowledge everyone who might read my ramblings.)

You make a good point about large hard drives being so cheap nowadays. I guess I just don't trust computers to work reliably all of the time, and feel safer knowing that my data is also backed up (fixed) onto cds.
 
First of all, I am only esteemed because I have a high number of posts. I have the high number of posts because I post a lot of crap. :)

Now, to your questions:
No, zipping does not help you avoid transfer errors, or maintain the data integrity. In theory, it actually could make it worse, since one small error would get bigger effects when zipped. If you burn a Wav to a cd, and a block of that cd gets unreadable, it's probably easier to salvage the rest of the file if it is a wav file. (Haven't done it with wav-files, myself, so this is all theory, but thats how it works with otehr files).

As to your second question, uhm, no, it makes no sense to me. If you want to make a backup, you might just as well make a backup of these files too, right?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top