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[Bobnoznothing]

I'm a bit confused about WMA encoding in MC. I've read that WMA version 9 is much superior to 8. In MC there is no mention of the version, the choices are WMA (CBR), WMA lossless and WMA VBR. Is all/any of that version 8 or 9 ? Does MC uses the encoder that is already installed on the PC ?

Also I read something about WMA9-PRO, is that yet another flavour and is all that backward compatible with portable players ? ?

[Omni]

Well, MC definitely installs WMA9, not WMA8, on your system if it isn't installed already.  (That's one of the reasons the download is so big!   )

Standard or Pro, I'm not sure.  I haven't really messed with WMA-anything in over a year, so my memory is sketchy, but isn't the lossless codec only available in the Pro version?

edit:  Forgot the crucial "not" in "not WMA8."  

[Omni]

Same thing with VBR... isn't that a Pro-only thing?  *thinking* Maybe it's just the mult-pass variant that is Pro-only.  <shrug>

If I were to guess, I would say they install WMA9 (Standard).

I guess we need to wait for Matt or Jim to know for sure.  

[Omni]

  (I'm so wishy-washy, I should just shut up.)

It just occurred to me that they might install the WMA8 version if only for portable-compatibility reasons. <shrug>

Sorry... I'll just shut up now.  

[Bobnoznothing]

Thanks for clarifying, so this is WMA 9.
I should have looked at microsoft web site first : VBR was introduced (It seems) with version 9.

As for WMA-PRO, this is a variant of version 9 that supports 5.1 audio channels.

I find WMA VBR quite efficient and it sounds pretty good even at the "normal" quality setting.

Bob