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Using MP3 instead of WAV

General and Gameplay Programming Programming

Started by Gf11speed January 02, 2002 02:51 PM

3 comments, last by Gf11speed 22 years, 3 months ago

Gf11speed

141

Author

January 02, 2002 02:51 PM

If I used MP3 files in my game instead of WAV files for sounds, voices, and music in the game, would this be more efficient? I would think that since MP3 files are smaller than WAV, there is no need to use WAV files at all. Is this smart or no? Thanks Greg *====================* http://www.syntasoft.com *=======================*

Greg FieldsSyntasoft Gameswww.syntasoft.comPost-Time Horse Racing (Available Now)

Dragn

122

January 02, 2002 03:13 PM

Mp3''s are more efficient in terms of file space used--and only that. Waves are more efficient in every other way.

You have to remember that mp3''s are compressed audio.
So, it''ll take up more cpu cycles to process mp3 than to play wave files.

Here''s my suggestion:
Use wave for "noises".
Use mp3 for background music (the cpu cycle loss is hardly even noticable anymore on modern 1Ghz+ machines).

Kaijin

163

January 02, 2002 03:17 PM

In terms of file space, definately. But there would probably be some overhead from the decoding of the MP3 file so using it for all your sound files might affect performance.

It would probably be better to use MP3 for large sound files (like background music) and wave files for sound effects (which will be pretty small anyway).

- Kaijin