As djdawn said a while ago, select a sample by first encoding using "Lame --r3mix", play it in Winamp to see how the bit rate changes, and note the sections of the track that has bit rates > 192. These are the sections that Lame has decided it needs a higher bit rate to retain an acceptable level of quality.

Even if you can't hear the difference at the moment between diffeent bit rate mp3s, you may regret it later when one day you may have better equipment on which you WILL be able to tell the difference. It also depends on your attitudes later. You might become more passionate about music, and want the highest level of quality as you can possibly afford, and wish that you hadn't compressed your favourite tracks to such a low quality mp3. One day we will all be using very high-speed Internet connections and have hard disk drives that are so much larger than today, and having 96kbps mp3s would just be a laugh... I think it's already a laugh. Just get a faster internet connection, larger hard disk drive, and a CD writer, that's what I have done.

being an MP3/cd burning lover, the difference is very obvious. 128 sounds pretty good, but it's not as smooth and clear as 192. 98 is pretty crappy....

___________________
The father made fetuses with flesh licking ladies / While you and your mother were asleep in the trailer park / Thunderous sparks from the dark of the stadiums / The music and medicine you needed for comforting / So make all your fat, fleshy fingers fingers to moving / And pluck all your silly strings and / Bend all your notes for me and / Soft silly music is meaningful, magical / The movements were beautiful / All in your ovaries / All of them milking with green fleshy flowers / While powerful pistons were sugary sweet machines, / Smelling of semen all under the garden / Was all you were needing when you still believed in me.

hmm...i never got an answer back from Paul...meybe he didnt get my pm....but i knew i was right 100%...i could totally tell the difference....

anywayz..i kinda dont care anymore..

>JM<

I think we should all still care, especially if we are sharing our music. There may have been occasions when you are looking for a particular track, downloaded it, and found that it sounded crap due to the quality being poor. It's annoying. Even on Audiogalaxy, you might find 192kbps mp3s but some still sound bad, maybe there are people encoding with poor quality programs or they re-encode from a low bit rate to a high one thinking it'll sound better.

WE SHOULD STILL CARE ABOUT MP3 QUALITY, AND DO OUR BEST TO ENCOURAGE/ENFORCE IT.