I know the normal answer for this is that the file is encoded wrong, but I have Audacity set to 44.1 kHz and 64 bit rate, and my Absolute Science files still chipmunk in the Pupu player and the multi-episode Pickle player, and it just never seems to play in the single episode Pickle player.

I'm using the exact same Audacity program to do my Grammar Girl files and they play fine in the Pickle player.

Does anyone have any ideas?

Mignon

Well, my usual response to questions like this is that I don't trust Audacity's front end to LAME as far as I can throw it.

Try RazorLAME; since I started using it I've never had any chipmunking problems. Just make sure, once you install it, to click on the LAME button, choose the Audio Processing tab, and set the sample rate to 44.1 kHz. That'll force the resulting mp3 to 44.1, which Audacity doesn't always do for you.

Probably reasonable, but not fair to Audacity in this case. According to LAME's release notes, 44.1 kHz at 64kbps is considered "extreme," so it's actually LAME that's configured to automatically downsample. lame.exe does the same thing unless you explicitly specify "--resample 44.1", which is what RazorLAME is doing. I blame Audacity only for not offering a way to change the default behavior.

Mignon, check the properties on the MP3 file to see if it really is 44.1. I was surprised to find my files at 24 kHz, since all of my Audacity settings said 44.1. If that's what you're getting, then the RazorLAME suggestion is probably the right one. However, my 24 kHz files chipmunk in the single Pickle Player as well, rather than failing to play, so you might have a different problem.

That's fine, but every other front end to LAME gives you options to override that, and Audacity doesn't. So I don't trust Audacity to give me control over my file given that I don't know what other defaults there are that Ican't override by using Audacity.

I export to WAV from Audacity then use "A Rob Fantastic MP3 Encoder" which can probably still be found here and there on the net.

Thanks guys! My deadlines are finally over and I can finally deal with this. Stupid question: How do I tell the encoding rate of my MP3s (other than looking at the settings in Audacity)?

Mignon

When you open it up in Audacity, it should say the sample rate On the track info on the left. You can find out the bitrate in Windows by opening up Explorer, navigating to the mp3 file and hovering over the file name with the mouse. It'll pop up information about the mp3 file including the bit rate.

Most decent mp3 players have a way to see the bitrate too. My mp3 player can show it on the screen (though I turned it off as I'm going spartan with my display these days to save battery)

So by "most decent" you're implying "not iPods"?

I don't know iPod's interface because, while I own an iPod, I don't use the native firmware. But if they do not, then I suppose you could include them

Note, if you know the mp3's length and size, you can get the bitrate yourself with some simple math.
If you know megs and seconds, just multiply meg by 8000 (Or, if you really want to, 8192), then divide by seconds, and that'll give you kb/s.

So if you have a 5 minute file (300 seconds) that is 5 meg, that's about 40000/300 = 400/3 = 126, so you can guess that it's a 128 kb/s file.

Or you can get a real mp3 player

Most of the non-Audacity instructions above are talking about the bitrate, which you already know is 64kbps. In Windows Explorer, the sampling rate is not shown when you hover over the file. However, if you right-click on the file and select "Properties," go to the "Summary" tab, and click "Advanced," then, at the bottom of the Advanced Properties under the "Audio" heading, you'll find "Audio sample rate." This is not a huge amount of effort, but the fact that it takes any effort at all is probably why it's so easy to overlook the fact that lame has automatically lowered the sampling rate.

Ah ha! I never would have found that on my own! Thank you.

It says the audio sample rate is 44 kHz (not 44.1), so I'm guessing that is the problem (or maybe it's just rounding down, but since the file doesn't work, and sample rate is the most likely problem, I'm assuming it's REALLY 44 and not 44.1).

No, it's probably rounding down. I'd take a look at one that does work and see what it says.

Yeah, mine says 44, not 44.1, and my problem went away when it changed from 24 to 44. So, I don't think this is the answer after all.

However, it mightn't hurt to try re-encoding using something else (like the aforementioned RazorLAME), to see if that makes a difference, since we've established that Audacity fails to expose some LAME defaults that matter.

Quick sanity check: you recorded in stereo, correct? A quick test shows that a mono track is not downsampled, so the Advanced Properties will show 64 kbps and 44 kHz, but 1 channel instead of 2. I imagine that a flash player might chipmunk by reading two channels' worth of buffer instead of one, or it might just fail to play... And you have both of those symptoms, depending on the player, right?

No, I actually record in mono. But I did just reconvert a file using A Rob Fantastic MP3 Encoder (couldn't get RazorLAME to work), and it also read 44 in the properties menu. Neverthless, I presisted and uploaded the new file anyway, and now it works. I have on idea why, but I'm glad.

Thanks again for all your advice.

Mignon

I'm having a similar problem: my podcast won't play in any player. Is it because it's in m4a format, or because the RSS feed has a wonky address (it starts itpc://).