WAV audiofiles and how to convert them into MP3

When recording any given sounds as a digital file, be it music, speech or any other source, one encounters the question: which format to use? MP3 has been all over the place for quite a while. However, for a recording with the highest possible soundquality, a recording should be saved as a WAV-file (or WAVE, as it is also known).

Another plus when using wav-files is the ease in editing: most standard audio-editing-software can handle this, while only advanced software can edit compressed MP3, Ogg or similar files.

One of the main problems one faces when recording a wav-file is its size. The audio-data is uncompressed, and therefore can become very large, which is why usually a wav-file is only used for sound-snippets, for instance 15 second soundbytes. However, when recording music, especially in professional surroundings, a wav-file is the way to go. It offers a much better resolution than compressed filetypes, and therefore captures the soundsource as authentic as possible.

Wav-Files offer different types of resolution, and therefore can vary in size: 8-, 16- or even 32-bit-resolutions are typical. Also, it is usually possible to choose between different acoustic ranges: 44100 Hertz, which represents the sound-quality of a CD, or even 48000 Hertz, the quality of a Digital Audio Tape. However, lower frequencies are also possible, and can significantly lower file sizes.

Every wav-file has a size limitation of 4 Gigabytes. Usually, this isn’t much of a problem; this is an equivalent of 6 hours sound in CD-quality. However, when recording in higher resolutions, it is quite possible to reach this size limit, so one should always choose carefully which resolution to pick, whether certain frequencies are really needed, and last but not least, whether to make a recording in mono or stereo, a feature that can also initially be chosen. A general rule of thumb: the lower the overall quality is, the smaller the wav-file that is produced.

Wav-files are compatible with all Windows and Macintosh operating systems, but will not be recognized by normal CD-players.