I really like VBR when using Lame for MP3s, and when I listen at work with Winamp, it handles VBR perfectly. I am new to this "science".

The question is:

Is creating VBR encoded MP3s limiting my usage of them of my MP3 music?
Meaning can portable MP3 players, car stereo MP3 players, stand-alone DVD players which can play MP3s, etc, can they play VBRs ? Is VBR a "standard".

If I'm going to create MP3s for general use on different types of MP3 players readers, is it better to use CBR ?

Thanks,

Jolo (Jon)

Some player can some can't. That's it!
You'll have to check the different player to be sure.

There's no VBR standard.
Most players should be able to play them fine, but the track time display might be wrong or might skip a bit

I know my Freecom Beatman plays them without any problem, so I only use VBR

Another issue, which isn't with VBR, but with Record Now from Stomp, is that RecordNow gets very confused about how long a file is when it is VBR.
Went to burn on in RecordNow and was told that there was not enough disk space, went back to Nero, and it fit in 45mb.

Easy solution: use only Nero

Does RecordNow maybe converts it to audio cd-format, like nero can do automaticaly? That could be the problem.

I much prefer to use RecordNow if I can, because of its great interface, ease of use and ordering is allowed on MP3s and it seems to me that the MP3s sound better when burnt from RecordNow.
Also, Nero's lack of tech support help is a negative for me as well.

But, there appears that there are things that the more mature product Nero can handle that RecordNow can't handle yet.

Of course you use lame --alt-preset standard to encode your music ?

If not, do so. You're gonna hear what I mean.

First, I want to report that RecordNow officially e-mailed me to tell me that they DON'T support VBR. Yet, this product is rated 9 out of 10 by CNET and their top product for burning (yet the user ratings are only 65% positive for it).

Anyway, I use EAC to rip music CDs to Wave, them Lame to encode the Wav files to MP3.

But .. I use RecordNow usually or Nero to copy already encoded MP3s from disk to audio CDs and also to burn CDs from MP3 files. Someday, I'll swap out my car stereo CD player for a MP3 player, then I'll only need to use MP3 or Wav formats.

Also for splitting up and slicing full Albums or editing MP3s I use one of my favorite products in the world (which is free), MP3DirectCut. It is a 73k download and creates lossless editing of MP3 files. It also allows for use of the Lame encoder. You can find it here http://www.rz.uni-frankfurt.de/~pesch/#mp3dc .

Last and not least, for editing and encoding audio from Divx movies, I extract the audio to a Wav file (using VirtualDub), then use Toolame to encode it back and my VCD and SVCD movies sound great.