Hi Thunderthud,

I'm reasonably sure that both BIAB and Audacity use the LAME mp3 encoder. I suspect that what you are hearing is that BIAB has saved the file using "Joint Stereo" while Audacity has saved the file as plain "Stereo".

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When I look at the two wav files in Reaper, it's possible to see very small variations.

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Personally, I don't like joint stereo because it lacks a little clarity to my ears (which is what you also seem to be hearing). The article below explains the differences between the two types of stereo. The better quality one is "Stereo". The article describes "Joint Stereo" an 'optimised' version of stereo.

https://riverside.fm/blog/joint-stereo-vs-stereo

I hope this helps with a little bit of insight.

When I tried to export a wav in the latest version of Audacity (3.4.2) this morning, it was also Joint Stereo and I did not have any options to save the file as just plain stereo. I'm guessing that your version of Audacity is somehow different from mine.

I'll report this behaviour to the development team and ask if it's possible for an option to export mp3s as either stereo or joint stereo. I always save my file as wav in BIAB and then use either Reaper (which also uses LAME but lets me disable joint stereo) or Freac audio converter (which also uses LAME and lets me diable joint stereo).

All the best,
--Noel

MY SONGS...
Audiophile BIAB 2025