Unmatched Audio and Video Quality
Windows Media Audio and Video 9 Series delivers unmatched audio and video quality at any bit rate from optimizing the dial-up experience to delivering home-theater-like experiences for broadband and beyond. With compression improvements across the board, new discrete digital 5.1 surround sound as low as 128 Kbps and 24-bit audio, and support for high-definition, full-screen video, Windows Media Audio and Video 9 Series sets the new standard for audio and video quality.
Key improvements include:
  Industry-Leading Audio and Video Technology
Windows Media Audio and Video 9 Series codecs provide compression improvements of 20% for audio and 15%–50% (most dramatic improvements seen at higher bit rates) for video compared with Windows Media Audio and Video 8. Windows Media Audio and Video 9 Series delivers the highest fidelity audio and best quality video at any bit rate from dial-up to broadband, for streaming, download-and-play, and delivery of content on physical media.
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 Optimizations for Dial-up Rates
The new Windows Media Audio 9 Voice codec is the first mixed-mode voice and music codec that supports superior quality delivery of combined speech and music content at low data rates (<20 Kbps). Screen content can also be delivered over dial-up rates with the Windows Media Video 9 Screen codec—a lossless screen capture codec that can deliver a pixel-perfect image.
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The Web's First Digital 5.1 Surround Sound Codec
Windows Media Audio 9 Professional codec provides discrete digital surround sound with 5.1 channels and above, for streaming or download-and-play, at bit rates as low as 128 Kbps. Windows Media Audio 9 Professional codec also supports full-resolution audio, with 24-bit sampling resolution and 96 kHz sampling rates.
 Lossless Audio Compression
Windows Media Audio 9 Lossless, a new mathematically lossless audio codec, delivers the ultimate audiophile performance. This codec is capable of losslessly compressing CD audio into one-half to one-third its original size, the listener will enjoy exactly the original sound quality, bit-for-bit. It's the ultimate "archival" codec for your music library!
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Home-Theater-Like Experiences
Capable of delivering high-definition video quality, Windows Media Video 9 can support video frame sizes of 1280 x 720 (720p) with software decoding, or even 1920 x 1080 (1080p) with hardware acceleration provided by graphics chips from ATI and NVIDIA. Windows Media Video 9 delivers approximately three times the compression efficiency of MPEG-2, enabling dramatic improvements in video quality for download-and-play, or for delivery via physical media such as CDs or DVDs.
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