Editing Digital Audio Broadcasting (section)

====Audio codec====
DAB initially only used the [[MPEG-1 Audio Layer II]] audio codec, which is often referred to as ''MP2'' because of the ubiquitous [[MP3]] (MPEG-1 Audio Layer III).

The newer DAB+ standard adopted the [[LC-AAC]] and [[HE-AAC]], including its [[parametric stereo|version 2]] audio codecs, commonly known as ''AAC'', ''AAC+'' or ''aacPlus''. AAC+ uses a [[modified discrete cosine transform]] (MDCT) algorithm,<ref name="Herre"/><ref name="Britanak"/> and is approximately three times more efficient than MP2,<ref name="autogenerated1">{{cite web |url=http://worlddab.org/pdf/DAB+brochure.pdf |title=Worlddab.org |access-date=17 November 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071128162449/http://worlddab.org/pdf/DAB+brochure.pdf |archive-date=28 November 2007 |url-status=dead}}</ref> which means that broadcasters using DAB+ are able to provide far higher audio quality or far more stations than they could with DAB, or a combination of both higher audio quality and more stations.

One of the most important decisions regarding the design of a digital radio broadcasting system is the choice of which audio codec to use because the efficiency of the audio codec determines how many radio stations can be carried on a fixed capacity multiplex at a given level of audio quality.