Due to unprecedented interest in a Convert FLAC to MP3 guide posted on AfterDawn last year that has since grown, we decided to add an article on how to play FLAC (Free Lossless Audio Codec) on your computer. While we usually stick to video playback guides, we noticed that many users may have been converting to MP3 out of a perceived necessity, but since FLAC is lossless we thought we would ... [ read the full article ]
Please read the original article before posting your comments.
Thank you so much for all the hard work it took to put this guide together. Now if someone can answer something for me---I have my movies, and tv shows in HD now whats the music equivelint of that? Is it FLAC or AC3?
Originally posted by AlBundy: Thank you so much for all the hard work it took to put this guide together. Now if someone can answer something for me---I have my movies, and tv shows in HD now whats the music equivelint of that? Is it FLAC or AC3?
That depends on what you consider equivalent. AC-3 uses lossy compression to achieve more channels, but lower quality than uncompressed audio. High resolution audio, which is more or less equivalent to HD video, typically uses 24 bit samples (significantly larger than CD or DVD-Video) and 96,000 or 192,000 samples per second (96kHz or 192kHz) to achieve much higher quality. Although FLAC can be used to encode hi-res audio, no consumer video format supports it. The most common high resolution audio format would probably be uncompressed LPCM, followed by Dolby TrueHD (originally MLP), and way back in the distance would be DTS-HD Master Audio.
I am still trying to find someone that can give me an intelligent reason why I should play a FLAC file instead of convert to 320 BR mp3. I have asked this question on many threds discussing FLAC files hear and in other audio forums. I have never gotten a reply let alone a good explaination. Granted the Flac stores 4 times the data but if you can't hear the difference why keep something 4 times bigger, just for grins? I know if you wish to edit and save a lossy format of anything resolution is lost. However, I would never edit a tune even if it had a pop in it due to it was a vinyl capture. I capture as a wave but eventually store as a 320 mp3. I believe they faithfully store up to 20,000 htz tones. This is was a child or a jungle person can hear. Anyone exposed to load noises for long can't hear tones that high. I know I can't. I know I can hear the difference between a 128 BR and a CD. I am not so sure I can tell the difference between a 160 BR and a CD. I figure at 320 BR (twice that rate) I certanly can't tell. The sample rate for a CD exceeds what a human can hear. Flac maintain that sample rate. They are about 1,2000 BR.
Originally posted by Mez: I am still trying to find someone that can give me an intelligent reason why I should play a FLAC file instead of convert to 320 BR mp3. I have asked this question on many threds discussing FLAC files hear and in other audio forums. I have never gotten a reply let alone a good explaination. Granted the Flac stores 4 times the data but if you can't hear the difference why keep something 4 times bigger, just for grins? I know if you wish to edit and save a lossy format of anything resolution is lost. However, I would never edit a tune even if it had a pop in it due to it was a vinyl capture. I capture as a wave but eventually store as a 320 mp3. I believe they faithfully store up to 20,000 htz tones. This is was a child or a jungle person can hear. Anyone exposed to load noises for long can't hear tones that high. I know I can't. I know I can hear the difference between a 128 BR and a CD. I am not so sure I can tell the difference between a 160 BR and a CD. I figure at 320 BR (twice that rate) I certanly can't tell. The sample rate for a CD exceeds what a human can hear. Flac maintain that sample rate. They are about 1,2000 BR.
Just because your ears can't tell the difference doesn't mean no one's can. In fact the human ear is quite capable of distinguishing between not only CD and MP3, but CD and hi-res formats like DVD-Audio.
Obviously it's dependent on both your playback equipment and ears, and I haven't seen anyone suggest you should worry about a difference you can't hear. But that doesn't mean other people shouldn't worry about it just because you can't hear it.
First off, thanks for the reply. I will try not to come off as a smart ass. I am actually trying to learn. It is possible I don’t know all the facts. I have read a good deal on audio but I don’t know everything.
I did state I am not sure I can even tell the difference between 160 and a CD. My question to you is can you hear the difference between a 320 BR and a FLAC.
DVDs are something different. HD DVDs have much more band width than a CD and have more tracks. The DVDs can produce more sound in a hearable range because it plays more tracks. I don’t doubt that someone listening intently can hear the difference if the music is fuller even if their ears are shot like mine. You might be able to hear the difference even if you are not listening intently.
I am trying to be specific to the mp3 320 BRs. Not only do the compresses the data but I believe it lowers the sample rate so that tones beyond 20,000 Hz are not reproduced accurately. Fletcher-Munson loudness phenomenon states we really can’t even hear the extreme ranges of our hearing well. The sounds tend to mute out gradually instead of just cut off. However, these tones were shown to add richness to music. That is the grey area. This is where the experts tend to disagree.
Dogs can hear much higher frequencies than humans if I was making music for them I would have to do things differently. Human ears are created equally but degrade when broken by damaging noises that are produced at a rock concert. Age also degrades what a human ear can hear. A 320 BR is supposed to keep up to about 20 Khz the end of human hearing. Most of the music data is kept to reproduce the high frequencies. Not only does a 22,000 hz have 1,000 times the data than a 22 hz tone but the sample rate of the music has to be much higher. You have all this data to faithfully reproduce tones that you probably can’t hear and even if you can you can barely hear them
Lastly, my playback equipment is plenty good. In fact, it is very extreme. The speakers can faithfully reproduce 4-26,000 hz. While the human ear can only hear 20-20,000 hz. Even though the human ear can not hear tones below 20 hz you can sure feel the sub tones. 4 hz is truly awesome. The power amp is truly a magnificent dinosaur. It can do 440 watts RMS per channel with 1% distortion. Actually, that is what you need to drive the speakers which are ultra-inefficient. No, I would never buy a stereo like that today even if I could afford to.
