MP3sparks (formerly allofmp3) offers the option to download the FLAC version of certain cd's. My question is how do I know that these files aren't just made from the mp3's they may have already had archived? The FLAC file is quite a bit more expensive than a medium quality mp3 and I'm VERY paranoid about my music quality. Is it even possible to make a FLAC file from an mp3? Thanks for any help.
roniston, Yes, you could very well make flac files out of mp3 files. Here's a thread here. I suppose there's no way of discerning original flac files from other audio formats that were encoded to flac.
Thank you for the reply, I am making FLAC files with FreeRIP. I am quite happy with the program... but what I really want to know is, is there any possible way to analyze a FLAC file with some sort of software to detect whether or not it is a FLAC made from the original cd source instead of a low quality, or even high quality mp3 file. The way I understand it is that once an mp3 is created there is information lost during the compression that can not be gotten back, so before I go and dish out hundreds of dollars for mp3sparks FLAC files, I want to make sure that they are "up to par". Or, even if anybody has done some in depth comparisons with mp3sparks FLAC files with ones from original CD FLAC's, their findings would be much appreciated.
dont know about flacs, but dbpoweramp will give you mp3 info. lots of it. its all an opinion, but... True, there is loss with mp3, but a PROPERLY ripped and encoded mp3 is lossless to the human ear. i have a very high end setup, and after many many hours of screwing around, came up with lossless(to my ear) mp3s. I use exact audio copy(with lame encoder) use alt preset extreme. output is around 200-250kbs vbr mp3. roughly 7:1 compression. i guarentee you cant tell the difference! ALL RIPPERS ARE NOT CREATED EQUAL! Use the one that is widely considered the best. EAC will even detect gaps between songs. So if you have a live cd that plays with no gap between songs, eac will embed gap info.(need a player that supports gapless playback tho) winamp, xbmc do. im sure there are others tho.
Thank you for not answering my question philzone. And thanks for the "lesson" on mp3's. I'm sure to YOUR ear they sound just fine, but unfortunetly I listen to my music through various high-end headphones with a usb headphone amp that picks up on almost every "impurity" in it's listening source... so mp3's are out for me. I've tried and they just don't sound nearly as good as lossless on headphones. Does ANYBODY on this board use mp3sparks to get mp3's from. Has anybody ever used mp3sparks? What's the quality of their FLAC files? That's basically my question. I don't know if I can trust this site but they have all of the music that I need. Anybody?
I get mp3 files from mp3sparks all the time & have been very satisfied with what I hear. I have no idea if there is a way to tell for certain if your Flac files are from an mp3 file or not. Why don't you download one & listen to it for yourself? If you can hear the "impurities" in a mp3 file at a bitrate of 256kb/s Then you certainly should be able to here a Flac file that was created from an mp3 file!
Yes Thank You... I have downloaded some certain FLAC files for my judgement and IMO I hear a quality of file that is comparable to an mp3 at a bit-rate of around 192-256. I believe these Russian bastards are ripping us off. I'm amazed that nobody on this forum has any experience with mp3sparks FLAC files. I've e-mail those Russian pigs and all that I get is what I would expect. Join together, raise the flag... let's all do something without all those... well, bon voyage.
