Moving to Flac

[Cocophone]

I'm thinking of moving my audio library to Flac. Currently, I'm using Netremote Version 1 and JRiver Media Center 10. What version of Netremote and mediabridge and JRiver Media Center will I need to upgrade to use flac? Also, I'm wanting to be able play flac in different zones just like I'm doing now with ogg files.

[Mastiff]

I don't think NetRemote cares what kind of files they are, as long as they are in the library. As for JRMC I think it can play just about anything with the right plug-in. But since I haven't gone that route myself, I'm not so sure about that. Another thing is that MC supports APE hysterically well since Matt Ashland in J. River is the man behind that format.

[Cocophone]

I noticed that about APE, but I'm thinking of going with Flac because it seems more widespread usage.

[NeoMorph]

The plugin for JRMC (for 11.1 and 12) can be found at http://mcplugins.sourceforge.net/in_flac.html so that's all you need. Once the plugin is installed in JRMC it works like normal.

Not sure how you will make flac files play in a different zone by default though. Most likely you know the way anyway as you are doing it for ogg.

Edit: I forgot to say that the auto install download failed and I had to download the zip package from http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=161914 - Run the "LocalInstall.mjp" and it installs fine. Restart JRMC and then voila! FLAC support.

Got to admit that I hadn't realised how clear lossless vs mp3-160 is. I'm playing Bach's Brandenburg in FLAC through my Denon AVR-3805 and it sounds superb. (The Brandenburg is available as a free FLAC download from http://www.rozhlas.cz/d-dur/download_eng).

Got to admit I'm glad you had the problem or I wouldn't have known about FLAC... ;)

[NeoMorph]

OK... got one major problem... I can't import flac files into the library of JRMC 12 and I don't know why. I can double click on a flac file and play it in JRMC so it's working... it just doesn't see flac files as importable for some bizarre reason. :(

DOH!

Forgot to open the advanced tab in the import screen and tick FLAC as a file to import... done now and it also allows you to tag the files too

[Jlee]

....Got to admit that I hadn't realised how clear lossless vs mp3-160 is. I'm playing Bach's Brandenburg in FLAC through my Denon AVR-3805 and it sounds superb.

I'd be interested to know how it sounds in 320 KBPS MP3. That's what I use as I wanted a good balance between compatibility, quality and file size and that seems to give me the right balance.

[NeoMorph]

I'd be interested to know how it sounds in 320 KBPS MP3. That's what I use as I wanted a good balance between compatibility, quality and file size and that seems to give me the right balance.
I'll dig out a CD tonight and encode it to both flac and 320kb/s mp3 and let you know how I get on.

[Jlee]

Thanks NeoMorph, much appreciated.

[NeoMorph]

Sorry I haven't told you the results JLee but I had a bit of a nightmare last night... Washing machine had a leak after I had the pump fixed and it managed to flood part of the kitchen... For some reason it also tripped the power breaker twice. :rolleyes: May have been a coincidence though as there were lightning storms around and it may have just been a power surge.

I'll do it tonight when I get back from shopping... promise (bar another emergency).

[theguywiththefunnyhair]

I would like to throw my 2 cents into this one, if i may.

Encoding to 320 kbs mp3's most likely will be transparent 99.5% of the time (the other .5% will never sound right with mp3) BUT so will 256k and alot of people wont even hear the difference at 220k.

The problem with mp3 is not so much how it sounds anymore but more future compatibility. If you take your music collection seriously you will have spent many hours ripping tagging and checking your files to ensure a perfect library of your favorite CD's. If you encode to mp3 (no matter what bitrate) you have compressed the data with a lossy encoder and essential thrown part of the sound away, you may think this is ok because you cant hear that part of the sound anyway but it means that you are stuck with mp3's forever, the only way to change formats is to re-rip the original cd.

If you encode to FLAC or APE or Wavepack lossless you are compressing the data by using a lossless algorithm, so you still have all of your original sounds, this means if in 10 years time you finally get over mp3 and decide mp8 is a much better codec offering the same quality of sound at only 35kbs you can easily (perfectly) transcode from your FLAC files.
The same logic applies for today. If you have a portable music player there is no point putting 320k mp3's on it, this takes up too much space and wont improve the sound coming out those tiny earbuds, but if you have a lossless format on your drive you can transcode to AAC or OGG at 160kbs creating the same files that a re-rip would produce at a fraction of the effort.

So i guess what im trying to get across is that if you really enjoy your music and you are building a collection you are proud of, that you plan to keep for as long as you can hear, its worth throwing a few extra bucks at a bigger HDD and keeping all the data your cd's hold.


Cheers

Dan

[NeoMorph]

Well after listening to some various types of music I have to say that mostly I can't tell the difference between 320k mp3 and flac. The only time I heard more definition was in some classical where the mp3 lost some detail in the background.

The thing about flac is that being lossless I do have all the information stored safely on my hard drive. I do tend to accidentally scratch cd's because of being clumsy (part of my disability means I drop stuff a lot). Because of that I bought a Skip Doctor Automax cd/dvd repair unit which thankfully managed to rescue my legit cd of Windows XP Pro SP2. Before I used the Automax the CD was unreadable. It also rescued some cd's that were originally classical but had turned into scratch music.

I think this plus guywiththefunnyhair (gotta do acronyms in future heh) has said makes me realise that it's going to be better to use flac in the future. I'm just not looking forward to having to dig out all my cd's and re-encode the lot again.