New formats on hdtracks

Peter_W, FLAC and WAV (and AIF for that matter) are identical in terms of the PCM sample data they convey. No data is lost. 

The differences can come from how different systems decode the files and the side effects caused,  but that is a different matter and is not do with the files themselves.

For HDTracks downloads I download FLAC as the file is smaller, and then transcode to WAV on the fly with my UPNP server tfor my Naim equipment. I personally prefer the sound that way.

In summary FLAC and WAV convey the identical sample data. (some encoder rippers allow you to explicitly check FLAC with WAV  after each file encode if you are of a paranoid type.. I have never ever seen even one bit of discrepancy

Simon

I've downloaded some files from HDTracks in wav and metadata works fine with my UnitiServe / Uniti combo.

Cannot comment on other uPnP servers - have not tried.

Album art seems mostly to be in pdf though which US will not handle - so needs to be converted to another format.

Simon

I don't think Twonky that I use supports FLAC to WAV transcoding on the fly. Perhaps that's why I can hear differences between FLAC and WAV tracks whilst others do not (assuming their servers can transcode on the fly). For the downloaded FLAC files I used Audacity to trancode them to WAV before storing on the NAS. I can only hope Audacity will not "corrupt" the music in anyway.

But Simon, I would assume wav and aiff would be considered more "purer" sounding although I honestly haven't heard that much difference myself. FLACs can have varying levels of lossless compression so I wonder if in some systems, this might affect audio quality.

Just a thought I've had bouncing around in my already over-flowing head.

Arun

Peter, if you need to manually transcode flacs to WAVs, you will be fine in terms of no corruption if use quality software like dbpoweramp.. And I am sure Audacity.. Although it will a bit of a pain.

Arun, if you exclude the side effects of unpacking the files to any local audio circuits or clocks, the FLAC at what ever compression level is equally pure as WAV. The more compression you use the harder the encoder works to find common patterns and therefore compresses, but there is no loss of information, and so is equally 'pure'

Lossy compression uses a completely different approach and can obtain far higher reductions in data size, but here information is discarded if it is not generally required by our brains to reconstruct  the essential audio information.  That is how mp3, AAC and other lossy codecs work simplistically.

Indeed, it's always been a misnomer to call MP3 or AAC compression algorithms. They're actually reduction algorithms, which throw away 3/5ths or more of the data in a track. By comparison, FLAC and ALAC are compression alorithms which simply pack all the data into a tighter spot, and then unpack it when being replayed. As Simon says, if you unpack a FLAC (it's not really transcoding) to a WAV file, that WAV file should be identical to whatever master WAV that it came from.

I have heard differences between FLAC and WAV replay and, because I understand that the unpacked FLAC stream is the same as the WAV stream, I assume that the difference is due to the unpacking process, wherever that may occur.

Regards,
Frank.
All opinions are my own and do not reflect the opinion of any organisations I work for, except where this is stated explicitly.

these discussions are fun but after several years we still haven't got any  new music to download .in fact we are only listening to ripped cds or downloading  albums we have, that are in high res. exactly what happened when cds came on the market  .flac/wav/alac try all select one and forget it.

Sorry to be slightly off topic, but...

What if I already have ripped a CD, in this case Blue by Joni Mitchell and now want to download it in HD format. What happens in NServe when I try and play it using the Unitiserve SSD? Is it duplicated on the database or would the download automatically overwrite the CD rip?

Tim

You see it twice.  I'd suggest you use MP3TAG* to rename the HD version that you've downloaded. I add (HD) at the end of the album title so that I can see which version I've selected in n-stream.

If (HD) is too 'in-your-face', then add a full stop or something subtle like that !

(* note that MP3TAG doesn't just do MP3s, it does HD stuff as well)

I add [HDTracks] at the end of album names to differentiate.  Because I'm a geek about this stuff, I'll also add [MFSL] for my Mobile Fidelity Sound Labs cd's, etc etc.  I have three versions of most of the Doors cd's so I have to know what's what

Thanks Chaps!

I will add an HD to the end of the album title before transferring to music library.

Tim