[...] Hi, the source files found on the web are often lossy, and the results of the remastering works will never be 100% like the original lossless source due to audio manipulation, so I obviously convert everything to FLAC to avoid any further loss of quality.
Anyway, in the case of remastered tracks the perceived sound quality is way better than the source, so I don’t see what's the problem with that...
If you want to rely exclusively on the spectral graph then I can convert everything to MP3 or post the original unremastered tracks, but it would be a real shame for everyone's listening experience.
I'm not here to ruin the site's reputation, but to share stuff with the best audio quality possible.
I commend you on deleting the offending rips, but you apparently have also deleted the genuine ones, which may not have been necessary in all cases.
Let me suggest that you will profit from learning a bit about digital audio and its manipulation before trying to "remaster" stuff you find on the internet.
What you're presently doing is not remastering, the proper term is "clueless tampering".
Here are a few hints:
[...] the source files found on the web are often lossy, and the results of the remastering works will never be 100% like the original lossless source due to audio manipulation, so I obviously convert everything to FLAC to avoid any further loss of quality. [...]
-- Lossy audio files **cannot** be manipulated in the way you seem to believe. Really. Don't ever do it. To work with lossy files in an audio editor they need to be converted to PCM (pulse-code modulation) format. After editing there is then no way to convert them to proper audio again. If you leave them as pure PCM (in a WAV file, for example), or if you compress them to FLAC or another of the many lossless audio formats, they turn into a deception. If you re-encode them to a lossy format the sonic result is even worse because then you have files that have been put through a lossy encoder twice.
(nidostar's statement
If the original is a lossy file then the lossy extension eg MP3 should continue to be used.
is incorrect in this point because lossy encoding of digital audio isn't idempotent. Meaning that if you do the following:
-- convert lossy file A to lossless file B (by importing an MP3 file to an audio editor, for example),
-- lossless file B to lossy file C (by exporting it from the audio editor to MP3),
-- lossy file C to lossless file D,
and so on (or just lossy to lossy to lossy ...), you're going to end up with unrecognisable sound if you do it long enough.)
[...] in the case of remastered tracks the perceived sound quality is way better than the source [...]
-- Please understand that sound quality has rather little to do with the presence of clicks or noise. It is almost impossible to reduce the noise of a recording without affecting the music also contained in it. Particularly with the tools and the knowledge you have at your disposal at this point. One may **manually** remove pops and clicks, but never let a program do it for you automatically. It does not work. You almost certainly will do damage. Programs simply cannot properly distinguish between noise and music algorithmically. Music instruments produce noise, it's part of their sound. If you remove that noise, the sound will deteriorate.
[...] I can convert everything to MP3 or post the original unremastered tracks [...]
-- It bears repeating: never, ever convert digital audio files from lossy to lossless. This includes importing a lossy file to Audacity (which automatically converts it to -- lossless -- PCM).
Always post unaltered files in the state that you received them in, except if they're truly lossless and you manually remove single pops and clicks one by one. Do not try to "improve" them otherwise. It cannot be done in the way that you do it.
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