Do we really need FLAC?

[likedeeler]

I was going to write a detailed contribution with a few technical explanations to this very interesting topic but I realise that it would be too laborious for me to do at this point. Let me instead state the following:

Lossy compression of music has no place in this world anymore. It is a technique that was developed 35 years ago when we had 16-bit operating systems and dial-up modems, and when very large hard discs for the consumer market had a capacity of 500MB. It made a lot of sense.

Lossy compression of music has lost that sense. We now have 64-bit computers, gigabit around-the-clock connections and standard hard discs that hold ten thousand times as much data.

Preferring an MP3 file over a lossless one today is like going to the record shop (Does anyone remember record shops?) and asking "Got that new Pusha T album on shellac?".

Never mind how shitty deficient your ripping setup, how bad your stereo or how atrocious mediocre the sound of those 24-bit, 96 kHz rips may be. Forget lossy.

[kpmhill]

The answer to this is fairly subjective.

I don’t understand why FLAC would be a “compromise.” It's just a slightly different workflow.

[kpmhill]

Well, if Microsoft cared enough to fix it (and it would be a REALLY easy fix), then Ogg Vorbis would be perfect, imo. Still not perfect for Mac devices, but most end users are on Windows.

If most end users are on Windows, and OV can't handle tags properly, that's a huge problem, no matter whose fault it is. The real problem with OV is that most people just don't use it, and haven't even heard of it. And OVs are useless in Apple's music ecosystem, which is very large portion of the market these days.

[likedeeler]

Well, if Microsoft cared enough to fix it (and it would be a REALLY easy fix), then Ogg Vorbis would be perfect, imo. Still not perfect for Mac devices, but most end users are on Windows.

If most end users are on Windows, and OV can't handle tags properly, that's a huge problem, no matter whose fault it is. The real problem with OV is that most people just don't use it, and haven't even heard of it. And OVs are useless in Apple's music ecosystem, which is very large portion of the market these days.

I have Windows, and there is no problem whatsoever with using Ogg Vorbis. What are you talking about?

(File formats are an irrelevance today. Except if you're hooked on Apple. Hahah! Poor thing. In the 1990s we thought Microsoft were bad. We had no idea.)

[kpmhill]

”File formats are an irrelevance today.”

Try: "File formats are an irrelevance today – for me."

There- fixed it for you!

”Except if you’re hooked on Apple. Hahah! Poor thing.”

The 90s called. They want their slogans back.

[tezeta]

Would like to thank (mostly) everyone for these thoughtful responses. These answers will be a lot of help to many people curious about file codecs used here, I think!

[Bronic]

Rant time. My most recent exchange on this forum was something like:

Bronic: Here, link to about 5000 albums of instrumental music

Person: They appear to be all in MP3 format.

Dude. Seriously??

This "FLAC first" mentality is nonsensical if you consider:

Numerous fake FLACS: Bloated files from MP3s hogging disk space from people who can't grasp the concept of what really means to upscale digital information.

FLACS made from vinyl rips: The type of record player itself introduces all kinds of distortion natural due the analog nature of the technology. No rip sounds the same across domestic equipments.

FLACS made from vinyl rips 2: Rips from worn out and dirty vinyls. That pop sounds better at 800 kBits, yeah.

FLACS made from vinyl rips 3: You are inevitably two generations apart from the master tape. Vinyl mastering had specific equalization that actually introduced distortion. Sloppy mastering jobs even misrepresented the original sound.

FLACS made from digital files of the official distributor: Numerous master tapes were lost or damaged over the years so they resort to rip vinyl. They even admit to be doing that in the case of APM's Patchwork recent releases. That's a 4.

FLACs of unremarkable, insignificant music: They are just not needed. That may subjective but it's a reality. And that's the case for the music I shared.

Recently I came across a Capitol sampler that was transferred from reel-to-reel tape to digital on Youtube. I was floored on how good it sounded compared to some tunes I am familiar on my collection and pretty much 90% of what I have. It's an illusion that a vinyl-to-FLAC would sound an inch closer to this kind of quality.

This lossy-driven mindset is just like asking for a 8K television plug a VHS. That's my rant.

[C0NN1E]

How about let people enjoy what audio formats they like, and offering options for both when possible?

[kpmhill]

How about let people enjoy what audio formats they like, and offering options for both when possible?

Agreed. At the same time, there's no harm in occasionally reminding people that FLAC is basically the Switzerland of file formats. It's neutral – and it's the most compact, mainstream format that gets you easily to anything else you might prefer. With no quality loss.

[soundtech39]

I use AIFF when importing cd's.  Then I'll convert them to 320kbs AAC and save them on a flash drive so I can play them in the vehicle.

[stylesforfree]

I've noticed a couple of FLAC rips not quite sounding right to my ears, at first I thought it was just the fact that maybe someone ripped a dusty record, maybe they didn't clean their stylus or what have you, so I downloaded the same record ripped in .WAV

This is [Bruton] - BRI 02 - Francis Monkman - Tempus Fugit

There's a very noticeable difference in quality with .wav being the superior rip in this case with a fair amount of high frequency content missing in the FLAC rip.

https://pixeldrain.com/u/prftKQSM
FLAC
https://pixeldrain.com/u/JjG6PvjW
WAV

I've done a little more investigating and some of the Wav CAM rips sound better while most of them sound identical to the FLAC rips.

Other rips that I found where the FLAC sounded a bit off was a Canopo release: CNP 1021 - Gian Piero Ricci, Daniela Casa & Remigio Ducros - Lo Sport (1971)
and Southern Library MQ/LP - 9004 Leonhardt And His Orchestra – Soul Of A City - the FLAC rip of this is absolutely terrible.

I am somewhat curious about the disparity in rip quality and wondering if some of the original WAV rips that got lost through the years that now only appear as FLAC are somewhat lacking so I have been doing a double take on some releases, looking for the .wav rip to compare.

Also case in point: I got into records when I started making music and inevitably adopted the whole crate digging for samples ethos spending time in dusty basements inhaling all kinds of debris and potentially shortening the lifespan of my lungs (haha). Im now in a situation where I can't afford to spend the time or money to feed an insatiable habit of record collecting to find that golden sound that would give me a moment of relief and auditory ecstasy where the hairs stand on the back of my neck and goosebumps emerge over my skin as I press record on the MPC to capture that loop or break.

Reissues digitally released in FLAC and the incredible work done by numerous members on this board to supply vinyl rips of insanely rare and obscure records have allowed me an escape into a world of music I could only dream of.

[Psyclon]

The actual cause of the problem is already in your thread title: "Record" and to an extend "Recording".

Just to make things very clear and short: FLAC is a bit-perfect copy of a PCM audio stream (or WAV as it is often called).

To make it easier to understand are the differences between the terms "recording" and "ripping".

A recording is basically taking another device to capture an audio signal while the source medium plays along.
To do so, there are many "joints" in a chain which can be different:

*What is the LP/tape like?
*What is the turntable/tapedeck/reel-to-reel like?
*What cable is being used (I had a humming jack-to-jack cable once adding bass in the lower frequencies)?
*Is any sort of noise reduction turned on?
*Is there an equalizer running?
*Is there any gain used (e.g. MIC-IN or LINE-IN) during recording (check your soundcard / system properties) or in your DAW (the computer programm you use). Just one dB more and people perceive that as "better".

Contrary to "ripping": To rip means that there is NONE of these above problems involved as "ripping" means "extracting" the audio stream 1:1 the way it is, often within the system itself. No EQ is being applied, no cables can cause trouble and the quality of the stylus does not matter. The term stemmed from computer games where the music files have been "ripped" out of the files from the game, often via hacks. By doing so, you have no change of the actual signal, so "rips" are pristine and always the same as the source medium/source file. E.g. ripping a CD is done on your system from CD directly to the file. That's it. Nothing else involved. So you can never "rip" a LP/tape/analogue medium to begin with. If you have a CD ripped and it suddenly has more bass, you should get an exorcist.

You have heard of a "CD ripper", you can "rip DVDs" and still "BluRay rips" are a thing. But never a "casette ripper" or "LP ripper", right? If so, I'd be surprised

So as you soon as you "record" something, differences are always happening. The PCM or FLACification at the end just works with the skills of the recording equipment and the guy/gal operating it.

Pretty recently, a bunch of SELECTED SOUND albums have been shared on this forum and I was flabbergasted how great these sounds. Yes, the LPs a private person owned sounded MUCH better and clearer than the WAVs you could get directly from APM. The guys over at APM, while recording (either the master tapes or the LPs) probably added noise reduction or a low-pass filter or whatever. The sharer here, sorry if you read this and I forgot your name!, recorded it absolutely masterful and this made this user's shares an absolute upgrade.

[nidostar]

In short @stylesforfree the FLAC album is a fake. I checked each FLAC track against the WAV counterpart on a spectrum analyser app. The individual tracks are lossy files which someone has attempted to upgrade by simply converting an MP3 or the like to FLAC. The problem is that in doing so all you do is change the file suffix without changing the quality of recording for the better. Plus you end up with a larger file containing the same poorer quality sounding music. It would be interesting to know where you got it from. The WAV files are the real deal.