flac or CD???

[el espectro]

short version: I have "too many" CD's and am thinking of putting together a music library on an external USB hard drive. I'll use flac as my codec, J River Music Jukebox 12 as my player, and get a USB HD about 750GB.

so here's the question. If I can get "bit-perfect" flac to my receiver via optical cable, will it be just as good as with a dedicated CD player?

what do ya think??

 

[obscbyclouds]

so here's the question. If I can get "bit-perfect" flac to my receiver via optical cable, will it be just as good as with a dedicated CD player?

what do ya think??

Theoretically, yes, assuming you are using an optical cable on that dedicated CD player. If you are using analog outputs on the CD player, then it all depends on the D/A converter in your player vs. the ones in your reciever. However, it's debateable whether different DAC's have audible differences anyway.

 

[fmw]

Yes, they will sound exactly the same as will 25kbps or higher MP3.

 

[GlocksRock]

I would just use VBR .mp3

 

[joebob]

Yes, they will sound exactly the same as will 25kbps or higher MP3.

Joking? Did you mean 125? Even so, flac will clearly sound much better on any decent system. When you get into the 320 range the difference is less, but I would go with flac for sure, which I am.

Another advantage with flac is that you can convert the files back to wav if you want to recreate your CDs without losing anything. Disc space is getting cheaper all the time. I would only use MP3 to use on a portable player.

 

[GlocksRock]

I'm pretty sure he meant 256kbps .mp3, not 25. But if you don't have high(er) end gear, you may not be able to hear the difference between 256kbps .mp3 and lossless, or the difference will be minimal. But storage space is getting cheaper all the time, I see that Staples this week has an external seagate hard drive on sale for $99, that's a pretty good price.

 

[furrycute]

Theoretically streaming lossless from your computer would give you the same sound quality as playing CD's in your CD player.

 

[rnatalli]

I've always used 320kps VBR and can't tell the difference between that and anything else really. To answer your original question, I think you'll be fine.

 

[el espectro]

Thanks folks. It was brought up in another forum that my sound card may be converting 44.1Khz to it's native 48Khz, thus making an unnecessary change in the digital stream. I have a sound blaster live 24bit sound card. So, is my card doing this?

 

[sam9007]

I dont like Flac.

 

[Biggiesized]

Thanks folks. It was brought up in another forum that my sound card may be converting 44.1Khz to it's native 48Khz, thus making an unnecessary change in the digital stream. I have a sound blaster live 24bit sound card. So, is my card doing this?

What kind of sound card do you have? Some cheap ones resample to a fixed rate because that's all they can output.

 

[el espectro]

What kind of sound card do you have? Some cheap ones resample to a fixed rate because that's all they can output.

Sound Blaster Live! 24bit

 

[el espectro]

I dont like Flac.

care to elaborate??

 

[MDS]

Thanks folks. It was brought up in another forum that my sound card may be converting 44.1Khz to it's native 48Khz, thus making an unnecessary change in the digital stream. I have a sound blaster live 24bit sound card. So, is my card doing this?

Yes, your card does that as do the vast majority. This is a requirement of the AC '97 spec for sound on personal computers. Many on-board sound chips as well as standalone sound cards can only process audio at 48 kHz (its internal engine works at 48 Khz). Just like the issue of resolution with TVs the card may accept different sample rates but it will be processed at 48 kHz.

In some cases it's an issue for recording but it won't make much difference for playback if your 44.1 kHz FLAC files are resampled on the fly to 48 kHz.

 

[Biggiesized]

Sound Blaster Live! 24bit

I have the same card on an old shitty Dell. It does exactly that--resample to 48kHz. Get a discrete sound card.

 

[fmw]

Joking? Did you mean 125? Even so, flac will clearly sound much better on any decent system. When you get into the 320 range the difference is less, but I would go with flac for sure, which I am.

Another advantage with flac is that you can convert the files back to wav if you want to recreate your CDs without losing anything. Disc space is getting cheaper all the time. I would only use MP3 to use on a portable player.

I meant 256 kbps. I left out the 6. Sorry. And no, there is no audible difference. I've done the bias controlled listening tests.

I was able to get a statistical significant but subtle difference between 192 kbps MP3 and lossless. But not 256kbps. At 320 kbps the difference is also inaudible.

 

[itschris]

I have the same card on an old shitty Dell. It does exactly that--resample to 48kHz. Get a discrete sound card.

Like? Are there any other HT friendly motherboards that have the correct sampling?

 

[CRIMSON PEARL]

I dont like Flac.

If I knew what Flac was I probably wouldn't like it either.

 

[MDS]

If I knew what Flac was I probably wouldn't like it either.

Not sure if that is tongue in cheek or not but for the benefit of those that may not know, FLAC stands for Free Lossless Audio Codec. It is a lossles compression algorithm so it reduces the size of the file without discarding any of the data; upon decoding you get back exactly what you started with (unlike lossy codecs like MP3, WMA, AAC, etc).

 

[CRIMSON PEARL]

Not sure if that is tongue in cheek or not but for the benefit of those that may not know, FLAC stands for Free Lossless Audio Codec. It is a lossles compression algorithm so it reduces the size of the file without discarding any of the data; upon decoding you get back exactly what you started with (unlike lossy codecs like MP3, WMA, AAC, etc).

No I was serious but to answer the original question of the thread.

short version: I have "too many" CD's and am thinking of putting together a music library on an external USB hard drive. I'll use flac as my codec, J River Music Jukebox 12 as my player, and get a USB HD about 750GB.

so here's the question. If I can get "bit-perfect" flac to my receiver via optical cable, will it be just as good as with a dedicated CD player?

what do ya think??

I had the same problem and was wandering the same thing. I used to use mega changers with an outbourd DAC and a vacume tube buffer. I just bought a HD for storage the other day. I was planning on using the CD changer for my FAVORITE albums only. My reciever is a Yamaha 2700 which has a USB port on the front for hooking a storage device.

I ripped a new CD in to the HD in WAV. I put the same CD in the changer with the outboard DAC. I started them at the same time and did AB comparisons for about an hour. I could not tell the difference with my B&W 600 on pure direct.

I'm retiring my mega changer. (gave the other one away anyway.)

I did install the vacume tube buffer in between the reciever and the power amp though.