Hi Everybody,
As of today, which of these might be the best to use for archiving Wave files?
Which one is more compatible with the software commonly used by most of us here? Which is faster or more accurate? Are there tag or feature advantages of either?
I have used Monkey's for about a year now and have been very happy with it. I was told in the beginning that FLAC or Monkey's were both excellent and it primarily depended on who (here) you talked to, that there were supporters of both. Monkey's is just the one I happened to get.
I presently need to archive a large number of valuable Wave files that have no other backup and I want to do it on discs. A member I respect has suggested I look into FLAC. So, I would appreciate your input.
FWIW, I downloaded Nero plugins for both Monkey's 3.97 and FLAC 1.1.0 today, so that's not a factor. I'll be using Replay Gain and that could be a factor. From what I've been able to find here, Monkey's files may be somewhat smaller (high compression setting) - all else equal that could be a factor.
What about the front ends? Monkey's frontend is certainly nice - and easy to use.
Would it ever make any sense to use both? I prefer to rip and encode separately and I'll be using the usual software - EAC, Lame, MPC, Ogg, and future improved lossy encoders, like everybody else here.
Thanks in advance.
APE gets you slightly smaller files, while FLAC is more of a standard and isn't as annoying to get to work under Linux.
I use APE.
Monkey's audio:
+High compression
+Fast compression
-Not pure open source, more like Microsoft's "source available"
-Very processor demanding playback (not suitable for portables)
-Full bitstream failure on single broken byte
-Format changes now and then, rendering older encodings useless (has happened before)
FLAC:
+Open source, multiplatform compatible
+Streamable (accepts bitstream failures without stopping playback)
+Low processor demand for playback (suitable for portables)
+The audio format is frozen and playback compatibility will not change with newer versions
-Slow encoding
-A few percentages lower compression than APE (2-3% average)
Okay, so I'm a bit biased. So what?
I never used Monkey's audio to compare, but I have been using FLAC and I am real happy with it. My only complaint is that I wish the files would compress smaller(that goes for Monkey's Audio also).
-Darin
:alien:
FLAC
-Slow encoding
much faster than ape on default compression level. --best is somewhat useless, because it does not give noticable benefits in size, while being about 5-8 times slower.
I use only WavPack for lossless and many times for lossy compression. It's very fast and when I compared it with FLAC, WavPack always ended with a bit better compression. The main reason for me was its speed and hybrid mode, anyway.
I'd say FLAC. It's more resistant to errors (speaking of CD-R archiving), and at least for me, ReplayGain is a must.
I use only WavPack for lossless and many times for lossy compression. It's very fast and when I compared it with FLAC, WavPack always ended with a bit better compression.
Default Wavpack is ~2x faster than default FLAC on encoding and gets about 1% better compression, but FLAC still decodes faster (~15%), which does matter on hardware players. In any case, Wavpack's compression/speed and decompression/speed ratio is very good. I have toyed with the idea of adding its method to FLAC now that their two licenses are compatible; I'm only worried about be more vulnerable to patent claims (not Bryant's, someone unknown third person's) since the method is more complicated.
Josh
I have been using Monkey's audio for archiving and I am very pleased with it, but these boards have convinced me that FLAC is the better choice (primarily because it is streamable and might someday be supported on my ipod). I use Music Center 9 to manage my library and transfer files to my ipod (the smartlists are really amazing). At this point, however, MC9 does not play FLAC files, so I am kinda in a holding pattern before I make the switch to FLAC.
Josh: I've noticed that a lot of people over at the MC9 forums are asking for FLAC support. Have you heard anything about a plugin? Is there any chance one might be in the works?
Josh: I've noticed that a lot of people over at the MC9 forums are asking for FLAC support. Have you heard anything about a plugin? Is there any chance one might be in the works?
It used to be that MJ would use winamp2 plugins and the FLAC winamp2 plugin supposedly worked fine. I don't know if that broke or MC does not support wa2 plugins. I don't think the media jukebox guys are going to write a native plugin since Matt Ashland (the Monkey's Audio author) works there. I don't have any plans to write one either but it should be straightforward for someone else to do.
Josh
I'd say FLAC. It's more resistant to errors (speaking of CD-R archiving), and at least for me, ReplayGain is a must.
what do you mean?
how do ape files get errors?
I'd say FLAC. It's more resistant to errors (speaking of CD-R archiving), and at least for me, ReplayGain is a must.
what do you mean?
how do ape files get errors?
Because of the way FLAC is designed, if a bit error happens somewhere in the FLAC file, only that block is affected. In most other lossless formats (including current versions of MAC and WavPack), a single bit error
can corrupt the entire file beyond that point.
Do a search for some of the best lossless codec threads, and browse the forums a little, you'll see lots more comments.
As far as file size, encode speed, and decode speed, see:
http://home.wanadoo.nl/~w.speek/comparison.htm (http://home.wanadoo.nl/~w.speek/comparison.htm)
For some other comparisons, see:
http://flac.sourceforge.net/comparison.html (http://flac.sourceforge.net/comparison.html)
I'd say FLAC. It's more resistant to errors (speaking of CD-R archiving), and at least for me, ReplayGain is a must.
what do you mean?
how do ape files get errors?
Because of the way FLAC is designed, if a bit error happens somewhere in the FLAC file, only that block is affected. In most other lossless formats (including current versions of MAC and WavPack), a single bit error can corrupt the entire file beyond that point.
ohh... does this only occur during downloading/burning?
QUOTE (Warlock @ Apr 3 2003 - 12:37 PM)
Josh: I've noticed that a lot of people over at the MC9 forums are asking for FLAC support. Have you heard anything about a plugin? Is there any chance one might be in the works?
It used to be that MJ would use winamp2 plugins and the FLAC winamp2 plugin supposedly worked fine. I don't know if that broke or MC does not support wa2 plugins. I don't think the media jukebox guys are going to write a native plugin since Matt Ashland (the Monkey's Audio author) works there. I don't have any plans to write one either but it should be straightforward for someone else to do.
Thanks for answering this for me. Unfortunately, recent MC9 builds no longer work with the old Winamp2 plugins. I guess I just need to be patient and wait for someone to put together a new FLAC plugin. In the meantime, I will keep archiving with Monkey's and then convert to FLAC at some later date (although that will obviate one of FLAC's advantages). I'll just have to hope that I don't get any file corruption before I convert.
I'd say FLAC. It's more resistant to errors (speaking of CD-R archiving), and at least for me, ReplayGain is a must.
what do you mean?
how do ape files get errors?
Because of the way FLAC is designed, if a bit error happens somewhere in the FLAC file, only that block is affected. In most other lossless formats (including current versions of MAC and WavPack), a single bit error can corrupt the entire file beyond that point.
ohh... does this only occur during downloading/burning?
I'm not sure where most file errors come from. They can come from downloading or reading from a bad CD-R or transfered over a local net or even just sitting on a hard drive, even though all of these errors should be detected when they happen. I have actually never seen a file go bad (except on floppies), but I prefer old cheap
stable systems.
But anyway, if a FLAC file
does get corrupted it's no big deal. If it's another lossless compressor you
might be hosed.
bryant:
I always verify my wavpack files and then make MD5 checksum before burning it on CDRs. On burned CDR again I verify and MD5 checksum verify... and as I use only high quality CDRs, I think I am okay. It costs some time but then you know you did everything you could.
-Very processor demanding playback (not suitable for portables)
With the standard settings?
-Format changes now and then, rendering older encodings useless (has happened before)
It was only once (v1?). The athor swears not to do it again...
-Full bitstream failure on single broken byte
If I'm not mistaken, alraedy corrected or will be soon.
edit: standart -> standard. This is an important word (--alt-preset standard, --standard...), don't misspell it...
bryant:
I always verify my wavpack files and then make MD5 checksum before burning it on CDRs. On burned CDR again I verify and MD5 checksum verify... and as I use only high quality CDRs, I think I am okay. It costs some time but then you know you did everything you could.
That lets you know that the write is ok. If an error develops later doesn't the checksum
only verify that there is an error? ie no recovery function, and no audio past the error?
I got a small question about flac..
Does the compression level of flac files have any impact on CPU usage when playing them? I would go for max compression when encoding, but only if it doesnt affect playback (like it does happen with monkey's)
thx
Not even close as much lag as the monkey does, even on the highest compression setting.
I got a small question about flac..
Does the compression level of flac files have any impact on CPU usage when playing them? I would go for max compression when encoding, but only if it doesnt affect playback (like it does happen with monkey's)
thx
Not much. FLAC is asymmetric in favor of decoding speed. See the comparison page (http://flac.sourceforge.net/comparison.html) for decoding speed comparisons with different settings. "flac -8" decodes fine even on hardware players.
Josh
One thing I don't like about current lossless compression is that many of my CDs are long enough and/or have complex enough music that 2 CDs won't compress to fit on 1 CD. And I'm currently using MAC, so getting even larger filesizes, like with FLAC, is not something I'd love to do.
FLAC is able to run on hardware players, but is there a single hardware player out there yet that plays FLAC?
I must ask, why would you use such a huge file as FLAC on portables? You could use --alt-preset MP3s instead, and likely you'll get about as good quality considering the small hardware you're listening through, for much less space. And ReplayGain support isn't really that useful for archiving files.
I must admit, though, the fact that one bit-error corrupts an entire MAC file is disconcerting. Hopefully it can & will be changed, as MusicLover asserts.
FLAC is able to run on hardware players, but is there a single hardware player out there yet that plays FLAC?
I must ask, why would you use such a huge file as FLAC on portables? You could use --alt-preset MP3s instead, and likely you'll get about as good quality considering the small hardware you're listening through, for much less space. And ReplayGain support isn't really that useful for archiving files.
FLAC already has a few products with hardware support, mostly car systems and home audio digital servers. Check out the right side of the FLAC homepage (http://flac.sourceforge.net/). The home audio digital servers are really cool because you can rip all of your CDs to them and use it like a 300 CD player yet sort them much easier and catergorize them by genre, year etc. The one big disadvantage is that they can be
very expensive. I don't think we will see any portable support though until we start getting about 50 GB portables though.
One thing I don't like about current lossless compression is that many of my CDs are long enough and/or have complex enough music that 2 CDs won't compress to fit on 1 CD. And I'm currently using MAC, so getting even larger filesizes, like with FLAC, is not something I'd love to do.
If you are using CDRs for backup, then the small difference in compression between FLAC and MAC is the least of your problems. Search the board for Pio2001 (http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index.php?act=Profile&CODE=03&MID=73)'s many fine posts on the unreliabilty of CDRs. You will probably have to add significant error correction information anyway.
Josh
If you are using CDRs for backup, then the small difference in compression between FLAC and MAC is the least of your problems.
I agree.
My personal choice for CDr backup is WavPack hybrid mode. So, if I ever lose the files on my HDD, I don't even have to re-rip my CDs - just copy the lossy parts to the HDD, and copy the "correction" parts along for the tracks I love the most - so that I have lossless playback.
No more re-ripping, re-encoding, re-tagging...
Besides, the overhead of hybrid mode over standard mode is just about 1-2%.
is WavPack hybrid mode preferable over flack or monkey?
is WavPack hybrid mode preferable over flack or monkey?
I didn't say that.
I just said that it's my codec of choice. Therefore, IMO, it's preferable over any other lossless encoder. But your preferences you should set yourself, based on your tests and comparisions.
is WMA 9's lossless algorithm any good compared to FLAC or Monkeys Audio? Is it really even lossless?
thanks for clearing that up, sorry for my previous messy post.
is WMA 9's lossless algorithm any good compared to FLAC or Monkeys Audio? Is it really even lossless?
WMA lossless is very good in compression and speed. But it's completely closed, as you probably already guessed.
Some good points of it are that it's readily playable on any PC with WMP9 (you don't need to download decoders and plugins, like for other formats), and there's hope that it will be supported on hardware players.
Regards;
Roberto.
i would rather use cassette tapes in a 1985 RCA boombox than let Microsoft touch my music collection...
thx for the answers. flac at the standard setting seems to be the best choice atm.
thx for the answers. flac at the standard setting seems to be the best choice atm.
It should be interesting to see what the future brings for flac, ape, and wavpack... I think the top3 spots will cycle between them all as they progress...
It should be interesting to see what the future brings for flac, ape, and wavpack... I think the top3 spots will cycle between them all as they progress...
I agree. Flac was on the spot when it joined Xiph some time ago. Maybe WavPack will be next when David releases v4.
So the best way to archive my CDs is to buy a huge hard drive?? (Considering how quickly CD-Rs decay...)
Blah, that's certainly dissapointing. I was hoping for a bit cheaper of a solution.
Blah, that's certainly dissapointing. I was hoping for a bit cheaper of a solution.
I believe that a 200Gb HDD is cheaper (or at least has a similar price) than the same space in high quality CDs (~280 CDs).
Is WMA 9 Lossless really lossless bit for bit like APE and FLAC? Because it says Mathematically Lossless.
Is WMA 9 Lossless really lossless bit for bit like APE and FLAC? Because it says Mathematically Lossless.
"lossless bit for bit" == Mathematically Lossless.
"lossless bit for bit" == Mathematically Lossless.
Double equal, now there's a sure sign of a C/Java programmer.
On a more related note...
Is there any media at all that will last for over a few decades? From what I've heard, hard drives, pressed CDs, tapes, DVDs, et al will deteriorate significantly over such a time period.
Double equal, now there's a sure sign of a C/Java programmer.
C
On a more related note...
Is there any media at all that will last for over a few decades? From what I've heard, hard drives, pressed CDs, tapes, DVDs, et al will deteriorate significantly over such a time period.
I read a comparision once that estimated the average lifetime of a well kept pressed CD to be about 100 years.
Burned CDs were averaged 5 years. Other medias were mentioned, but I don't remember.
It was linked here. Just don't expect me to find that link in over 80000 posts.
Hrmm...
Do you know of any small CD-pressing units that sell for relatively cheap? =p
I imagine most people are going to be disappointed (including my father) when they find out all their backed-up files on CD-R are gone after a few years. You think that would garner some press, ya know? And Gateway has its "Rip, Burn, Respect" campaign going on... while no one realizes their burned CDs'll be corrupt after only a few years.
Back more to the topic...
Is Monkey's Audio proprietary, or just not open-source?
And, can you confirm that one bit error does indeed corrupt the rest of a MAC file with the latest version?
EDIT: Is there a FLAC plugin for WinAmp 2?
EDIT 2: Does FLAC support (and properly decode) multichannel & greater-than-16bit audio?
I imagine most people are going to be disappointed (including my father) when they find out all their backed-up files on CD-R are gone after a few years. You think that would garner some press, ya know? And Gateway has its "Rip, Burn, Respect" campaign going on... while no one realizes their burned CDs'll be corrupt after only a few years.
Keep in mind that 5 years was the
average. Depending on brand, you can have burned CDs that last much more (Taiyo Yuden, Mitsui...) and much less (CMC, Gigastorage...)
Back more to the topic...
Is Monkey's Audio proprietary, or just not open-source?
It IS open source!
(Or, to please the GNU freaks,
the sources are available)
EDIT: Is there a FLAC plugin for WinAmp 2?
Yes, It's available at the FLAC page. Take a look there.
(http://flac.sourceforge.net)
Cool, I thought MAC was closed-source. So both FLAC and MAC are open.
And thanx for directing me to the plugin... I definitely overlooked it since the sourceforge page isn't unfamiliar to me.
One thing I would like to know that didn't get answered...
1) Does FLAC support surround-sound ( >2 channels)?
2) Does FLAC support 24 & 32-bit?
I believe MAC does, and I would suspect FLAC does too, but I'd like to know for sure.
EDIT: Actually, I still can't find the WinAmp 2 plugin. The only reference to WinAmp on flac.sourceforge I see is to an unreliable WinAmp 3 plugin.
EDIT2: Okay, I found it now, but where to download it really isn't that apparent. "Releases are first made through SourceForge and can be found here", which I took to mean all FLAC encoder releases... since that's virtually everything that is there, except the WinAmp2 plugin sticking out of the middle of all the Windows FLAC encoder versions.
EDIT3: After getting everything set up & encoding some of my MACs to FLAC, I have a couple questions:
Does applying ReplayGain to FLAC files change the playback using the WinAmp2 plugin? Also, wouldn't it be simple enough to modify the FLAC plugin so you can change & view FLAC tags from WinAmp?
is WMA 9's lossless algorithm any good compared to FLAC or Monkeys Audio? Is it really even lossless?
WMA lossless is very good in compression and speed. But it's completely closed, as you probably already guessed.
Some good points of it are that it's readily playable on any PC with WMP9 (you don't need to download decoders and plugins, like for other formats), and there's hope that it will be supported on hardware players.
Regards;
Roberto.
WMA9 Lossless is neither fast nor efficient, compared to FLAC or APE ... and it cannot be decoded easily (cannot be decoded at all in my environment).
EDIT3: After getting everything set up & encoding some of my MACs to FLAC, I have a couple questions:
Does applying ReplayGain to FLAC files change the playback using the WinAmp2 plugin? Also, wouldn't it be simple enough to modify the FLAC plugin so you can change & view FLAC tags from WinAmp?
Apologies for any confusion, I had installed an old version of the plug-in, not knowing that the most recent version *comes with* the FLAC encoder package.
flac.sourceforge.net could be a bit more specific about that for newbies to the format, like me... =p
One last question (sorry to be such a bother)... can ReplayGain be applied to FLAC files after encoding? Or is the only way to re-encode the FLACs with the --replay-gain line? (I used the "-5" command)
I've seen a "sweep.exe" mentioned before, but I don't know if that only applies to the MPC ReplayGain...
One last question (sorry to be such a bother)...
Hey, don't worry, man, that's what forums are there for.
... can ReplayGain be applied to FLAC files after encoding?
Yes, using the MetaFLAC utility (
metaflac --add-replay-gain).
What about tags. It looks like EAC and FLAC play well together as far as tags are concerned but you need a special program (wapet) to make sure EAC passes tags to Monkey's. Can someone comment on this?
Yes, using the MetaFLAC utility (metaflac --add-replay-gain).
Is there any frontend for MetaFlac? I'm using WinXP, and the command-line box is hell to use when you're trying to apply replaygain to multiple files.
Is there any frontend for MetaFlac? I'm using WinXP, and the command-line box is hell to use when you're trying to apply replaygain to multiple files.
Foobar2000 can apply ReplayGain to mutiple files very easily.
Foobar2000 can apply ReplayGain to mutiple files very easily.
Thank you! Foobar did it perfectly.
MultiFrontend seems to mess up ReplayGain. Although it is still great for converting one format to another.
APE gets you slightly smaller files, while FLAC is more of a standard and isn't as annoying to get to work under Linux.
I use APE.
Nonsense.
Here FLAC do not compile and MAC do compile.
Is there a list which tools and versions must be installed to compile FLAC?
I use only WavPack for lossless and many times for lossy compression. It's very fast and when I compared it with FLAC, WavPack always ended with a bit better compression.
Default Wavpack is ~2x faster than default FLAC on encoding and gets about 1% better compression, but FLAC still decodes faster (~15%), which does matter on hardware players. In any case, Wavpack's compression/speed and decompression/speed ratio is very good. I have toyed with the idea of adding its method to FLAC now that their two licenses are compatible; I'm only worried about be more vulnerable to patent claims (not Bryant's, someone unknown third person's) since the method is more complicated.
Josh
BTW:
Me (and also at least 5 other persons) are searching for a FLAC which can be compiled on a
2 year old system OR for FLAC binaries which are linked against glibc 2.1 (and not glibc 2.2).
Update of these machines may be possible, but will end up in a replacement of nearly the whole
system.
And there is also at least a person searching for a libc5 version of FLAC. The machine
used is a AMD K-5/166 with 32 MB RAM. Modern Linux distributions do not start on these
machine.
Is there any chance to get these versions?
Cool, I thought MAC was closed-source. So both FLAC and MAC are open.
And thanx for directing me to the plugin... I definitely overlooked it since the sourceforge page isn't unfamiliar to me.
One thing I would like to know that didn't get answered...
1) Does FLAC support surround-sound ( >2 channels)?
FLAC do support more than 2 channels.
APE, LPAC, OptimFROG, LA do not support more than 2 channels.
I use only WavPack for lossless and many times for lossy compression. It's very fast and when I compared it with FLAC, WavPack always ended with a bit better compression.
Default Wavpack is ~2x faster than default FLAC on encoding and gets about 1% better compression, but FLAC still decodes faster (~15%), which does matter on hardware players. In any case, Wavpack's compression/speed and decompression/speed ratio is very good. I have toyed with the idea of adding its method to FLAC now that their two licenses are compatible; I'm only worried about be more vulnerable to patent claims (not Bryant's, someone unknown third person's) since the method is more complicated.
Josh
BTW:
Me (and also at least 5 other persons) are searching for a FLAC which can be compiled on a
2 year old system OR for FLAC binaries which are linked against glibc 2.1 (and not glibc 2.2).
Update of these machines may be possible, but will end up in a replacement of nearly the whole
system.
And there is also at least a person searching for a libc5 version of FLAC. The machine
used is a AMD K-5/166 with 32 MB RAM. Modern Linux distributions do not start on these
machine.
Is there any chance to get these versions?
[argh, something goes seriously wrong between this forum and konqueror 3]
Frank, just what about the autoconf system does not work on these systems?
Josh