I just want to make sure Winamp does FLAC in following way
That FLAC setting (scrollbar) between "fast encoding", and "best compression" is only changing speed of ripping and size of compressed file.
So, slowest (best compression) is smallest FLAC file, while (fast encoding) produces biggest FLAC file, and fastest ripping
time, due to least processing time.
Regardless of this compression factor setting, quality of the audio will not be compromised, and song will be same as original source.
please confirm,
much appreciated!! thanks
28th March 2012, 22:07
#2
Forum King
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Yes, you have this about right.
The 'L' in FLAC stands for lossless. That is to say, you will get back exactly what you started with, regardless of what other settings you use.
Unless storage is at a premium then just use the default setting(6, I think).
UJ
28th March 2012, 23:28
#3
Junior Member
Join Date: Mar 2012
Posts: 34
thank you for reply!
one more silly thing related.
Say I have plenty of time and want to save space. Would such more compressed original file be more difficult to uncompress while playing back on some FLACK media players, including portable players? Specially for 24bit/192kHz files. Just thought of that one. I suspect not. Any thoughts on that?
thank you very much!
31st March 2012, 16:55
#4
Major Dude
Join Date: Jun 2008
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Interesting question. To add to Milos1977's question, do I assume that a more heavily compressed FLAC would burn more battery life in a portable media player? (I only use FLACs in my Blackberry phone's media player, and it would be nice to know what is most "power efficient")
31st March 2012, 18:02
#5
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Take a look at the tables on this page
http://flac.sourceforge.net/comparison.html
Doesn't appear to be much difference in decoding times or CPU usage, whatever the setting. It seems to be saying that the grunt work is done during encoding in order to leave decoding as easy as possible.
UJ
31st March 2012, 18:46
#6
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also, strictly speaking "ripping speed" and "encoding speed" are separate issues, and shouldn't be conflated.
fyi: i use the highest compression for flac, but i haven't used those khz or many portable devices with flac.
4th April 2012, 01:21
#7
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Thank you for your inputs!
I found out that current version of Winamp (free addition) has virtually no difference in ripping time between "best compression" and "fast encoding".
For example, single song will be compressed in "fast encoding": for 4 minutes and it will be %67, while at best compression only %65 and it still takes 4:02 minutes.
Has anyone else noticed this? Its easy to test. Just
rip same song with compression setting bar all the way to the left, and then repeat this (to a different destination location for song) with bar all the way to the right. For me it was only 2% compression difference.
different album songs get compressed at %85. I still don't know why it differs.
I wander if Winamp Pro FLAC compression makes more sense?
cheers
4th April 2012, 10:00
#8
Join Date: Sep 2003
Posts: 27,873
the Pro version has no effect on encoding speeds - the only encoding thing it does is unlock mp3 encoding.
as for the similar times, it depends on the input audio to begin with how much compression and hence how long it takes for the encoding to happen. so it can be that you get similar encoding times and output. really you should focus on getting files out which you are happy with quality off as well as the final file size
(in that order).
-daz
4th April 2012, 12:35
#9
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my exp has been that the setting for flac compression has little effect either way, so i just always set it for max compression b/c i don't see a reason not to.
4th April 2012, 13:15
#10
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As Mr_S said earlier, ripping is more than just encoding, drive access time would be a major factor.
Over the years CPU speed has increased immensely compared to drive access speed, with a modern processor the encoding/compression component may be hardly noticable anymore compared to drive access.
PRO should make a difference if your drive can handle it as it removes the 8x access limit. I don't have PRO so no direct
experience
UJ
18th November 2012, 14:08
#11
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Join Date: Sep 2012
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Milos1977
Thank you for your inputs!
I found out that current version of Winamp (free addition) has virtually no difference in
ripping time between "best compression" and "fast encoding".
For example, single song will be compressed in "fast encoding": for 4 minutes and it will be %67, while at best compression only %65 and it still takes 4:02 minutes.
Has anyone else noticed this? Its easy to test. Just rip same song with compression setting bar all the way to the left, and then repeat this (to a different destination location for song) with bar all the way to the right. For me it was only
2% compression difference.
different album songs get compressed at %85. I still don't know why it differs.
I wander if Winamp Pro FLAC compression makes more sense?
cheers
The other songs and every song will be ripped in a different percent, so you say, why? Well WAV has lots of tags on it, so those tags are useless and become the 30% or the rest of the flac you dont have to be at 1411.2 kbps.
Each song has different tags that can
be removed. Let me put you an example: I have 2 songs of the same lenght "4:11", but they're not the same song. They're song 1 and song 2. So song 1 will be ripped in an average bitrate that is 1000, and the second may be 900. It's hard to have almost the same percent of compression and it doesn't matter how long is the song. What makes the difference is that song 1 has less tags to be removed, so thats why it's 1000kbps, and the song 2 has more tags to be removed than song 1, that means
less kbps needed: 900kbps.
NOTE: Remember that FLAC is a variable bitrate, but what Winamp does is that it gives you the average bitrate. If you want to change that go to Winamp Preferences (Ctrl+P)>Input Plugins>Flac decoder>Configure>Show average bitrate
Well at least thats what I know, hope it helped
Those who look only to the past, or the present, are certain to miss the future...
18th November 2012, 18:49
#12
Forum King
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tags is the wrong term to use. tags refers to metadata.
what FLAC attempts to do is compress every wav to the maximum amount in a lossless way. some wavs are more complex than others, (based on their actual sound content) thats why they give different bitrates. simple sounds compress more than complex ones. flac also allows 1-8 levels of compression, but while there is a difference between them, its pretty minor overall.
