Any alternative to stuffunes?

[C-Zech Chrome Ind.]

EUGH. At least compress it into FLAC files.

Been there, done it.  FLAC distorts sound quality, I've painstakingly listened to a couple of FLAC files from their original WAV files brown townysing segments in the same track.  I quickly found that FLAC is less dynamic than WAV and more rounded (in lack of a better description), even though I kept the bitrate and hertz width the same. It proclaims as being lossless audio, and whilst that may be true, that doesn't mean that the audio stays the same during the compression.  I used two different programs for both of the files, and I tripple-checked the settings to make sure I wasn't going insane.  I used dbpoweramp and freac.org.

Like I said, I have very sensitive hearing.  I just resorted in getting another hard drive dedicated for this sort of thing both on my laptop and on my desktop.

[Ad Bot]

[Ipquarx]

Been there, done it.  FLAC distorts sound quality, I've painstakingly listened to a couple of FLAC files from their original WAV files brown townysing segments in the same track.  I quickly found that FLAC is less dynamic than WAV and more rounded (in lack of a better description), even though I kept the bitrate and hertz width the same. It proclaims as being lossless audio, and whilst that may be true, that doesn't mean that the audio stays the same during the compression.

That's literally impossible. It's literally not possible. It's not that it "claims" to be lossless. It IS lossless. That's how FLAC works.
That means that the waveforms themselves are exactly the same. The waveforms produced are identical. It is not physically possible for them to sound any different.

In fact, in order to test this theory, I took a high-quality audio wav file. I converted that file to FLAC with maximum compression. I then took that FLAC file, and emphasis on the FLAC file itself and not the original, and converted it back to a wav file. When I compared that generated wav file to the original wav file, the two were byte for byte identical. Any differences you're hearing is purely placebo.

[C-Zech Chrome Ind.]

That's literally impossible. It's literally not possible. It's not that it "claims" to be lossless. It IS lossless. That's how FLAC works.
That means that the waveforms themselves are exactly the same. The waveforms produced are identical. It is not physically possible for them to sound any different.

In fact, in order to test this theory, I took a high-quality audio wav file. I converted that file to FLAC with maximum compression. I then took that FLAC file, and emphasis on the FLAC file itself and not the original, and converted it back to a wav file. When I compared that generated wav file to the original wav file, the two were byte for byte identical. Any differences you're hearing is purely placebo.

I expected the FLAC to sound the same, and it simply didn't.  It sounded different when it was compressed.

You have indeed ruled out that it is impossible for the files themselves to be any different, which is undeniable.  That does not rule out, however, the fact that I heard a difference when I was expecting none, so perhaps it's something to do with the effects/player/both? Something is handling the files slightly differently during the playing of the file.  Perhaps there is an explanation for that?  I'm open to discussion.

[sir dooble]

well forget


Any recommendations?

Anyway, I've no idea if it works with iPhones/iPods, but I use Media Go, which is Sony's service, for my Walkman.
And that works quite well actually.

http://mediago.sony.com/enu/features

[Katadeus]

I buy music on iTunes but only with gift cards because people give me iTunes gift cards and then after that I transfer it to Google Play

[TheBlackParrot]

I expected the FLAC to sound the same, and it simply didn't.  It sounded different when it was compressed.

Free Lossless Audio Codec
Lossless

what compression

[Blaze0]

even with an i7 4770 and 2GB of RAM.

That's like owning a Ferrari 599XX with rubber go-kart tires.

[pefu19]

i dont know, you could not use a potato and get a real phone

[McJob]

http://mediago.sony.com/enu/features

I've stopped using MediaGo and just manually manage my phone's playlists because it's a heaping pile.

I much prefer iTunes to anything out there, but only because not a single other application has iTunes' structure tools. I can create playlist folders and randomise playlists really easy, and I have much more control over IDv3 tags. I don't listen to music by artist or album, I rely on playlists, so it's a big loving deal to have correctly organised playlists.

It might be awful, but it's the least worst audio library tool.

[C-Zech Chrome Ind.]

Free Lossless Audio Codec
Lossless

what compression

i'm old and senile don't listen to me

[Pastrey Crust]

That's like owning a Ferrari 599XX with rubber go-kart tires.

DDR3 RAM cards are about $500 each GB.

[Donnies Catch]

spotify premium is best music software. idk how anyone can say otherwise
how can i even begin to say anything other than this when i have 150+ albums saved and half of that for offline play on my iphone in the highest possible quality.
not to mention i can also easily import songs that are not on spotify to my phone even without the use of a stuffty cable
i dont even need my albums saved on spotify because i have 4G and the streaming even in the highest quality is seamless.
it also supports last.fm scrobbles and thats just amazing
it also has on the fly equalization and many perfect pre-sets
and im using an iphone.

the only way i can see you not like spotify is when youre too poor to have premium or if you only like EDM, because you cant find ur monstercat and nightcores on spotify thats for sure

[The Resonte!]

FLAC impresses me though- how do people even make a system like FLAC anyway

[Ipquarx]

FLAC impresses me though- how do people even make a system like FLAC anyway

Honestly, all modern compression algorithms nowadays are extremely impressive, and some are very complex.
But, just as an example of how it can compress stuff so much, let's take this waveform/set of samples (the blue dots):


This is a stereo (2-channel) track. Now obviously the first thing you can do is see that the two tracks are very nearly identical; meaning at most you'd only have to store the differences between the first track and the second, which takes up much less space.

Then you can see that the waveform itself isn't totally random; there's a lot of structure to it. Like for a long while it's in the bottom half, then it moves up into the top half for a while, etc... You can store when the samples are in the top half and in the bottom half, and since there's a fair bit of structure there you can get good compression on that. Then you repeat, is it in the top or bottom quarter? You repeat this until it gets to a point where it gets so complex you can't compress it anymore. After all that is said and done, it's been compressed quite a bit!

You could also just store the difference between each sample (Which as you can see is usually quite small!), which wouldn't require as much storage space as storing the whole sample.

That does not rule out, however, the fact that I heard a difference when I was expecting none, so perhaps it's something to do with the effects/player/both? Something is handling the files slightly differently during the playing of the file.  Perhaps there is an explanation for that?  I'm open to discussion.

Alright. What music player do you use? Because for the one I use (Foobar2000), there's a plugin called ABX comparator: http://www.foobar2000.org/components/view/foo_abx
Basically, it's a double-blind listening test to see if you can audibly tell the difference between two audio files.
In fact, I'll provide you with two audio files here, one FLAC and one WAV. https://mega.nz/#!Ct4WVJgK!YsDK6fOSs7EYyLU67vLIKxt7mz55f ihtUPf3NaXoNOo

[Tayasaurus]

ZUNE

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHEAHAH. .ahah..aha..

*cries*