INTERACT FORUM

Please login or register.

Login with username, password and session length
Advanced search  
Pages: [1]   Go Down

Author Topic: Converting WAV to FLAC - Question on Bitrate  (Read 2675 times)

Magic_Randy

  • MC Beta Team
  • Citizen of the Universe
  • *****
  • Posts: 2367
  • I used to be indecisive, but now I'm not so sure..
Converting WAV to FLAC - Question on Bitrate
« on: February 13, 2015, 12:50:38 pm »
I converted a bunch of 96kHz/24-bit wav files to flac primarily to have a single format in my library.

After conversion the flac files are still 96kHz/24-bit but the Bitrate is dropping. As an example, in the wav file it is 4608 and in the flac file it is 3022. Note the wav files are always 4608 but the flac files have different values.

Did I do something wrong? Does this have any impact on the quality?

Thanks...

Randy
Logged

Matt

  • Administrator
  • Citizen of the Universe
  • *****
  • Posts: 42524
  • Shoes gone again!
Re: Converting WAV to FLAC - Question on Bitrate
« Reply #1 on: February 13, 2015, 01:28:56 pm »
Of course the bitrate dropped!  That's the point of lossless compression -- keep the same sound but use fewer bits.
Logged
Matt Ashland, JRiver Media Center

Magic_Randy

  • MC Beta Team
  • Citizen of the Universe
  • *****
  • Posts: 2367
  • I used to be indecisive, but now I'm not so sure..
Re: Converting WAV to FLAC - Question on Bitrate
« Reply #2 on: February 13, 2015, 02:57:41 pm »
Thanks Matt...

Just wanted to make sure I was doing it right before I went too far.

Randy
Logged

Al ex

  • Citizen of the Universe
  • *****
  • Posts: 551
Re:
« Reply #3 on: February 13, 2015, 03:23:18 pm »
Matt, technically, how does it work: lossless compression (flac)? I thought the idea of compression is to to eliminate “similar“ or “same“ bits, where the human ear cannot make a difference anyway. So, how can you compress without making it lossy? Or maybe you have a good explanation link...
Logged

glynor

  • MC Beta Team
  • Citizen of the Universe
  • *****
  • Posts: 19608
Re: Converting WAV to FLAC - Question on Bitrate
« Reply #4 on: February 13, 2015, 04:10:33 pm »
There are lots of examples of lossless compression, including the ubiquitous zip file.  ZIP compression must be lossless, or else it would break executables and DOC files that you zip up.

There are also lossless image compression systems, and a whole variety of audio compression systems.  In fact, the "normal" way to compress files is via lossless compression (otherwise they'd break).  It is only relatively recent development that gave us "perceptual" compression (that is lossy that throws away "non-relevant" data, like MP3 and H.264).

More:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lossless_compression
Logged
"Some cultures are defined by their relationship to cheese."

Visit me on the Interweb Thingie: http://glynor.com/

kstuart

  • Citizen of the Universe
  • *****
  • Posts: 1955
  • Upgraded to MC22 Master using preorder discount
Re: Converting WAV to FLAC - Question on Bitrate
« Reply #5 on: February 13, 2015, 05:52:05 pm »
It's interesting to note that digital video throws out 99% of the bits ( ! ).

At one point, I calculated that it would require one satellite per channel to broadcast uncompressed HD video. (So, on those fancy five-slot DirecTV or Dish Network dishes, you would have a total of five channels, lol.)
Logged

Matt

  • Administrator
  • Citizen of the Universe
  • *****
  • Posts: 42524
  • Shoes gone again!
Re:
« Reply #6 on: February 13, 2015, 05:54:56 pm »
Quote from: Al ex on February 13, 2015, 03:23:18 pm
Matt, technically, how does it work: lossless compression (flac)? I thought the idea of compression is to to eliminate “similar“ or “same“ bits, where the human ear cannot make a difference anyway. So, how can you compress without making it lossy? Or maybe you have a good explanation link...

I wrote this years ago.  It might help.

http://monkeysaudio.com/theory.html
Logged
Matt Ashland, JRiver Media Center
Pages: [1]   Go Up
« previous next »