File-based audio playback - compressed vs. uncompressed

[bobbasrah]

Same here, no issues or differences noted up to and including 24/192, irrespective of what it is being used for. MediaPortal using PureAudio for audio output on desktop.
Desktop Win7/64Pro, 4core 3GHz, 8Gb, 4 Hot-swap Sata. Usb -> Musiland02US->CA 640R
This was also tested 24/96 on 2 other laptops (one XP one 7) and on 1 additional DAC fed audio system, both using Foobar, again no issues.

[Ali Tait]

Ah forgot my processor specs, might be useful - Win7/64 bit, i5 processor 2.7 gig, 6 gig of RAM.

[bobbasrah]

Ah forgot my processor specs, might be useful - Win7/64 bit, i5 processor 2.7 gig, 6 gig of RAM.

With what these lads found testing with the SBT, I would not be so sure as it should not be a struggle Ali....

What would be interesting is to find someone, anyone, who has the problem so we can home in on cause. The only information we have been told for Stan's situation is that it was fed out over optical, but at least from that we know the transfer limit.
We know FLAC contains the same data as WAV though.

[Ali Tait]

Yeah, maybe I need more power!

[bobbasrah]

Change of lead to the PSU perhaps....

[Ali Tait]

My Touch has a MCRU linear power supply. Both Bantams are fed from another linear power supply. Maybe my dac is crap, despite it being by far the best sounding I've had in my system.

[Welder]

My Touch has a MCRU linear power supply. Both Bantams are fed from another linear power supply. Maybe my dac is crap, despite it being by far the best sounding I've had in my system.

That must be it Ali. I have the same problem. Now if we had truly transparent and resolving systems where no expense or efforts had been spared then no doubt we would also be able to hear the difference between Flac and WAV.........

Interestingly I cant hear a difference with my mates file setup either and his is probably the best file system I've heard. Strangely neither his or mine have a laptop or SBT or a Caiman in the chain so that automatically rules us out as deaf.

I did mention I would submit my findings from my purpose built server and the rest of my crap kit but I got the impression that my contribution may not be welcome; prolly coz I piss about too much and don't seem to be taking the debate seriously enough; can't really argue tbh.

Oh well, back to a few awful sounding Flac files then.

[sq225917]

Where I do hear a difference is between WAV and say something like apple lossless. I have a play around with FLAC at the weekend.

Can you explain what you mean? Do you mean that the same software player decodes the files so that you can distinguish between identical source files where one has been encoded as Alac and the other left as wav?

That's a little surprising, because and Alac is every single bit as lossless as Flac. Which isn't surprising seeing that they use the same coding algorithms and differ only in that Apple writes none standard file headers as part of the wrapper. That would imply that some bit of software knows a file is in Alac and accordingly treats it differently to Flac on purpose.

I've never heard any difference between the playback of any lossless file formats on any of the dacs I've ever owned, I must suffer from same shit hifi as others. ;-)

[John]

What i hear is mostly when using J play in full hibernation mode
So in terms of sound we talking more air and depth. Perhaps a good example of this is Kate Bush Waking the Witch on Hounds of Love With using WAV in full JPLAY mode I get to hear the full church bells ringing, whilst before it was only just some of this happening
I am compairing using Apple Lossless to WAV files of the music. One recorded from CD the other a Apple Lossless copy

[Ali Tait]

ALAC copy from the same cd John?