General Forum

Re: BeoSound 5 now support Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC)

Electrified — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 10:04:03 GMT

tournedos:
That'll be culturally difficult and there's not much pressure - everybody else is expected to "embrace" Apple by its customers, while Apple itself can do this as difficult as possible without getting much flak (pardon the pun).

I agree. Well put.

tournedos:
I haven't looked much into this, but I believe one issue is that tagging is still a bit volatile in FLAC specs, especially for binary data like embedded cover art.

I don't seem to have any problems in that regard.

tournedos:
The music industry will of course be highly suspicious about anything open & free.

This I disagree with to some extend. Many musicians offer flac as their only lossless format, and there are (small) music labels that focus on high definition (24bit, 96/192khz) audio and use flac as the format for delivering that.

Plus, all of my collegues either use straight bwf files (wav), aif, or we use flac - at least for storage. I don't know anyone using wma lossless or alac for storage, and I do know a few. Hell, even my main portable recorder does flac (as well as bwf/wav, mp3, and mp2).

Hehe, even Metallica offers flac downloads.

Re: BeoSound 5 now support Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC)

Stan — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 09:53:00 GMT

Carolpa:

With UPnP direction of B&o, it wouldn't surprise me that Beoplayer and Beoport sw 5.04 will be the last version.

I was kind of thinking the same thing...

Re: BeoSound 5 now support Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC)

tournedos — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 09:34:32 GMT

Electrified:

Perhaps it's about time Apple added native Flac support, at least in iTunes.

That'll be culturally difficult and there's not much pressure - everybody else is expected to "embrace" Apple by its customers, while Apple itself can do this as difficult as possible without getting much flak (pardon the pun).

I haven't looked much into this, but I believe one issue is that tagging is still a bit volatile in FLAC specs, especially for binary data like embedded cover art.

The music industry will of course be highly suspicious about anything open & free.

Re: BeoSound 5 now support Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC)

Electrified — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 09:32:41 GMT

Stan:
Oh yeah, that's really going to happen. Apple loosen its grip? I wouldn't hold my breath...

LOL, me neither. The continual increase in control from Apple's side is one of the most important reasons I jumped ship after more than twenty years on the platform. Other reasons include all the workarounds becoming increasingly necessary to make it do what I what I wanted to, and bugs in their "pro" software that never seemed to get fixed as they seemed more focused on catering to the iPod crowd.

But, anyway, B&O supporting flac is a good thing. If Apple could pull themselves together and stop pretending they exist in a vacuum, them adding support for the cross-platform open format would be excellent.

Re: BeoSound 5 now support Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC)

Carolpa — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 09:28:46 GMT

Stan:

Teletom:

Does anyone know if the Flac codec will also be implemented in BeoPort Software?

BeoPort doesn't implement *any* codecs... it just plays the audio presented to its (analog) audio input. Perhaps you mean BeoPlayer? In which case, I don't know... I wish it would... there's probably ways of making it...

Although, right now, you cannot transfer a .flac file via BeoConnect (I've experienced) or BeoPlayer (I'm told) to the BeoSound 5 - you must do an operating system level transfer so perhaps there is something in the works (we can hope).

Stan

With UPnP direction of B&o, it wouldn't surprise me that Beoplayer and Beoport sw 5.04 will be the last version.

Re: BeoSound 5 now support Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC)

Stan — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 09:23:56 GMT

Electrified:

Perhaps it's about time Apple added native Flac support, at least in iTunes.

Oh yeah, that's really going to happen. Apple loosen its grip? I wouldn't hold my breath...

Re: BeoSound 5 now support Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC)

Electrified — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 09:21:50 GMT

TripEnglish:
Maybe B&O should buy Apple and start running them right! (-;

Ha ha! I agree!

Re: BeoSound 5 now support Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC)

Stan — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 09:20:11 GMT

Teletom:

Does anyone know if the Flac codec will also be implemented in BeoPort Software?

BeoPort doesn't implement *any* codecs... it just plays the audio presented to its (analog) audio input. Perhaps you mean BeoPlayer? In which case, I don't know... I wish it would... there's probably ways of making it...

Although, right now, you cannot transfer a .flac file via BeoConnect (I've experienced) or BeoPlayer (I'm told) to the BeoSound 5 - you must do an operating system level transfer so perhaps there is something in the works (we can hope).

Stan

Re: BeoSound 5 now support Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC)

Electrified — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 09:19:24 GMT

Puncher:
Why?

My thoughts exactly.

Here's a link to just some of the devices that support FLAC:

http://flac.sourceforge.net/links.html

There are many other, of course, but it's a matter of supporting it. Granted, if you're on a Mac, Flac support is cumbersome at best to make it work across the board.

Perhaps it's about time Apple added native Flac support, at least in iTunes.

Re: BeoSound 5 now support Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC)

Carolpa — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 09:15:39 GMT

TripEnglish:
Apple must have their reasons for excluding certain codecs, but not having an open platform is frustrating. ;

Just a simple word: protection by Apple

TripEnglish:
Maybe B&O should buy Apple and start running them right! (-;

David buying Goliath that would be something!

though Flac is the most open and free lossless format. Big, big advantage: it is independent of one of the Goliath's in this world. For me flac is the format to play on all my toys (mobile excluded). it can be played on TViX, PC, Mac......... and now also on my BS5. great

Re: BeoSound 5 now support Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC)

Puncher — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 08:52:18 GMT

TripEnglish:

........................ but I've been looking at the FLAC format since the BeoSound 5 was launched. At the time, there was an undercurrent of grumbling concerning the lack of support. But after much research it just doesn't look like a credible format for the main stream. .......................................

Why?

Re: BeoSound 5 now support Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC)

TripEnglish — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 08:16:47 GMT

I wish that this was good news in general, but I've been looking at the FLAC format since the BeoSound 5 was launched. At the time, there was an undercurrent of grumbling concerning the lack of support. But after much research it just doesn't look like a credible format for the main stream. The great thing about digital (or the aggravating thing depending on your POV) is the way the content can be fractured and walled in so easily.

Apple must have their reasons for excluding certain codecs, but not having an open platform is frustrating. Maybe B&O should buy Apple and start running them right! (-;

Re: BeoSound 5 now support Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC)

Teletom — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 07:55:44 GMT

Does anyone know if the Flac codec will also be implemented in BeoPort Software?

Re: BeoSound 5 now support Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC)

Carolpa — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 07:03:19 GMT

see

http://flac.sourceforge.net/documentation_tasks.html#osx for start

BeoSound 5 now support Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC)

Olof — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 06:14:21 GMT

so will you ripp you music now in FLAC ? And if so, which programm do you use (for MAC) and how will you get your cover arts ?