24bit FLAC audio?

[Trident77]

Is 24bit FLAC audio compatible with the Cowon J3? Every time I try to play an album in 24bit, it completely freezes up and is unresponsive. I have to reset my device using the tiny hole in the back in order to use it again. I'm on firmware v2.22. Anyone else having this problem?

[Marvin the Martian]

Originally Posted by Trident77

Is 24bit FLAC audio compatible with the Cowon J3? Every time I try to play an album in 24bit, it completely freezes up and is unresponsive. I have to reset my device using the tiny hole in the back in order to use it again. I'm on firmware v2.22. Anyone else having this problem?

Convert it to 16 bit FLAC......problem will be solved, and I highly doubt you'll hear any difference, unless you have the ears of a bat.

[Trident77]

I have ears of a bat.

Thanks.

[Trident77]

The question is, how do I accomplish this in foobar?

[Marvin the Martian]

Originally Posted by Trident77

The question is, how do I accomplish this in foobar?

Right-click on your album to bring up the option for the converter, and then see this image below......

[Trident77]

You're the man. thanks!

[Marvin the Martian]

Originally Posted by Trident77

You're the man. thanks!

If you want to preserve your 24bit files, you can save the conversion to a different folder, too.....as long as you have enough space on your computer. Good luck!

[Trident77]

I just downloaded the 24 bit because someone had removed the high pitch squeal in the background of the entire album. The other versions still had it and it was quite annoying.

[Trident77]

So I've converted the files using the settings you provided.

I play the song in foobar and it's perfectly fine.

I play the song on my Cowon and it's SUPER slow and creepy sounding. I've checked the settings and the play speed is @ 100%. I then play other songs and everything is fine. It just doesn't work with this album.

Ideas?

[Marvin the Martian]

Now, I am not sure.....I can't figure out why it would play in foobar and not on the player. Hopefully someone else can chime in with an idea.

[lestatar]

huh...this is indeed odd...

@OP, take that 24bit FLAC and convert to LAME mp3 V0, send to the J3 and see if that one plays normally or does the super slow creepy thing.

This might help you narrow down the issue...

<ears of a bat indeed... lol...>

EDIT:
Maybe also look at the source 24bit FLAC files for integrity? Use foobar to check it as well...you may need to download and install the Verify Integrity foobar plugin.

Google for "FLAC checker" - lots of results/tips/hints on this.
http://www.google.com.hk/search?num=...hecker&spell=1

[Thib]

Originally Posted by Marvin the Martian

Convert it to 16 bit FLAC......problem will be solved, and I highly doubt you'll hear any difference, unless you have the ears of a bat.

That happened to me to and this is what I did . The J3 was freezing too...
It was actually 3 electronic music songs in 24 bits (32 bits initially ?) I got them out of Fruity Loops myself , the good thing is that it even passed through the audiochecker when downgrading to 16 bit .
Unfortunatly, I've never got my hands on any interesting 24 bit release, even with the DVD audios I can't find anything, why the hell were the songs of the extremely popular artist Michael Jackson never released as such ? Anyways, it's already hard to tell the difference between 16 bit FLAC and 320 mp3 or V0 so maybe 24 bit FLAC is too much :P. No, I don't have bat ears lol !
As for the 24 bit vinyl release it makes no sense there is always too much noise. Even with proper ones, it still isn't like CD, I really don't get it, where's the point ...


As for playing : Foobar plays 24 bits perfectly and the J3 plays the downgraded 16 bit version perfectly too.
Wait, I switch to my big computer I'll upload a screen :P.

[meetooman]

Is 16bit FLAC the lossy lossless of 24bit Flac?

[saratoga]

Originally Posted by Thib

Unfortunatly, I've never got my hands on any interesting 24 bit release, even with the DVD audios I can't find anything, why the hell were the songs of the extremely popular artist Michael Jackson never released as such ?

There may not be any 24 bit material recorded by him. Of course that didn't stop them from taking 16 bit Beatles disks, converting to 24 bit and selling them to people who already owned the same 16 bit versions

[Sam Lowry]

Originally Posted by Marvin the Martian

Now, I am not sure.....I can't figure out why it would play in foobar and not on the player. Hopefully someone else can chime in with an idea.

Maybe it's too much for the J3's CPU :
- The decompression processing (flac is a lossless compression, but it needs some CPU's work for being... decompressed)
- The handling/playing of a 24-bit sound file, it probably has a high sampling rate too (like 96 khz)
- The use of BBE+

I think he should try with a 24-bit wav file, at least it would put less charge on the CPU.

[saratoga]

Originally Posted by Sam Lowry

Maybe it's too much for the J3's CPU :
- The decompression processing (flac is a lossless compression, but it needs some CPU's work for being... decompressed)
- The handling/playing of a 24-bit sound file, it probably has a high sampling rate too (like 96 khz)
- The use of BBE+

I think he should try with a 24-bit wav file, at least it would put less charge on the CPU.

It has nothing to do with the CPU, its just a bug in their decoder. They probably use the same one as the Sandisk players, which also don't work with 24 bit FLAC.

[Trident77]

Fix:

I got a new 16 bit version of the album.

That's how they did it back when man was man, so that's how I did it today.

[Thib]

Originally Posted by saratoga

There may not be any 24 bit material recorded by him. Of course that didn't stop them from taking 16 bit Beatles disks, converting to 24 bit and selling them to people who already owned the same 16 bit versions

Wow that's really not nice ...

Originally Posted by meetooman

Is 16bit FLAC the lossy lossless of 24bit Flac?

If I'm not mistaken, 24 bits has just more accuracy, there are more frequencies and so, less interpolation.
The most noticeable difference I've heard in 24 bit 96 Khz vinyl releases is the voice of the singer being more amongst the instruments rather than on top of those. But maybe it was coming from the vinyl itself. So, nothing interesting in fact, but if a digital store sells a track I love in such format I'll buy it just for the sake of it .

[saratoga]

Originally Posted by Thib

If I'm not mistaken, 24 bits has just more accuracy, there are more frequencies and so, less interpolation.

Nope, same frequencies, same interpolation. Frequency is determined by sampling rate.

Originally Posted by Thib

The most noticeable difference I've heard in 24 bit 96 Khz vinyl releases is the voice of the singer being more amongst the instruments rather than on top of those. But maybe it was coming from the vinyl itself. So, nothing interesting in fact, but if a digital store sells a track I love in such format I'll buy it just for the sake of it .

The best vinyl transfers are about 14 bits in practice (vinyl has extremely low resolution by modern standards - no surprise, its a very old format!), so usually 24 bit means someone didn't know what they were doing along the way.

[Scuttlebutte]

Originally Posted by Trident77

So I've converted the files using the settings you provided.

I play the song in foobar and it's perfectly fine.

I play the song on my Cowon and it's SUPER slow and creepy sounding. I've checked the settings and the play speed is @ 100%. I then play other songs and everything is fine. It just doesn't work with this album.

Ideas?

All right....I am going to revive an antiquated post, because I couldn't understand the responses provided to the above quote and found a solution to the slow motion issue with converting from 24-bit to 16-bit FLAC files.

Open Foobar2000, load the files you need to convert to 16-bit, select all files, right-click, and under 'convert', select '....'. For output format choose FLAC (choose whatever compression level you desire), set output bit depth to 16-bit, leave the dither setting alone. Under 'Processing' add 'Resampler (PPHS)' to the Active DSPs. Then convert...

I've only tried this on one album (Eva Cassidy's American Tune) and the audio seemed a little lispy and blotchy on rare occasion...might just be an artifact of the recording though. Have to try out the Resampler DSP with other albums to see how it performs on the whole.... Also...there may be other resampling DSPs out there for Foobar2000 that may be worth trying.