Flac Support

[LaoTzu]

will spotify be upgrading to flac support soon? and streaming in flac for higher quality music? if so spotify would be a leader in sound quality and would set it apart from other competitors. please consider this.

[lkjlkjlkjlkjlkj]

@Pauky

Use my solution and convert your FLACS to ALAC (apple lossless). Spotify can play ALACs and they are lossless. 

[BrokenHaiku]

While I agree that streaming FLAC would be of little point for most users, I for one,  would find it extremely useful to be able to include such tracks in the local files, and perhaps create an on-the-fly conversion to OGG for using in offline mode on your mobile device.

I have pretty much my whole music collection converted to FLAC, and would like to keep them that way for using Spotify on my surround system.

[AndreasHelke]

Modern mp3 at reasonalbe bit rates is absolutely the same quality as flac. For classical music and the most recent version of the LAME encoder I habe no trouble at all to distinguish 96 kbps mp3 from flac. For classical music it gets difficult at 112 kpps and impossible at 128 kbps to get it right in a abx blindtest. There are other types of music that are more difficult to encode properly.

But I am sure that almost all people with almost all music tracks will not be able to tell apart 160 kbps Vorbis or 320 kbps from each other or from FLAC or even the original 24/96 HiRes digital file.

The first few years of mp3 encoding where awfull and you can easily hear the distortions they introduce. Todays mp3 encoders at medium to high kbps rates is indistinguishable from the more modern codecs.

[gloom]

Please listen to a decent system before trying to tell others what they hear and do not hear (Or just don't tell it at all?).

For some of us, music is a big part of our lives and our demand of quality has risen beyond the casual listeners.

Have you tried ripping a original CD with "Exact Audio Copy" http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/ and then compared it to your song ripped in a standard program like itunes or windows media player?

Even there, I can hear/feel a quality difference and I think you can too with a decent system.

I have better now but back then I played the .wav files from my PS3 via a 400$ yamaha reciever on 300$ floor speakers and I could definately hear it.

Then saying you can't hear a difference of a mp3 and the original CD/WAV or even 24-bit is depressing and I hope you get to enjoy it soon.

And with classical music, if you don't hear a difference from 128kbps to original, again with a decent system, then I believe your hearing might be impaired..

[DevinDahlgren]

Hi David,

Thanks for chiming in. I come from an indrusty where the customers spend thousands on their music systems, including thousand on their cables. The quality of sound we create with todays best engineering is out of this world. Playing music from a lossless files created from a CD rip actually outperforms the CD. This post is not the place to explain how its posible so please just trust me on this. I speak from experience. As you are arware the music industy has changed radically. The mainstream downloads from iTunes and the likes and with the Spotify services it seems obvious the future is streaming. This leaves the audiophile in a dilmema. Audiophiles want the resolution so they won't purchase mp3 files. If they can't find a losselss version to download, they will purchase the CD and rip it. But that's heading down a dead end road and will one day not be an option. This leads me to why it makes sense to offer flac service on Spotify. If an audiophile could simply login and have the world of music Spotify offers delivered to them in a lossless version, they'd be willing to pay premium prices for it. This, in my opion is a triple win for all. Spotify collects the necessary revenues to offer this special service, the high end audio industry continues to thrive because hi resloution music has made it to the mainstream again and the music industry, which includes the artist, are getting paid again to make great music. Spotify could change the music industry. But then so could iTunes if they decide first to go that direction.

[edalytical]

I don't know why FLAC is popular...or any compressed format for that matter lossless or lossy. Storage is so cheap now days! I'm storing all my CDs on hard drives as AIFFs. AIFF is a professional-level format used by pro applications. It's uncompressed pulse-code modulation...e.g. raw audio. It will play on your iPod, iPhone or most any other device, it supports ID3 tags unlike: FLAC, WAV, or Ogg. It is hands down the best format around.

[gloom]

Smaller cause it's technical progress. If you go by the same thinking about computers in general you would need another room just to place your computer and your phone would be in a suitcase or something and not in a small handheld format. I like .aiff cause it works but if you can make it smaller, why not? Maybe Flac does not compress enough for people to bother?

[edalytical]

The biggest issues I have with FLAC: 1) doesn't play on an iPod, iPhone, or iPad...or whatever; 2) does't support ID3 tags; 3) generally takes longer to encode/decode; 4) isn't really something I can assume others are able to playback. 

And you're correct, to me the 60% smaller file size isn't worth the effort and the issues stated above. I mean 2TB is less than $100 these days.

[DevinDahlgren]

I mean no disrespect, but this post is not about the lack of compatibility with ipods. It's about Spotify streaming flac to your Spotify app so that those with streaming devises connected to their hifi systems can get true CD or even better sound quality.

[snuzzfugget]

I was wondering the same thing as well..All my albums have been ripped by EAC proper rips and compressed to 8 times commpression .flac. It would be awesome if this came to be in this program. I have tons of MFSL Japan Remasters and 24bit recordings that would blow your mind at the sound quality..I support what LaoTzu stated that would kick butt...There are other options agreed but I have a feeling the developers are gonna get to the point that this program will handle all types files it just takes a lot of time and effort programming assembly code..

[snuzzfugget]

This is true what hpguru is saying streaming flac to ipods and such you wont here a difference indeed but when you are using hi-fi stereo equipment such as Klipsch speakers and Bang and Olufsen stereo equipment you will definetely hear a major difference and in my expereince with music players I know of many audiofiles that would take this program under their wing if it did and would expand this community..when usenet was good now sucks couldn't believe the amount of folks who wouldn't even touch lossy rips, but as for now I guess will see what happens. Either way I'm fine for now 🙂

[borisgoodenough]

This thread actually caused me to register on the forum just to express my agreement with flac support -- first, play of local files, followed by development of streaming technology.

It doesn't make us audio snobs to point out that many folks around here have both the ears and audio equipment capable of distinguishing between very decent mp3 and lossless flac files. And it doesn't take a crystal ball to predict that, after a couple of decades of sacrificing sound quality to acessibility, the convergent evolution of storage and streaming technologies will make it more likely that the future will see a re-emergence of demand for higher-quality audio.

Want an analogy? Twnety years ago, portable carry-anywhere tiny TVs were all the rage. Today, we're playing Blu-Ray discs and streaming Netflix and Amazon in HD on our 55" screens.

Someone -- most likely Appple -- will lead this trend. I'd rather it was Spotify.

[the_bean]

I can't see any reason to not support flac for local files. Flac is an open and free format isn't it?

Alot of people (including me) rip their CD's to flac.

[Steview]

Personally speaking, FLAC support for local files is immaterial as I use the Sonos software to play Spotify via my decent Hi Fi.  However, I can see that lots of you use Spotify as your main music player and I can understand how a lack of FLAC support must be very iritating.  

But streaming in FLAC, or at least being able to download in FLAC for local playback, now that I would really love - and would be prepared to pay for.  The 320 kbs stream is very decent, but it's not CD quality, and does, to a certain extent, put me off listeneing to Spotify through my Hi Fi - there's not much point in investing in a decent Hi Fi and then listening to (even marginally) sub-standard source material. And, by the way, I'm not convinced that all material actually comes through at 320 kbs - some albums sound far more compressed?

Att the moment, I use Spotify on my mobile and to check out unfamiliar music, but still turn to CD or lossless streaming for 'serious' listening.  Genuine lossless streaming would really make CDs redundant for me, and the facility to listen to the massif, and constantly growing, Spotify catalogue at CD quality would be truly mind-blowing.  Of course, we'll then be clamouring for high-resolution facilties.  But that's for another day......

[snuzzfugget]

I do agree with Steview that quote " The 320 kbs stream is very decent, but it's not CD quality, and does, to a certain extent, put me off listeneing to Spotify through my Hi Fi - there's not much point in investing in a decent Hi Fi and then listening to (even marginally) sub-standard source material. And, by the way, I'm not convinced that all material actually comes through at 320 kbs - some albums sound far more compressed?" It is true that I have purchased CD's and ripped them to .wav and analyzed them with an Audio Analyzer only to find that the CD wasn't even recorded at lossless levels but looked like it was made from lossy format recordings lol. I would like to see flac support since for archiving CD purposes that's the only logical way to do it without loss of quality there are other lossless formats but flac is definitely the most popular...:)

[spitspotpremium]

Flac support for own files now!

Will spotify answer why it's not a possiblity yet?

[Dangermind]

I have all my music in .flac format. 
If you only support to play flac fles i'm already happy. no need for streaming in flac 🙂

I just joined spotify but if i cant play my own files in it i'mgoing to look for something else.

People might say that i just need to convert them. but i have so much music on my computer that it will take weeks to convert them all!

Please consider this 🙂

[TomasJohansson]

I wouldn't trust the everymans opinion about this. They probably can't tell the difference from rock or pop. Or between cd or casette or vinyl. But they do hear the difference. They just dont think about it. As for bandwidth thats really not a problem since spotify uses p2p tech for it. But its really stupid now that if i pay good money for a song then its actually in lower quality than free account streaming. Beatport allows you to buy in wav for a 40% increase in price. I have 60$ speakers with no amp and i hear the difference. Just imagine it. Everyone re-buying their digital music collection and getting new flac players and bigger harddrives and flash memorys. Its the future. Youre gonna get left behind

[ise]

I have studio monitors because I make music... The difference is very obvious on them. I also have a very old sanyo stereo and the difference is also obvious on them. My friend's that have always moaned that I seem to get a FLAC hard-on completely understand when I actually show them FLAC vs 320 OGG side by side, especially on vinyl master rips, and even on the sanyo stereo...

ise

http://soundcloud.com/ise

[AbsolutelyNoFB]

Add my name to the list of people asking for streaming FLAC support. I currently pay for a Premium account so I use the 320k Ogg streaming, but would happily pay more for FLAC streaming.