FLAC vs MP3 - Which Has Better Quality

[bigdaddydude]

I've been listening to MP3s at a 192 kb/s bitrate for awhile now and the quality sounds good, but now I'm curious if FLAC has better quality? Does FLAC eat up more of my hard drive space? Any trackers that would be dedicated to FLAC and teach me how to upload/rip music to FLAC files?

[anon]

I've been listening to MP3s at a 192 kb/s bitrate for awhile now and the quality sounds good, but now I'm curious if FLAC has better quality?

https://filesharingtalk.com/threads/4...h-bit-rate-MP3

Does FLAC eat up more of my hard drive space?

Yes.

Any trackers that would be dedicated to FLAC and teach me how to upload/rip music to FLAC files?

There are some FLAC trackers, but they're generally hard to get into. I'd recommend you read this and the wiki on What.cd (if you're a member there) to get started with EAC and FLAC ripping, and then, if you'd prefer a specialized site, apply for an LW invite here. You'll need to answer some questions, post some proof of membership on other trackers, and upload one torrent within a 24 hours timeframe.

[Waddafocky]

If encoded correctly, a >192kbps MP3 will sound transparent to its source.

In this day and age, your hardware is more likely to be the limiting factor than the source. For example, your laptop speakers/iPod headphones can only make your music sound so good. Really, if you don't have semi/quasi-audiophile hardware, FLAC will be a wasted investment. I am using $200 IEM's (granted no sound card or pre-amp), and I can't really hear the difference between FLAC and V0/V2 MP3's unless I'm listening to delicate classical.

I recommend that you find some FLAC copies of albums you have already, preferably in both CD and mp3 format, and do some testing yourself. If you can only detect a minor difference, then stick with what you have, or move up to V0. V0 LAME MP3's will take up about 1/3 of the space of FLAC and will have about twice the number of bits to sound transparent.

Any dedicated music-tracker will have quality standards that promote close-to-transparent rips of music. What and Waffles come to mind, but I've been at Libble for a little while, and depending on what kind of music you like (mostly indie, other relatively unknown music), it's a great tracker. Also, you look like an all-right guy (not referring to your avatar), if you want an invite to Libble, I can spare you one.

[whatcdfan]

flac is far more better in terms of quality then any lossy formats, flac preserves the original bitrate of 1411kbps whereas u can go to the maximum of 320 kbps with mp3 so theoretically theres a huge difference in quality but as Anarkial said u gotta have the hardware to take the difference into ur notion.
As for the size:
one simple universal fact applies to all the media, the better the quality=the larger the size
the compression rate of FLAC varies from 20 to 40% depending on various factors meaning a 40MB wav track wud become something like 30 MB whereas MP3's compression revolves between 78 to 87% in standard quality so the 40MB wav track wud become something like 6MB
Before u do anything take Anarkial advise of testing for urself into consideration

[ca_aok]

Do an ABX test on a few of your favourite albums (preferably across a range of genres) on your best listening equipment in a quiet room. If you can tell the difference, go for FLAC. Otherwise, stick to MP3.

There are several other reasons to go for FLAC though. Hard disk space is cheap and it's nice to have 1:1 copies of your CDs stored digitally (and any other CDs you might obtain). Besides, you have complete control over choosing FLAC over MP3 and it's generally a choice made for free... ensuring that the bottleneck for your audio listening experience will be your equipment, not your files.

[yevgeny]

well i can discern some improvement with flac which was a bit of a surprise to me since my pioneer setup is quite old, it used to play only minidisc and cd to give an idea of how old so connecting it to xbmc saved it from languishing in my shed doing nothing. tbh i havent had a problem finding anything in the usual places like w&w.

i found this, it gives an overview but there heaps of other guides on there.


http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?title=Free_Lossless_Audio_Codec

[streetrider]

FLAC is the best way to archive your music files for the versatility it offers. It definitely uses up more storage space but then hard discs are getting more and more affordable with each passing day. Personally, the music I've been downloading since the past few months is only flac and I'm absolutely enjoying it. For a start you could find a lot of perfect flac on wh@t and w@ffles. Later on you evolve to LW's, P's or E's where you get those flawlessly ripped files with proper scans and wouldn't have to search for them under heaps of mp3 files.

PS. There you'll will also find encoding and ripping guides by the best guys in the business.

[Rigel9]

Mp3 obviusly is superior. FLAC is only for nerds and n00bs, u cant even play it in iTunes so its basicaly useless.

[b3owulf]

Mp3 obviusly is superior. FLAC is only for nerds and n00bs, u cant even play it in iTunes so its basicaly useless.

Thanks, man, you made my day!!!

[ScottK]

HD over XviD : 1 - 0
flac over 320 Mp3 : 1 - 1

im not pro, but my belief is flac = overrated. i can watch HD quality over Xvid, but i cant hear any difference between mp3 & flac. (i have normal ears?) . i do download flac (album i want to burn into cd) but not obsess to make collection on my pc