Crappy Flac Conversion

[primem0ver]

I am relatively new to flac but I understand the principle behind it as I am pretty tech savvy.  I recently bought a cd and used MusicBee to rip it to flac after buying several albums (with cd's no longer available) by the same band from QoBuz.  I noticed right away that the sound was not the quality I am used to from flac.  The volume was less than a quarter of the other flac files and the it sounded like I was listening to a 96 kbps mp3 file.  I listened to the flac file side by side with the same song on youtube (which seems to ALWAYS use 128 kbps) and youtube sounded better when it came to the fullness of the sound. I did NOT check lossy compression when I went to the encoder settings so I want to know what is going on.  Are there different flac encoders?  The report from playback is reporting 44.1 kHz at 904k stereo but it sure as heck doesn't sound like it. 

[frankz]

Converting to FLAC is like putting a document in a zip file. The audio data is not touched in any way. What you get out is exactly what you feed in, and if you were to convert it back to wav it would bit for bit match the input file. Therefore what you're reporting is not possibly the result of the conversion to FLAC.

Put the CD in and listen to the FLAC side by side and they will be exactly the same.

Edit: Reading over your post I'm really not clear on what you're comparing.  First you compare this album to an entirely different album by the same band and expect them to sound the same.  Listen to Black Keys Thickfreakness and El Camino back to back and you'll see why this isn't really indicative of a problem.  Then you're comparing a YouTube version (which could be a remaster or remix or any one of a number of things) to your version from CD.  Why don't you compare your rip to the CD it came from and then go from there?  Same to same.

[primem0ver]

I was planning to compare it to the original CD (though that will take some time because I had to disconnect my optical drive due to a recent SATA port failure).  However it is a commercial CD that is more recent than the ones I downloaded from QoBuz.  Yes I am comparing multiple sources and I should check the original source (and was planning too) but in the meantime, I find it rather hard to believe that the quality of a commercial CD is lower than a 128 kbps audiostream from youtube even if the volume is lower.  In my comparison I did turn the sound up to a comparable volume.  It still had a significantly lower quality than the youtube stream.

[frankz]

I was planning to compare it to the original CD (though that will take some time because I had to disconnect my optical drive due to a recent SATA port failure).  However it is a commercial CD that is more recent than the ones I downloaded from QoBuz.  Yes I am comparing multiple sources and I should check the original source (and was planning too) but in the meantime, I find it rather hard to believe that the quality of a commercial CD is lower than a 128 kbps audiostream from youtube even if the volume is lower.  In my comparison I did turn the sound up to a comparable volume.  It still had a significantly lower quality than the youtube stream.

It may have lower quality than an entirely different source, but not as a result of the conversion to FLAC.  What is in the FLAC is what is on the CD.

The volume difference may be accounted for if you set it to analyze for ReplayGain data on rip and then use ReplayGain on playback, but that's an adjustment that is made at playback, not during the ripping.  The data in the FLAC is lossless as compared to the CD you gave it.  It's not possible for it to be anything else.  Audio information is not touched in the conversion to FLAC.

[primem0ver]

It may have lower quality than an entirely different source, but not as a result of the conversion to FLAC.  What is in the FLAC is what is on the CD.

The volume difference may be accounted for if you set it to analyze for ReplayGain data on rip and then use ReplayGain on playback, but that's an adjustment that is made at playback, not during the ripping.  The data in the FLAC is lossless as compared to the CD you gave it.  It's not possible for it to be anything else.  Audio information is not touched in the conversion to FLAC.

Wow.  You really assume a lot don't you? Are you reading my post?  I have already stated I am comparing quality, not volume.  I have already stated My source is a commercial CD, made within the last two years.  It is likely using the same source recording as the other versions of the song available on the internet and those other versions are of an inherently LESSER quality than the CD (or traditional FLAC files).  As for your assumptions: your first statement is only true if the conversion worked as intended.  That is my point. Chances are, It DIDN'T.  (Unless I really did get a bum CD... how many faulty CD's make it to market?). It could be settings, it could be an issue with this particular flac encoder.  I don't need you to tell me how FLAC works.  I need to look for potential reasons as to why it didn't work.

EDIT: Your last statement about FLAC is also completely untrue.  The Audio information is read from the CD.  It then travels along a SATA cable into an I/O port.  It then is sent into memory where MusicBee reads it in.  The audio information is then converted into FLAC Format by the encoder which then compresses it (if compression is enabled).  The final format is not identical to the original; otherwise we would have FLAC cd's.  So yes... it is touched SEVERAL times and at any one of those points, something CAN go wrong.

[Steven]

What frankz says is correct. If you have concerns about the data retrieved from the CD, enable accurate rip in the ripping preferences which compares the # totals for the cd data against a database of rips made by other people, or even more strict but very much slower, enable error checking but in my view that is unnecessary if you are using undamaged CDs. If you do want to enable accuraterip then update to the latest version from the first forum topic as there is a bug with older MB versions.
Are you sure the differences are not a result of replay gain processing which seems the most likely explanation

[frankz]

It may have lower quality than an entirely different source, but not as a result of the conversion to FLAC.  What is in the FLAC is what is on the CD.

The volume difference may be accounted for if you set it to analyze for ReplayGain data on rip and then use ReplayGain on playback, but that's an adjustment that is made at playback, not during the ripping.  The data in the FLAC is lossless as compared to the CD you gave it.  It's not possible for it to be anything else.  Audio information is not touched in the conversion to FLAC.

Wow.  You really assume a lot don't you? Are you reading my post?  I have already stated I am comparing quality, not volume.  I have already stated My source is a commercial CD, made within the last two years.  It is likely using the same source recording as the other versions of the song available on the internet and those other versions are of an inherently LESSER quality than the CD (or traditional FLAC files).  As for your assumptions: your first statement is only true if the conversion worked as intended.  That is my point. Chances are, It DIDN'T.  (Unless I really did get a bum CD... how many faulty CD's make it to market?). It could be settings, it could be an issue with this particular flac encoder.  I don't need you to tell me how FLAC works.  I need to look for potential reasons as to why it didn't work.

EDIT: Your last statement about FLAC is also completely untrue.  The Audio information is read from the CD.  It then travels along a SATA cable into an I/O port.  It then is sent into memory where MusicBee reads it in.  The audio information is then converted into FLAC Format by the encoder which then compresses it (if compression is enabled).  The final format is not identical to the original; otherwise we would have FLAC cd's.  So yes... it is touched SEVERAL times and at any one of those points, something CAN go wrong.

LOL. No.

[smann]

It may have lower quality than an entirely different source, but not as a result of the conversion to FLAC.  What is in the FLAC is what is on the CD.

The volume difference may be accounted for if you set it to analyze for ReplayGain data on rip and then use ReplayGain on playback, but that's an adjustment that is made at playback, not during the ripping.  The data in the FLAC is lossless as compared to the CD you gave it.  It's not possible for it to be anything else.  Audio information is not touched in the conversion to FLAC.

Wow.  You really assume a lot don't you? Are you reading my post?  I have already stated I am comparing quality, not volume.  I have already stated My source is a commercial CD, made within the last two years.  It is likely using the same source recording as the other versions of the song available on the internet and those other versions are of an inherently LESSER quality than the CD (or traditional FLAC files).  As for your assumptions: your first statement is only true if the conversion worked as intended.  That is my point. Chances are, It DIDN'T.  (Unless I really did get a bum CD... how many faulty CD's make it to market?). It could be settings, it could be an issue with this particular flac encoder.  I don't need you to tell me how FLAC works.  I need to look for potential reasons as to why it didn't work.

EDIT: Your last statement about FLAC is also completely untrue.  The Audio information is read from the CD.  It then travels along a SATA cable into an I/O port.  It then is sent into memory where MusicBee reads it in.  The audio information is then converted into FLAC Format by the encoder which then compresses it (if compression is enabled).  The final format is not identical to the original; otherwise we would have FLAC cd's.  So yes... it is touched SEVERAL times and at any one of those points, something CAN go wrong.

Can you inform us of the exact CD? Artist, album, songs in question, a CD that is directly commercial from the publisher or one that is put out by a third party website? I guess what I'm asking is do you have a website for exactly where you purchased the CD from? Also, what kHz are the songs downloaded at? This can cause issues on certain systems.

FLAC is a lossless, compressed format. While it won't be exactly what the original source is on a bit-by-bit basis when looked at uncompressed, uncompressing it for playback will result in the same exact bit-by-bit quality song as the source. If this is not the case, then it is definitely something else causing the issue that we need to identify.

My bet is that the drive your are ripping the CD from isn't calibrated properly, the CD isn't properly ripped, replay gain is causing clipping, or you are comparing the songs to Youtube versions that have been manipulated to "sound better". I know a lot of Youtube songs that boost certain frequencies to sound "better" to the majority of the population with no regards to clipping or other issues.

The first step in identifying any issues would be exactly what CD you bought and from where exactly. Also, I can't overstate the importance of using AccurateRip in ripping any CD! It is a godsend! I personally spend a little bit of money to use dBpoweramp and take advantage of everything they have to offer.

[hiccup]

I am relatively new to flac but I understand the principle behind it as I am pretty tech savvy.

ehh...

[Zak]

If you upload a track (or part of it) so other peole can hear what you're hearing, that may help.