Head-Fi.org › Forums › Equipment Forums › Computer Audio › Latest Version of pkshan's Foobar HE Project
New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:

Latest Version of pkshan's Foobar HE Project - Page 2

post #16 of 34
9/5/11 at 2:46pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by svyr View Post

Quote:
Originally Posted by leeperry View Post

Q: Why does not support flac / ape
A: trouble, but not as good as wav sound

 

oh, bummer devil_face.gif


lolololo...


well, really - that:

>Well, I fully agree that all players don't sound identical...but he claims that FLAC doesn't sound as good as WAV...I'd say that it'd require a truckload of measurements to back up this kind of placebo ridden impression.


we'd even go for someone distinguishing between foobar and lolbar in a blind test biggrin.gif ...
Reply
post #17 of 34
9/5/11 at 11:39pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dradder View Post

 

For those who are interested, pkshan's put up the 5.0 version of his Foobar2000 HE project:

 

http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_72b3301c0100rvot.html

 

I'm puzzled by reports from others that they've been able to get FLAC files running on this player: 1) I haven't been able to do it yet, and 2) pkshan doesn't indicate that his player supports FLAC. This from the "readme" text file that comes with the player:
 
Supported formats:
foobar2000 HE wav     = wav
foobar2000 HE cue wav = cue/wav
foobar2000 HE cd      = cdda
foobar2000 HE mp3     = mp3
 
Not seeing FLAC in that list. Is there a workaround that I don't know about?


Open "!foobar2000 config" Folder and run "foobar2000" application, that's all. (you can find that in components folder there is a FLAC and APE plugin that are working just fine)

 

 

Reply
post #18 of 34
9/6/11 at 10:46am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by DarKu View Post




Open "!foobar2000 config" Folder and run "foobar2000" application, that's all. (you can find that in components folder there is a FLAC and APE plugin that are working just fine)

 

 


I think you might want to take another look at the readme.txt file in pkshan's foobar2000 HE distribution. The foobar2000 application in the !foobar2000.config folder isn't meant to be used to play music files. It's just there to set the config file with your preferences, which then needs to be copied to the other folders in the distribution. Then the foobar2000 applications in those other folders are the ones you use to play music files. The foobar2000 application in the !foobar2000.config folder dates from 2004 and I don't believe it has any of pkshan's current modifications to the original foobar2000 application.

Reply
post #19 of 34
9/7/11 at 4:34pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by leeperry View Post

Well, I fully agree that all players don't sound identical...but he claims that FLAC doesn't sound as good as WAV...I'd say that it'd require a truckload of measurements to back up this kind of placebo ridden impression.


That CAN happen on very slow computers due to various background processes running at the same time. For instance, all cplay phylosophy is based on hardware optimization. As crazy as it may seem, it has some truth.

BUT with multicore processors, lets say from C2D up, the processing power needed to decompress a flac is so little that there shouldnt be perceived differences vs a wav. Anyway, removing the codec from a player is just plain stupid.

 

The author could have used instead a more intelligent approach like is done in xxhighend, that is to convert all files to wav prior to playback (i.e. not in realtime).

Reply
post #20 of 34
9/8/11 at 6:20am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Telstar View Post




That CAN happen on very slow computers due to various background processes running at the same time. For instance, all cplay phylosophy is based on hardware optimization. As crazy as it may seem, it has some truth.

BUT with multicore processors, lets say from C2D up, the processing power needed to decompress a flac is so little that there shouldnt be perceived differences vs a wav. Anyway, removing the codec from a player is just plain stupid.

 

The author could have used instead a more intelligent approach like is done in xxhighend, that is to convert all files to wav prior to playback (i.e. not in realtime).


most players have a decoder buffer (since flac on modern CPUs decodes a lot faster than realtime...Even for your good old pentium 4 or old core CPUs). There is no practical difference to converting to wav prior to playback, and the PCM output in the decoder buffer. For a lot of cases, FLAC is actually preferable, since you get a large IO saving reading 30-50% less from disk. There is absolutely nothing intelligent about converting all recordings to wav prior to playback or claiming buffered decoded to PCM FLAC sounds worse than buffered read from disk PCM WAV...

seriously... I've asked Tyll to post some measurements to show there is no practical difference in the output FR/THD+N/impulse response/IMD, but there really is no need for that. That said - be annoying, shoot him a PM on http://www.head-fi.org/user/tyll+hertsens (also asked him to measure WASAPI vs KS vs ASIO vs DS)
Reply
post #21 of 34
9/9/11 at 11:07pm

Flac won't sound as good as wav,

because additional processing time will cause jitter.

jitter is the biggest sound killer in digital audio

 

You may do a test by yourself:

Make 2 flacs, one uses level 8 compression,the other one uses level 1 compression.

Listen them carefully, you may hear the difference...


Edited by pkshan - 9/9/11 at 11:10pm
Reply
post #22 of 34
9/10/11 at 1:03am
Quote:
Originally Posted by pkshan View Post

Flac won't sound as good as wav,

because additional processing time will cause jitter.

jitter is the biggest sound killer in digital audio

 

You may do a test by yourself:

Make 2 flacs, one uses level 8 compression,the other one uses level 1 compression.

Listen them carefully, you may hear the difference...

We hear you, but still, a lot of us are using Flac as their main music format, myself included. Can you make a Foobar HE version where Flac will work too ?

That will be Awesome !
 

 


Edited by DarKu - 9/10/11 at 1:05am
Reply
post #23 of 34
9/10/11 at 1:06am

This is incorrect. The processing required to extract data from the compressed FLAC file has nothing to do with the actual bit stream that is being send to the DAC. The DAC receives the exact same stream from FLAC and from WAV. If you think you're hearing a difference you are most likely experiencing bias. Try doing an honest blind ABX comparison between FLAC (of any compression level) and WAV.
 

Quote:
Originally Posted by pkshan View Post

Flac won't sound as good as wav,

because additional processing time will cause jitter.

jitter is the biggest sound killer in digital audio

 

You may do a test by yourself:

Make 2 flacs, one uses level 8 compression,the other one uses level 1 compression.

Listen them carefully, you may hear the difference...



 

Reply
post #24 of 34
9/10/11 at 1:48am
Quote:
Originally Posted by DarKu View Post



We hear you, but still, a lot of us are using Flac as their main music format, myself included. Can you make a Foobar HE version where Flac will work too ?

That will be Awesome !
 

 


 

I've made an APE plugin & tested it.

Without  optimization, it sounds worse than foobar2000 HE mp3

I guess even the APE plugin is fully optimized, it will sound just like a MP3...

 

You may convert your flac collections to wav using foobar diskwriter, it's fast.

http://translate.google.com.hk/translate?hl=en&ie=UTF8&prev=_t&sl=zh-CN&tl=en&u=http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_72b3301c0100rvor.html

Reply
post #25 of 34
9/10/11 at 1:52am

APE sounds like MP3? Seriously, where are you getting this totally misleading, unsubstantiated crap? If you mention the word "jitter" in your answer I may be forced to throw something at you. (totally nonapplicable here, even moreso than normal)

Reply
post #26 of 34
9/10/11 at 12:02pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Willakan View Post

APE sounds like MP3? Seriously, where are you getting this totally misleading, unsubstantiated crap? If you mention the word "jitter" in your answer I may be forced to throw something at you. (totally nonapplicable here, even moreso than normal)


Due to language issues, it's hard sometimes to tell exactly what's being said here. But what I believe pkshan is saying is that with his foobar2000 HE player, an optimized APE plug-in won't sound as good as the player playing a WAV file, similar to the way that with his player, a MP3 file doesn't sound as good as playing a WAV file. Whether that's true or not is another issue, but technically speaking, I don't think he's saying that in all circumstances an APE file sounds like an MP3 file. 

 

Reply
post #27 of 34
9/10/11 at 12:31pm

Well, that's his player after all: no FLAC/APE support, no VST plugins. He can believe what he wants and mod his player as he sees fit.

Reply
post #28 of 34
9/10/11 at 5:06pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by leeperry View Post

Well, that's his player after all: no FLAC/APE support, no VST plugins. He can believe what he wants and mod his player as he sees fit.


That's kind of the way I see it. I use pkshan's crazy little player on a regular basis and enjoy it quite a lot, but I keep a regular version of foobar and a couple of other players on my machine for those times when I don't want to bother with the whole PITA-ness of it. And I'd be the first to say that the differences between them are slight.

 

Reply
post #29 of 34
9/14/11 at 12:58pm
Thread Starter 

 

For those who are interested, pkshan's put up the 6.0 version of his Foobar2000 HE project:

 

http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_72b3301c0100rvot.html

 

Still has the eccentric negatives that so endear him to our hearts: no FLAC or VST support, user-hostile interface, etc. That being said, I'm listening to it right now and it does seem to sound good. Whether the marginal difference between it and stock foobar, if any, is worth an effort on your part -- only you can decide.

Reply
post #30 of 34
11/16/11 at 12:01pm
Thread Starter 

 

For those who are interested, the enigmatic pkshan's put up the 6.3 version of his Foobar2000 HE project:

 

http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_72b3301c0100rvot.html

 

Still bare bones, no FLAC or VST support, user-hostile interface, etc., etc...

 

At the same time, I think he might be on to something. Still one of my favorite foobar implementations. YMMV.

Reply
New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:
  Return Home
  Back to Forum: Computer Audio
Head-Fi.org › Forums › Equipment Forums › Computer Audio › Latest Version of pkshan's Foobar HE Project