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In Reply to: RE: cPlay 2.0b27 Released posted by cics on June 15, 2009 at 08:37:20
I had upgraded cPlay from b15 to b27 (I know I am a bit lazy but I was away from my main system until a week ago) and the different is huge. The sound I am getting now is very close to the analogue (LP with Infinity RS1) sound twenty years ago. Thanks to cics for getting me close to what I have been missing for so long, the emotion of the music.
I have been trying out the FLAC option in cPlay last night and am totally puzzled! The sound is quite different from WAV from which the FLAC file was derived. I expected that the difference would be minor and that WAV would sound better. On the contrary, the difference is quite noticeable on the get go and what is most surprising, FLAC sounded better, more analog! (There is one case-Joni Mitchell's big band version of 'Both Sides Now' which I haven't decided yet on which is the better version. But the difference is there.)
Does anyone have the same experience or am I just delusional? And can someone explain the difference in sound? I thought the FLAC file was first decoded when load and that would not be any difference at all.
I have given the system another listen this morning and discovered another recording that I prefer WAV over FLAC: Van Morrison's Astral Weeks (Remastered)--Japan import only. My guess is that:
-- there is more high frequency content in WAV playback (easily detectable but why?)
-- less high frequency in FLAC renders some recordings more analogue sounding
But why is there difference between WAV and FLAC playback?
Jumping from b15 to b27 is massive! Analogue together with recreating that natural "un-electrified" sound remains the only reference - doing 192k SRC output of 44.1k material to an external high-end DAC is very special and pure...
Depending on mobo / CPU / RAM setup and power supply, FLAC will have an impact. cPlay decodes all FLAC material into RAM before playback (thus ensuring exact same audio data). FLAC decoding is however intensive ito CPU load. This intensive decoding process should be seen as a severe electrical storm being unleashed. We get a large PS load being generated. How your PSU and mobo setup handles this will affect SQ thereafter. All my music is stored in WAV thus avoiding this issue. A way to reduce this PS spike (which can last several seconds) and its "after effects" is to cap your CPU, i.e. set maximum CPU frequency to lowest stable level ~900MHz.
By turning off alias in SOX, I find the 'electronic' sound of WAV files playback deminishes
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