Submitted by Fitz Music on Mon, 01/11/2010 - 11:51
I recently purchased a few FLAC album downloads from Hyperion Records in the UK. All the tracks displayed noise, a kind of rasping or sandpapering static. To test my connections I bought a FLAC album from the Deutsche Grammophon site; the sound was as good as a CD gets. Has anyone else experienced problems downloadiing from Hyperion? I corresponded with the company, but received only a deflective response.
I download my first track from hyperion earlier today. I've only listened to it once and heard similiar to what you described. I thought it was a microphone picking stuff up. I have no other recordings by them so its hard to say. Will listen again later. What reply did they give?
I received the following response from Hyperion, replied with as much information as I had, but received no further communication from them:
We are testing this file as I write but it would be useful, since we
have found no problem so far - to have from you exact timings of where
there is distortion in this track. And also to give the exact file name
and size of the track 3 you are playing so we can check it's identical
to what we've supplied.
I received an attentive response today from Hyperion. In an attempt to identify the problem, they forwarded to me two FLAC files of the track I initially reported to them as the most distorted, and a WAV file from the CD itself. When I played the FLAC files, both exhibited the noise I complained about (which turns up in every FLAC album I've downloaded from Hyperion). The WAV file was clean and clear. Something's going on with the FLAC downloads that is beyond my non-technical grasp. As I mentioned earlier, FLAC downloads from other sites are noise-free.
Out of frustration, I tried converting the FLAC files from my initial purchase to WAV format, and voila! the rasp and hash disappeared. Does anyone have an idea of what's going on? I'm dabbling in downloads in pursuit of music, not gadget entanglement and annoyance. Nothing's as easy as the theory, is it?
Your symptoms suggest that the flac decoder in whatever software you are using to play the files is not working correctly.
Have you downloaded Hyperion's test files and if so do they exhibit the same issue?
Perhaps you might download foobar2000 (free and perhaps one of the best software music players available) and try the files again.
Hyperion's test files play OK for me.
And yes, nothing is ever simple.......
Take care,
Baxtus
...but FLAC files I download from Deutsche Grammophon and Linn decode without noisy artifacts. That's why I suspect the flaw is at Hyperion's end. Alas, I'm working in the Apple domain, for good or ill, and Foobar is not, I think, applicable. In addition, CDs that I convert to FLAC with my device, an Olive 4HD, play without complaint. I use the digital out from the Olive into a Bel Canto DAC3 to play the files.
I had hoped that the Olive was a simple way to get into digital downloads while waiting for the dust to settle around the many, often contradictory, methods, the fussbudgetry, caveats, maybes, and don'ts that distract from my goal: getting good music in superior formats. So, for the moment, I'm taking out a little plastic disc, an SACD, and listening to the music, not the prattle, rattle, and noise.
fm
I suspect that your player's FLAC decoder is old. I have had problems playing FLAC files encoded with a newer encoder when the player's decoder was old. Hyperion probably uses a newer encoder while DG probably uses an older encoder. The decoder you used to convert FLAC to WAV must be newer than your playback decoder and hence it did not have noise.
Thanks, Sound Guy for your suggestion about an outdated FLAC decoder. I decided to try playing the Hyperion files through my Sonos system, which I use for casual listening. The files played without the offending noise. So, it seems the problem lies with Olive 4HD and its handling of the FLAC files, which is annoying since the Olive has only been on the market for a couple of months. -fm
To put a proper full stop on this discussion: Both Hyperion and Olive have been attentive and communicative about this problem, with Olive finally realizing that something was amiss within their device. A solution, they assure me will be pursued.
Hyperion, a company that has produced marvelous, award-winning recordings through the years, has been especially interested--and guiltless. They've sent me altered, re-encoded, personalized test files (which the Olive still wouldn't decode properly) and offered to re-send their files in the altered encoding. But the generous offer is not necessary; the Hyperion files are properly made; the Olive machine needs a bit of work.
-fm