Squeezebox and flac

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Polkitup2
Polkitup2 Posts: 1,644
edited August 2008 in Electronics
I was wondering if anyone had tried using a squeezebox with flac files? If so, what tool do you use to copy your CD's to flac files on your harddrive? Any comments on the sound quality of a squeezebox playing flac files would be appreciated. Just wondering whether this was worth pursuing for a high quality music server.
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  • heiney9
    heiney9 Posts: 25,620
    edited June 2007
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    Polkitup2 wrote: »
    I was wondering if anyone had tried using a squeezebox with flac files? If so, what tool do you use to copy your CD's to flac files on your harddrive? Any comments on the sound quality of a squeezebox playing flac files would be appreciated. Just wondering whether this was worth pursuing for a high quality music server.

    Flac Frontend. The squeeze box has very mediocre (Wolfson) dac. It's alright but an outboard unit is suggested if you want great fidelity. Other than that the Squeezebox is a nifty little unit. The fact that it can play FLAC's is BIG bonus and the rest is great (except IMO the dac), but you could do worse. Very worthwhile to use as a music server.

    I've posted before, but my bro has a seperate computer server with 1 terabyte of storage space and the hard drives are in raid aaray so one drive is a parity drive if anything goes down he can recover all the data. He has almost all his 3500 cds ripped as FLAC files and uses this server to feed 3 squeeze boxes (wireless) through out his house all systems having a seperate dac instead of using the built in one form the squeezebox.

    Here's a link to the FLAC program

    http://flac.sourceforge.net/download.html

    H9
    "Appreciation of audio is a completely subjective human experience. Measurements can provide a measure of insight, but are no substitute for human judgment. Why are we looking to reduce a subjective experience to objective criteria anyway? The subtleties of music and audio reproduction are for those who appreciate it. Differentiation by numbers is for those who do not".--Nelson Pass Pass Labs XA25 | EE Avant Pre | Holo Audio Cyan 2 Dac | MIT Shotgun S1 | Puritan Audio PSM136 Pwr Condtioner & Classic PC's | Legend L600 | Roon Nucleus 1 w/LPS - Tubes add soul!
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  • Gaara
    Gaara Posts: 2,415
    edited June 2007
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    I personally just started recently using a squeezebox and found it an amazing value. I use exact audio copy to rip music and all my research seemed to point to it as being one of the best programs to rip music. You can download a plugin that automatically converts the ripped wav files to FLAC.

    Jared
    The Basement HT
    PC Rig
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  • heiney9
    heiney9 Posts: 25,620
    edited June 2007
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    Gaara wrote: »
    I personally just started recently using a squeezebox and found it an amazing value. I use exact audio copy to rip music and all my research seemed to point to it as being one of the best programs to rip music. You can download a plugin that automatically converts the ripped wav files to FLAC.

    Jared


    EAC is the BEST period! for ripping cd tracks. I also didn't know they had a plug in to rip straight to FLAC, that will save me some time, good to know :) .
    "Appreciation of audio is a completely subjective human experience. Measurements can provide a measure of insight, but are no substitute for human judgment. Why are we looking to reduce a subjective experience to objective criteria anyway? The subtleties of music and audio reproduction are for those who appreciate it. Differentiation by numbers is for those who do not".--Nelson Pass Pass Labs XA25 | EE Avant Pre | Holo Audio Cyan 2 Dac | MIT Shotgun S1 | Puritan Audio PSM136 Pwr Condtioner & Classic PC's | Legend L600 | Roon Nucleus 1 w/LPS - Tubes add soul!
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  • Polkitup2
    Polkitup2 Posts: 1,644
    edited June 2007
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    Thanks for the input guys. I currently use a denon 3910 and listen to a lot of SACD CDs and don't really want to give up much in fidelity. So maybe an external DAC would be the way to go.
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  • scottdwagner
    scottdwagner Posts: 106
    edited June 2007
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    This has everything you need:

    http://wiki.slimdevices.com/index.cgi?EACBeginners

    I used apple lossless given that I don't want to have to transcode to use our ipods and using itunes is much easier to get the correct file hieararchy and tags. Not natively supported by squeezebox, but it works just fine transcoding on the fly. Good choice...I love my squeezebox.
    Monitor Audio GR 60, GR10, GRLCR
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    Parasound Model 5250
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  • heiney9
    heiney9 Posts: 25,620
    edited June 2007
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    Polkitup2 wrote: »
    So maybe an external DAC would be the way to go.

    No harm in listening to the built in dac in the Squeezbox first but I think an outboard dac is the way to go, especially if are used to the sound of the 3910.
    "Appreciation of audio is a completely subjective human experience. Measurements can provide a measure of insight, but are no substitute for human judgment. Why are we looking to reduce a subjective experience to objective criteria anyway? The subtleties of music and audio reproduction are for those who appreciate it. Differentiation by numbers is for those who do not".--Nelson Pass Pass Labs XA25 | EE Avant Pre | Holo Audio Cyan 2 Dac | MIT Shotgun S1 | Puritan Audio PSM136 Pwr Condtioner & Classic PC's | Legend L600 | Roon Nucleus 1 w/LPS - Tubes add soul!
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  • scottdwagner
    scottdwagner Posts: 106
    edited June 2007
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    I have found the DAC in the squeezebox to be not bad at all. If you're going to use an external DAC, why not spring for the transporter?
    Monitor Audio GR 60, GR10, GRLCR
    Velodyne HGS18
    Emotiva MMC-1
    Parasound Model 5250
    Denon DVD-3800
    Pioneer pdp-5070
    Secondary HT with B&W CDM-NTs all around and Rotel Separates (thanks Venom!)
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  • Polkitup2
    Polkitup2 Posts: 1,644
    edited June 2007
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    Something to look at for sure. I think it costs $1999
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  • mldennison
    mldennison Posts: 307
    edited June 2007
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    boulder cable company also does some modifications to the squeezebox:
    http://www.boldercables.com/servlet/Search?category=MODIFICATIONS
    these are more economical than the transporter and seem to get very good reviews.
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  • Gaara
    Gaara Posts: 2,415
    edited June 2007
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    polkitup2,

    I compared my Pioneer Elite 47Ai to a Squeezebox with a Lite Audio DAC-AH and preferred the SB3 + DAC over the elite. Not sure how close they would match bit the Elite is supposed to be on par/better for cd playback then the 2900. If I remember correctly the 3910 was the replacement for the 2900.

    There are plenty of cheap DACs that you could go for which should be equal or better then your 3910 for CD playback, and cost less then the transporter. A few that come to mind would be Lite Audio, DIY Paradise, Scott Nixon, MHDT Labs, and Ack.

    Jared
    The Basement HT
    PC Rig
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  • wingnut4772
    wingnut4772 Posts: 7,519
    edited August 2008
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    Does anyone know how I can successfully do this with my Mac?
    Sharp Elite 70
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    Polk Atrium 7s on the patio just to keep my foot in the door.
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  • heiney9
    heiney9 Posts: 25,620
    edited August 2008
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    wingnut4772 wrote: »
    Does anyone know how I can successfully do this with my Mac?


    Ha,,,,,HA,,,,ROLFLMAO.......
























    Ok now that the tears have stopped.

    Look here:

    http://flac.sourceforge.net/

    Not sure but since it's Apple and it's not "their" proprietary system I bet they will make it difficult.

    H9

    P.s. If no one else chimes in I'll check with my brother he will know for sure what you need to do and I'll post the info.
    "Appreciation of audio is a completely subjective human experience. Measurements can provide a measure of insight, but are no substitute for human judgment. Why are we looking to reduce a subjective experience to objective criteria anyway? The subtleties of music and audio reproduction are for those who appreciate it. Differentiation by numbers is for those who do not".--Nelson Pass Pass Labs XA25 | EE Avant Pre | Holo Audio Cyan 2 Dac | MIT Shotgun S1 | Puritan Audio PSM136 Pwr Condtioner & Classic PC's | Legend L600 | Roon Nucleus 1 w/LPS - Tubes add soul!
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  • bigaudiofanatic
    bigaudiofanatic Posts: 4,415
    edited August 2008
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    For a mac save yourself some trouble get a apple tv make it a whole lot easier on yourself. There is a program that allows you to play any type of format on the apple tv I will have to look it up but its very easy to use. Just forgot the name of it.
    HT setup
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  • jmwest1970
    jmwest1970 Posts: 846
    edited August 2008
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    I use MAX, Macintosh Audio for OSX to rip my CDs. Also, If you want to play flac files in Itunes, I use Fluke to import them. I still use SqueezeCenter to serve the files to my Squeezebox.
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