2. digital
  3. 181788-178702

Converting my CD Collection from .FLAC to .WAV

Lately I have begun converting my CD collection from .flac files to uncompressed .wav files. on the theory that doing away with a computing step in my transport and dac might improve playback sound. In some cases it does so quite unequivocally. Especially, there is a slight de-glaring of female vocals and horns. James Taylor's voice on October Road is now less shouty. Listening in general feels more relaxed and paced. SRV's guitar jangle is less rankling at times. Julian Bream's lute is less smacking.

Most of the websites from which I download files now offer only MP3 and.flac. In the old days they offered .wav too - understandble since download time and server space cost money.

What say you, knaves?

bolong
designsfx
794 posts
 

Heard this argument since FLAC began- any form of file compression (math theory or not) is no longer truly lossless. Rip to WAV- storage cost is not the concern it once was. 

bolong OP
617 posts
 

Ok - good comments. It needs to be reiterated here though that the proposed reason for converting to .wav is to theoretically eliminate the process of conversion in the transport or DAC - the idea being that the file conversion on the fly inside your gear is potentially adding noise.

designsfx
794 posts
 

What transport and Dac are you using now? Which is burdened with the conversion and what processors are in the circuit? Depending on how the circuit is designed it may not handle this extra step without robbing you of something else (which you’ve eluded to). Are you only talking about digital downloads or previous CD rips? 

bolong OP
617 posts
 

Digital downloads.

Jay's Audio CDT mk2 Transport

Denafrips Terminator R2R ladder Dac

 

designsfx
794 posts
 

Got it. You have nice equipment- should sound good. JRiver’s conversion to WAV is done in memory (as I’m sure you know) so as long as that requirement is met I don’t see it affecting your Dac. I agree that starting from WAV to begin with would be better as it eliminates the process entirely.

More to discover