"JoeSpareBedroom" wrote in
:

Just the word "flac" sounds like something you'd wipe off the floor
with a big wad of paper towels, and then spray with Lysol just to be
safe.



Actually FLAC, (Free Lossless Audio Codec), an opensource project across
the planet housed at http://flac.org/ is a wonderful audio product. You
can download and add FLAC to about any computer. They even have a nice
player if you want a different one.

What's neat about FLAC is if you encoded an audio file into FLAC, then
decode it back into the audio file you started with, you get an EXACT
duplicate of what you started with....right to the single BIT! It's
perfect. That won't happen with MP3.

That said, it's crazy to use it unless you're encoding directly from the
audio console at Carnegie Hall of some amazing symphonic concert and
simply MUST have every crazy harmonic, noise and sneeze the audience can
make. Flac is superior to 44.1 Khz encoding on a CD, which does
"distort" the music 99.99% of the humans would never hear or sense.

But this is about BOATS.....BOATS with ****ty little speakers hooked to a
crap boat stereo in little acoustic disaster cutouts in a hollowed out
plastic box or crappy little Boze tinyspeakers hung under a shelf in a
cabin that, acoustically, is like listening to music in a 55 gallon oil
drum!

I mean......what's the point?!

Test my hypothesis for yourselves. Take your favorite CD and rip it to a
set of MP3s at DIFFERENT sample rates. Make some song encoded at 32Kbps,
64Kbps, 128Kbps, 256Kbps all mixed up from all the songs. Put the mixed
up MP3 disk into your MP3 player on the boat speakers and play it for the
onboard drunks. See if any of them notice the difference....they won't,
even if they're not drunk. Actually if you make it a point to tell them
about this experiment, I bet most of them will appreciate the 32K MP3
songs the most because it does dull out some of the highs, effectively
boosting the bass and giving you a "rounder" sound like an old tube amp
used to...deadening the damned boat's oil drum acoustics and making those
****ty little white boat speakers HAVE a little bass, instead of a buzz!

If you encode at 16K or 22K, the music sounds about like AM radio
rounding out the highs even better.

Now, figure out what encoding sample rate everyone likes the best and
encode ALL the music you use on the boat like that! You'll be AMAZED at
how much music you can put on a CDR at 32K! It'll play all day without
swapping disks with lots of albums to SHUFFLE with so you don't HAVE to
listen to a WHOLE album of Yanny all at once in FLAC, which DRIVES ME
CRAZY! You won't even need that stupid CD changer you can't find a place
to hide from the water that will destroy it.

After 2 beers, 16K sounds just as good as 320K or perfect
FLAC!....especially when there are 20 albums to shuffle on ONE disk!!
Write the GENRE of each of the 3 disks the boat now carries on the CDR.
Take the changer and those huge disk carriers home. Drink another beer to
thank me for curing this other insanity....on a BOAT!

Larry
--
I bought a MotoROKR Z6M Sellphone from Alltel that has a 2GB microSD card
and fairly nice, but simple, MP3 player in it. Its speakers suck. Moto
finally put a STANDARD stereo headphone jack on the tiny phone so I can
plug in my tiny FM transmitter to it. I'm on 88.3 if you like light
classic rock and Carolina Beach Music made to squish the sand between
your toes dancing in the sand.

I load up the Z6M and put a fresh AAA alkaline in the transmitter before
going on anyone's boat. Fed up listening to the opera after a couple of
hours, after the group has mellowed on libations, I say, "Have you heard
the new station on 88.3 FM?", much to the relief of everyone else aboard.
Without drawing attention to myself, I put my hand in my pocket to turn
on the FM transmitter and punch PLAY on the phone.

The music goes on in SHUFFLE for all 800-1000 tunes for hours to the
delight of everyone groovin' around on board. Mixed in with the music, I
put some jingles it stumbles upon a friend sent me from WABC Engineering.
They all look at me funny when the "radio" comes on with the 1970's
station jingles...."Seventy Seven, W-A-B-C!....The station with the happy
diffffffrence!" The Les Paul/Mary Ford Riengold Beer commercials always
get a grin from us old folks. They also sold Robert Hall discount
clothes.

As the night wears on, as I sail with an older crowd usually, a nice
Jackie Gleason Orchestra program of dreamy love songs winds down the
onboard festivities with close dancing some couples haven't done in
years, barefooted on deck against the backdrop of Charleston Harbor at
night....as we motor quietly into the marina, the envy of the whole
assemblage on the docks........(c