Saved FLAC files increase in size

[Apesbrain]

I still run into situations where this is confusing. Maybe changing the way it is labeled in "Preferences" would help.

Rather than "Real-time Conversion" and "High-quality Conversion", the labels should describe what is actually happening such as "Playback" and "Export". That way I wouldn't need to look at the online manual every time I can't remember what the current labels mean. Thanks.

[steve]

Rather than "Real-time Conversion" and "High-quality Conversion", the labels should describe what is actually happening such as "Playback" and "Export". That way I wouldn't need to look at the online manual every time I can't remember what the current labels mean. Thanks.

"Real-time Conversion" is any time you are playing or recording in Audacity. This includes:

• Normal playback
• Recording
• Overdubbing
• Play at speed
• Previewing effects

In short, it is any time that the conversion is done on the fly while playing or recording.


"High-quality Conversion" is used whenever converting the sample depth "off-line" (not playing). This includes:

• Exporting
• Resampling
• Mix and Render
• Mixing down stereo to mono
• Applying an effect in a situation where sample rate / format conversion is required

In short, the "High-quality Conversion" settings are used any time the sample rate / format conversion is required "except for" when converting in real time.


Normally you can leave both of these settings at their defaults (recommended).

The only time that there is any value in changing the default settings is if you are working with lossless formats, and you are not applying any processing and you are not changing the amplitude, and you are not modifying either the track Gain or Pan, and you are dealing with only one track in the project, and you are using lower than 32-bit float format, and you need the exported file to be sample accurate. In all other cases, use the defaults.


Arguably we could now remove the "real-time" settings because the resampling library that Audacity now uses is more efficient than the old one, so the default settings should work well for everyone and never need changing.

[Apesbrain]

Thanks for your reply. Maybe then:

"Recording & Playback"

"Editing, Processing & Export"

I do often use Audacity in the case you described: trimming a lossless file of excess head/tail and exporting it back to lossless. I always turn dither off when doing so.

[steve]

"Recording & Playback"

It's a little more complex than that. In the case of recording, whether or not the real-time conversion settings are used depends on exactly how you are recording, what you are recording, and the capabilities of the sound-card drivers. In the "usual case", Audacity doesn't do any conversion when recording, but in "some" cases (for example, recording from Stereo Mix when the "play" source is a higher format than the recording target), Audacity "may" need to perform a conversion. IF that conversion has to be done on the fly ("real time"), then the real-time settings will be used. If the conversion can be deferred to an "off-line" conversion, then the "High Quality" settings will be used.

What it comes down to is not the specific task that is being performed, but whether that task requires a format conversion to be performed in real-time (on the fly).

Personally I think that a better approach would not concern preferences at all, but rather to provide an option in the Export dialog to disable dither.

[Apesbrain]

Personally I think that a better approach would not concern preferences at all, but rather to provide an option in the Export dialog to disable dither.

Ok, there you have it!