Quality differences after ripping

[Tel19]

I have just started ripping my CD collection and I am finding that I can hear a drop in quality between the original CD and the rip to FLAC. Is this just because the DAC in the CD player is different from the one in the sound card on the computer or do I need to tweak the settings while ripping to improve the quality?

Thanks

[jultsu]

Re: Quality differences after ripping

Is this just because the DAC in the CD player is different from the one in the sound card

Most probably yes, but listing out your audio setup would help tremendously.

[garym]

Re: Quality differences after ripping

FLAC is lossless. So it will sound the same as the original CD. But of course, as jultsu noted, you'd have to be playing the FLAC through the same DAC and playback system as the CD in order to actually compare. My computer playback via PC soundcard doesn't sound near as good as listening to the same files on my main system. Also, when comparing make sure you keep volume the same in both playbacks. Even an imperceptible higher volume on playback can make the higher volume audio be perceived as "better".

[Tel19]

Re: Quality differences after ripping

Both the CD player and the computer are playing through the same system (Denon amp, Celestion Ditton 33 speakers) the only difference is the DAC. They are both attached to a Numac mixer, the CD via standard HQ phono and the computer via USB (so the Numac mixer is providing the DAC from the computer, not a sound card).

I am asking the question because I have ripped the original CD and downloaded 2 or 3 different FLAC rips (presumably also from the original CD but ripped by different software and hardware) and can hear the difference between the FLAC versions (and of course this is using the same DAC to play each).

[garym]

Re: Quality differences after ripping

Both the CD player and the computer are playing through the same system (Denon amp, Celestion Ditton 33 speakers) the only difference is the DAC. They are both attached to a Numac mixer, the CD via standard HQ phono and the computer via USB (so the Numac mixer is providing the DAC from the computer, not a sound card).

I am asking the question because I have ripped the original CD and downloaded 2 or 3 different FLAC rips (presumably also from the original CD but ripped by different software and hardware) and can hear the difference between the FLAC versions (and of course this is using the same DAC to play each).

very strange. Try playing them all through the same DAC, volume leveled. Note that many CD players have "hot" outputs that increase volume over other sources.

[mville]

Re: Quality differences after ripping

Both the CD player and the computer are playing through the same system (Denon amp, Celestion Ditton 33 speakers) the only difference is the DAC. They are both attached to a Numac mixer, the CD via standard HQ phono and the computer via USB (so the Numac mixer is providing the DAC from the computer, not a sound card).

The CD player DAC and the Numac DAC are different, hence you are hearing the difference between the 2 DACs. The Numac mixer is getting an analog source from the CD and (I assume) a digital source from the PC via USB.

I am asking the question because I have ripped the original CD and downloaded 2 or 3 different FLAC rips (presumably also from the original CD but ripped by different software and hardware) and can hear the difference between the FLAC versions (and of course this is using the same DAC to play each).

So to confirm, you have 3 flac versions of the same album? These may be different releases though, of the same album e.g. remastered vs. non-remastered versions. To check whether the flacs are originating from the same audio files, download and install the Calculate Audio CRC utility codec. Then, using dBpoweramp Batch Converter, run this against the flac files and a temporary CRC32/MD5 text file is displayed. The CRC is generated from the audio data and if the audio files are identical, the CRC will be identical.

[Tel19]

Re: Quality differences after ripping

Thanks for the comments. I hadn't thought about different releases of the same album; that is almost certainly why the various FLAC downloads sound different.

I have been playing with the settings on each channel of the mixer and now have both the CD version and the ripped FLAC version sounding almost identical. I think they are never going to sound exactly the same because of the different DACs but the quality is now close enough that I am satisfied that the FLAC version is a suitable replacement for the original CD.

Thanks again for the suggestions.

[jultsu]

Re: Quality differences after ripping

Some rips might have replaygain enabled on them.