Is Flac overkill for portables?

[buddyjay]

I was going to invest in a new portable that supports flac but some say that this is overkill for portables. That you won't hear any differance in SQ. Is this true?
Also, if there is NO differance why is it supported in some portables? Thanks.

[Spoon]

Re: Is Flac overkill for portables?

Most people would no be able to head a difference between 160Kbps mp3 and the CD, even on a good hifi.

[LtData]

Re: Is Flac overkill for portables?

It's supported in portables probably for marketing purposes (our player supports this, their player doesn't) or because some people only want to use FLAC for whatever reason.

[buddyjay]

Re: Is Flac overkill for portables?

It's supported in portables probably for marketing purposes (our player supports this, their player doesn't) or because some people only want to use FLAC for whatever reason.

Am I right in assuming that even with quality headphones on a portable you are NOT going to hear a differance between 128k-320k mp3 and flac recordings?

[Teknojnky]

Re: Is Flac overkill for portables?

Its nice to be supported so that you don't have to worry about taking the time to transcode to your device or having to maintain both lossless and lossy files. Of course there is the price you pay, in used space.

[LtData]

Re: Is Flac overkill for portables?

Also, playing FLAC files on your player results in lower battery life, as instead of 4-5 files or more fitting in the RAM buffer on the player, you get about 1 song, thereby making the HDD spin up more. Also, you can put fewer songs on your player, since FLAC files are bigger.

Also, you are correct, people will probably not hear the difference between 320kbps mp3 and FLAC. However, the 128kbps example is a little more iffy, as some people can hear the difference between 128kbps mp3 and 320kbps mp3, for example.