Android HD audio playback issue, any suggestions?

[dougoftheabaci]

I'm kind of new to Android and so far the biggest pain-point has been pretty much anything to do with audio playback... I'm an iOS convert so almost all of my music is ALAC, including several albums I have that are 24/96.

 

I tried PowerAmp (seemed to be the most recommended audio app out there) but it played my 24/96 ALAC files at 1/3 the speed. Apparently there's a bug with how 24/96 files present themselves on Android? Has anyone come across this bug and is there a solution? This bug doesn't present itself in every player (Neutron), but some just refuse to play any sound at all (Google Music)! Any suggestions?

 

I still have other iOS devices so I can't just drop iTunes or convert all my ALAC files to something else.

 

OnePlus One, Cyanogen based on Android 4.4.

[_ASSASSIN_]

Try converting to flac, I know the stock 44S ROM natively supports 24-bit playback.

Just look for a desktop application to do it.

[dougoftheabaci]

Try converting to flac, I know the stock 44S ROM natively supports 24-bit playback.

Just look for a desktop application to do it.

 

As I said, I have other iOS devices so FLAC is off the table. Besides, I don't want the reduction in audio quality I'd get from re-encoding all my music.

[Mew]

I'm not entirely sure about this, but I recall Google Play music or whatever it's called lets you upload your own music and it'll convert it to 320kbps mp3 files to store on their servers so that you can stream it to your devices. The part I'm not sure is that if you wanted to download your uploaded music, if it let you download it as an mp3. If this works, you can use this as a ghetto way to convert your music lol.

[dfsdfgfkjsefoiqzemnd]

ALAC is a difficult format for non-apple devices due to Apple's DRM. Try some 24-69 FLAC files first. If the phone plays those fine, it's Apple's format or DRM that's causing the problem.

My M8 with Poweramp plays 24-96 FLAC files without a single hiccup, so I doubt that we'd need to look at Poweramp itself.

[dougoftheabaci]

If I can at all help it, I'd prefer to avoid a cloud-based system. The cloud is great for many things, but this tends to be one of those places it falls flat for me.

 

ALAC is a difficult format for non-apple devices due to Apple's DRM. Try some 24-69 FLAC files first. If the phone plays those fine, it's Apple's format or DRM that's causing the problem.
My M8 with Poweramp plays 24-96 FLAC files without a single hiccup, so I doubt that we'd need to look at Poweramp itself.

 

I was hoping the issue was with PowerAmp if only because other players seem to be OK. Though, the more I look into it the more what you say seems to be true and that most other systems just have built-in workarounds for ALAC stuff. Luckily, it seems like it's only the high-res stuff that's giving it trouble.

 

It seems in some ways iOS spoiled me. I have to tinker more to get Android where I want it. That being said, it's remarkably friendly to tinkering...

 

Since my original plan of getting something that would downsample the way iTunes can for iOS devices, I think tomorrow I'll do a bit of science and see if there's a way to give iTunes FLAC support and let it convert the files to iOS-friendly ones when I sync my iOS devices. If that works then that's a happy medium.

 

The open-source guy in me likes the idea of FLAC more than ALAC anyway (even if they're almost identical).

[Pomfinator]

The open-source guy in me likes the idea of FLAC more than ALAC anyway (even if they're almost identical).

Pls, ALAC shows dynamic bitrate in Foobar, therefore it's better. /s

 

Seriously though, the one thing that annoys me about FLAC is that it doesn't show that, even though I already know that lossless is inherently variable bitrate.  It'd be nice to know where the music is harder to compress.

[dougoftheabaci]

Seriously though, the one thing that annoys me about FLAC is that it doesn't show that, even though I already know that lossless is inherently variable bitrate.  It'd be nice to know where the music is harder to compress.

 

I thought ALAC files were CBR not VBR? I mean, I know they don't go for some target bitrate of #kbps but I didn't realize they used a true VBR.

[Pomfinator]

I thought ALAC files were CBR not VBR? I mean, I know they don't go for some target bitrate of #kbps but I didn't realize they used a true VBR.

Lossless by definition is VBR, it is has to be, you can't choose a single bitrate to compress something while keeping the filesize as low as possible.  If it wasn't VBR it wouldn't be worth using it over WAV or AIFF. ALAC tends to compress a little less, but in most 16/44 songs it makes 0.1-0.3MB of difference.

[dougoftheabaci]

Lossless by definition is VBR, it is has to be, you can't choose a single bitrate to compress something while keeping the filesize as low as possible.  If it wasn't VBR it wouldn't be worth using it over WAV or AIFF. ALAC tends to compress a little less, but in most 16/44 songs it makes 0.1-0.3MB of difference.

 

Do you mean true VBR where the bitrate changes from track to track or do you mean CBR where the stream is set to a maximum required bitrate (VBR vs. Faux-VBR)?

[Pomfinator]

Do you mean true VBR where the bitrate changes from track to track or do you mean CBR where the stream is set to a maximum required bitrate (VBR vs. Faux-VBR)?

True VBR, you're confusing ALAC's compression method with Apple's AAC encoder, which has a Constrained-VBR method as well as VBR and Constant.

[dougoftheabaci]

True VBR, you're confusing ALAC's compression method with Apple's AAC encoder, which has a Constrained-VBR method as well as VBR and Constant.

 

Ha, weird. Learn something new every day.

[Gala]

Ha, weird. Learn something new every day.

Maybe AIMP can play it? I play 24bit FLAC on my Snapdragon 200 Huawei without problems

[dougoftheabaci]

Maybe AIMP can play it? I play 24bit FLAC on my Snapdragon 200 Huawei without problems

 

I was able to get it to play in Neutron Music Player, but that's it. I was convinced that meant it was PowerAmp until Google Music refused to play them, too. Now my assumption is that there's something most Android apps don't like about ALAC.

[Pomfinator]

I was able to get it to play in Neutron Music Player, but that's it. I was convinced that meant it was PowerAmp until Google Music refused to play them, too. Now my assumption is that there's something most Android apps don't like about ALAC.

When I get home I'll try out some ALAC on my Nexus 5, see what happens.

[dougoftheabaci]

When I get home I'll try out some ALAC on my Nexus 5, see what happens.

 

Look forward to hearing your results. My task will be converting a problematic album to FLAC and seeing if it behaves.

 

Then, if so, figuring out how I'm going to convert 10,000 ALAC files to FLAC without having to re-import my entire iTunes library...

[Pomfinator]

Look forward to hearing your results. My task will be converting a problematic album to FLAC and seeing if it behaves.

 

Then, if so, figuring out how I'm going to convert 10,000 ALAC files to FLAC without having to re-import my entire iTunes library...

Alright, basically any music player that relies on HW decoding to playback music will be unable to play ALAC, strange considering ALAC is royalty-free, and even more strange since I know for a fact that Poweramp uses SW decoding.  I don't know about your 24/96 bug, cause FLACs work just fine.

 

So yeah...if you don't want to convert everything to AAC...well it's gonna be tricky.  IMO I would convert everything to 128k AAC in Foobar to a folder away from your main iTunes library and then Bittorrent Sync that folder to your phone, but that's me.

[dougoftheabaci]

Well, FLAC in iTunes is apparently not an option. At least not in Windows. I can't drop iTunes because I have too many other devices that rely on it. So there goes that plan...

 

I think I'm just going to have to downsample the albums in my library.