Serato Software Feature Suggestions

What features would you like to see in Serato software?

Codecs!!

tehfoiler 3:29 AM - 8 July, 2004
I myself love SSL but even after demoing it extensively, I still refuse to buy it, or its competetors, until we get some good lossless audio codecs for them.

FLAC and APE are both opensource, and the 2 best lossless codecs with the nerds of the net, so you know they are good. lol.

FLAC - flac.sourceforge.net
APE - www.monkeysaudio.com

Thanks, I hope you add them, then I have no more excuses not to buy SSL.
Serato
Josh 4:01 AM - 8 July, 2004
What about the Apple lossless encoder which came with a recent update to iTunes? That may be added at some stage.... Not sure about all the others.
SpinThis! 5:20 AM - 8 July, 2004
Wikkid... Apple's lossless would be great. I wouldn't mind seeing OGG either.
mrfett 6:03 AM - 8 July, 2004
Yes Apple Lossless would be FANTASTIC!
Serato, Forum Moderator
Steve W 6:38 AM - 8 July, 2004
OGG now has a BSD license allowing commercial use, so expect OGG in 1.2.
nik39 8:38 AM - 8 July, 2004
Quote:
OGG now has a BSD license allowing commercial use, so expect OGG in 1.2.

Great!
tehfoiler 3:16 PM - 8 July, 2004
Awesome. OGG is a right step in the right direction. I think FLAC is now under a BSD like license as well, not sure on its site it meantions the Xiph project and OGG. Will all OGG codecs be supported, since ogg is just a framework?
Serato, Forum Moderator
Steve W 9:10 AM - 9 July, 2004
I was using OGG as shorthand for Ogg Vorbis.

One important requirement for a format to work successfully within Scratch LIVE is sample accurate random access. Note that this is much more than the ability to pick up a stream part way through.
Stuart Ramdeen 10:06 PM - 12 July, 2004
would the ALAC encoder be considered? I'm about 60% through importing my entire DJ collection onto my powerbook and am strongly considering purchasing scratch live.

stu
tehfoiler 9:56 PM - 13 July, 2004
ALAC = Apple Lossless Audio Codec?

Also, I'm curious, if its not too time consuming to explain, you said the sample accurate random access, exactly what does that mean?

Thx.
Serato, Forum Moderator
Steve W 10:51 PM - 13 July, 2004
That means if Scratch LIVE needs to access a bunch of samples, starting from say number 125333, the codec can do it without needing to decode everything from the beginning of the file to get there.
DJ C-Zer 9:27 PM - 15 July, 2004
So the best idea is to not use MP3s and eventually move to lossless format? Hopefully this ALAC codec will be available for the windows vers. if it's not already. And a batch converter to convert all MP3s to this format. Some good input would be usefull if this is the way to go. I read somewhere that less CPU would be used because there is no more CPU time for reencoding the mp3s which makes sense. This would hopefully improve some delays in the graphics of the time line scroll.
nik39 9:49 PM - 15 July, 2004
You dont get better audiofiles if you reencode your mp3s to the ALAC format.
Serato
Josh 12:08 AM - 16 July, 2004
Quote:
I read somewhere that less CPU would be used because there is no more CPU time for reencoding the mp3s which makes sense.


This would be true of wav's and aiffs, lossless encoded files would still require decoding, just how much remains to be seen.

And re-encoding mp3s to ALAC would just give you giant files of the same quality.
Serato, Forum Moderator
Steve W 1:10 AM - 16 July, 2004
Quote:
So the best idea is to not use MP3s and eventually move to lossless format?

"Lossless" is orthogonal to "Sample accurate random access". It is easy to randomly access CBR MP3s, and relatively easy to access VBR MP3s (with a single pre-pass).
BadCompany 12:46 PM - 16 July, 2004
Quote:
"Lossless" is orthogonal to "Sample accurate random access".
... Steve Likes Math :D
tehfoiler 9:36 PM - 16 July, 2004
bah. I need to take clac. orthogonal means what in plain english?
Serato, Forum Moderator
Steve W 10:37 PM - 16 July, 2004
Quote:
orthogonal

adj. [from mathematics] Mutually independent; well
separated; sometimes, irrelevant to.
Stuart Ramdeen 11:39 PM - 20 July, 2004
the plan I have so far is to store the ALAC encoded files on my main machine (g4 dp 533) and the 192k/256k/whatever converted mp3 versions of them on my powerbook (which will be my SSL machine)
Eventually I'd love to store all of my audio files in one place (my 60GB iPod.... it's coming :-) )
So do you think Apple Lossless Audio Codec will ever be supported? I'm not sure about the technical implementations of the decoding. I know that due to the huge file sizes there would be increased reading from the HD, but if the entire song is loaded into ram first this wouldn't be a problem. I dunno, it's late and I'm off to bed.

probably to dream about ssl. oh no. it's begun.


stu
:)

ps, dictionary.com
;-)
I had to look it up too :-P
Serato, Moderator
AJ 12:46 AM - 21 July, 2004
Quote:
And re-encoding mp3s to ALAC would just give you giant files of the same quality.

To quote Bill Oakley of Shure "You can make roses smell like crap, but you can't make crap smell like roses."
tehfoiler 3:00 PM - 21 July, 2004
Stuart, I will be doing the same thing as you, except using FLAC instead of ALAC, and using Ogg Vorbis for the compressed versions instead of MP3. Open source owns you.
mrfett 7:12 PM - 21 July, 2004
uhhh... we won't be using anything other than uncompressed and MP3s until we figure out what Serato is gonna support :)

i understand the OSS appeal, but the Apple solution makes a lot more sense given the ease, flexibility, and cross platform nature of managing your stuff in iTunes (IMHO). For that reason, I'd prefer AAC and ALAC to Ogg and FLAC. Unless I was trying to rally support for a Linux SSL I guess ;)

Just AAC would be a huge benefit, I think.
Serato, Forum Moderator
Steve W 11:42 PM - 21 July, 2004
Ogg Vorbis support is already in 1.2. In the longer term the plan is to add support for Quicktime decoding and all its formats. We have also discussed making a codec plug-in API available so the GPL'd codecs we can't include can be made to work with Scratch LIVE.
mrfett 1:45 AM - 22 July, 2004
Wow Steve that's fantastic. Longer term = 6 months? v.1.5? heh hate to be a PITA... just curious.

my SSL is on the way, and i'm going to try converting my AACs to MP3s directly at first to see if the sound quality is bearable. i'm hoping that this will be a temporary fix, and that in 6 months or so i can switch back to the AACs. the thought of re-encoding everything from scratch to get better quality is just too painful right now. i was using the AACs with Sonophile, but the importing process is just too cumbersome, so i'm hoping SSL will get the job done proper. anyway thanks for the info, FWIW the frank communication here is a major selling point. i hope you continue the practice.
radish 4:13 AM - 22 July, 2004
Just to point out that Vorbis etc is a lot more "multi-platform" than the Apple-only ALAC. If (like me) you don't like iTunes, don't run a Mac and don't own an iPod, you can't use ALAC even if you want to. I can however playback Vorbis and FLAC on my Windows box, my Linux boxes, my Squeezebox wireless music player and my 20gb Rio Karma pocket player :)
mrfett 6:09 AM - 22 July, 2004
yeah i know. not trying to start a platform war or anything. i just prefer iTunes for its quick database and the integrated store. i know its not for everyone. anyway we'll all be happy soon apparently so it's a moot point :)
radish 2:59 AM - 23 July, 2004
yup :)
Stuart Ramdeen 2:58 PM - 23 July, 2004
the main thing is that it doesn't cost anyone any additional money to play the files. I think with AAC we'll have more than enough lossy codecs. Who realistically really uses anything other than 192k mp3 and 160k aac? Storage is SOOOO cheap these days that we don't need to worry about how many tunes we can stick on our 60GB ipod or 160GB external drive. I think all that is needed after aac is a great lossless codec and seeing that iTunes is such a great (and free) program and SSL integrates with it so well, it may as well be ALAC. Then again, that's if this is possible due to licensing. I'm not sure if ALAC is part of QT?

stu
:)
radish 8:14 PM - 23 July, 2004
> Who realistically really uses anything other than 192k mp3 and 160k aac?

Lots of people, I for one have over 50gb of ripped music and not one AAC file. It's mainly Vorbis and FLAC, with some mp3 because what's what beatport gives me.

The problem with buying into these non-open formats is that ALAC might be free (as in money) now and iTunes might be free (as in money) now, but we don't know they will be in the future. Let's say you convert your whole library to ALAC, and then in 2 years Apple decide to charge $100 for iTunes. What are you going to do? Pony up the cash? Personally, I'm happy that all my music is in a format that no-one can take away or charge me to play.

When it comes do data formats, the only good license is a totally open one.
Stuart Ramdeen 1:46 PM - 25 July, 2004
sorry, maybe I should of made it clearer that when I said "Who realistically really uses anything other than 192k mp3 and 160k aac?"
I was talking about lossy codecs only. Of course, we're all dying to see some sort of lossless capability in SSL.

s
SpinThis! 4:24 PM - 26 July, 2004
i say if you're worried about saving space, ogg is the way to go. FYI: if you're worried about ogg support in iTunes, there's a plugin that supports it. I know it's Mac-supported in iTunes; not sure about Windows.
Alexander 5:44 PM - 26 July, 2004
Was thinking about using OGG but I think I am going to lean towards AAC....any thoughts on this?
SpinThis! 6:39 PM - 26 July, 2004
IMHO, AAC is inferior to OGG sound-quality wise anyway. And from a developer's standpoint, AAC is somewhat of a "closed" format, with licensing issues among other things.

from what i can gather on the boards here, there aren't any plans to support AAC (unless they start supporting QuickTime as a "wrapper" format--which supports other formats). OGG support is SSL is more or less right around the corner (in 1.2 of SSL which is awesome news).
Alexander 7:11 PM - 26 July, 2004
I hear you that is why I am waiting...I am willing to try out OGG or AAC to see how it sounds compared to my AIFF for club use! Running out of room and I am soon going to have to get another external so I want to backup all my AIFFs to a big 500GB or 1TB in the future!

So you think OGG is the way to go? Looking for another DJs/Audiophile honest opinion. Also what program encodes OGG for OSX Panther....I have seen that there is a plugin for iTunes for OGG support as well which is a good thing since I use iTunes!

All I have to wait for is support on SSL. :)
Serato, Moderator
AJ 8:13 PM - 26 July, 2004
Try these for ogg tools...

www.versiontracker.com
Alexander 8:29 PM - 26 July, 2004
thanks AJ I will check it out.
SpinThis! 7:23 PM - 27 July, 2004
you can always burn dvds as well and then pop those in to keep things manageable. 500 gigs of music? i'd like to know why anyone would carry *that* much music.
Alexander 10:54 PM - 27 July, 2004
well not to carry....just to keep on a back-up drive since I would never want to get rid of my AIFF rips...but I guess I could use DVDs as well save some cash while I am at it.

P.S. I am sure I would not only have 500 gigs of music on that bad boy either. :)

Looks like I am going to go with OGG when SSL supports it.
tehfoiler 11:26 PM - 27 July, 2004
neato. I think I started the longest thread yet. :)
Alexander 11:48 PM - 27 July, 2004
Its a good topic to discuss....I guess....I think so anyway.
DJ Dynamight 4:06 PM - 28 July, 2004
Quote:
neato. I think I started the longest thread yet. :)


lol...I don't want to burst your bubble, but I think there is another thread that is a tad bit longer:

www.scratchlive.net

:-)
Stuart Ramdeen 12:13 AM - 23 September, 2004
i don't want to be a bitch but is there any kind of roadmap for integrating different codec support? I currently have two copies of each song on my powerbook. One in ALAC and one in 160k mp3 just so that it's 'usable' in ssl whilst I decide what to do for a more permanent solution.

My hard drive is full!!!!!!! :-)

I'm not sure whether or not to just say "fuck it" and convert everything to 256k mp3 and be done with it, (and hence have mp3s as my 'masters') or to wait a while longer to see if we get alac or flac or whatever.

ahh, the problems in life

s
Serato, Forum Moderator
Sam 12:24 AM - 23 September, 2004
Stuart, ALAC and FLAC have been suggested, and are being considered, but you wont see them any time soon.
Alexander 7:28 PM - 24 September, 2004
Stuart I would put those tracks on CD or even DVD if you can as backup. Just don't go to 256k MP3 as masters if you don't want to? So put the ALAC and FLAC on backup so you can free up some space and maybe in the future SSL will have more support for more compressed file types. Then you can decide what you want to do? Just my 2 cents. :)
nik39 7:53 PM - 24 September, 2004
What are the normal compression ratios on ALAC and FLAC approx.?
radish 9:05 PM - 24 September, 2004
FLAC gives you between 30% and 50% saving. In my experience with mainly dance music, it's at the low end of that, so an album will be approx 70% of it's original size after compression. I have no experience with ALAC sorry.
Stuart Ramdeen 1:11 AM - 29 September, 2004
well, forget that. I've just spent an hour trying to decide what to do. Here's what I did:

Got tracks from cd of varying styles of music. They were:

Michael Jackson - speechless
" " - Unbreakable
todd edwards - saved my life
The Meices - Ready, Steady, Go
Drill - What You Are

imported each one from cd as a direct rip. 16 bit 44k stereo. Then I made two copies of each original file and converted them with itunes as:

160k mp3 normal stereo
and
192k mp3 normal stereo

I then converted the mp3s back to aiffs ready to burn onto a normal audio cd.

I burnt two copies, put a copy in each of my cdj1000s and put my sennheiser hd25s on plugged into my djm600 mixer. I played the original aiff on one deck and then took turns in playing the 160 and 192k mp3 versions on the other. I synched up the position of both tunes and set the pitch to 0% in all cases. I played each song whilst flicking the crossfader between decks to see if I could tell any difference in the audio. I couldn't even tell the difference in the 160k version let alone the 192k one! If anything there was a TINY difference in teh 160k one but I think I was imagining it as I 'wanted it' to be noticable. The 192k one definitely fooled me.

I'm gonna try it tomorrow daytime when I can blast it all through my mackies (it's too late to do that now.. :-( ) and post if I hear any difference. I'm also gonna get my girlfriend to blindfold me (hey, stop right there you perverts) and ask her to flick the crossfader between decks to see if I can tell her which is compressed and which isn't.

I think I've got pretty good hearing. I know I have very good high frequency hearing as I'm always hearing whines or beeps and when I ask someone 'can you hear that?' they look at me like I'm mad. I can also always tell if a tv or computer monitor is on nearby from the very high frequency whine given off where none of my friends can. Could the iTunes mp3 encoder really be THAT good @ 160?

I may just forget all this flacalac nonsense and go 256k for everything.

time for bed. I'm rambling
:-)
s
Serato
Josh 1:15 AM - 29 September, 2004
Try listening to mp3s on some nice big electrostatic speakers.

It's unbelievable how bad they sound.

Lucky for us clubs are hardly audiophile heaven.
Stuart Ramdeen 1:28 AM - 29 September, 2004
I wish I were lucky enough to own some Martin Logans!
I never worked out how Joey and Chandler had enough dosh to have those (I only ever noticed one though) in their apartment....

A friend has quite a nice setup (audiolab pre & power, DPA little bit 3, arcam, tdl's etc) so I think I'll try it on his as well before I make a final decision

/goes off to dream about electrostatics
J-BRAVO 2:03 AM - 29 September, 2004
using the itunes encoder then playing it through a pioneer mixer does not a good test make.
Stuart Ramdeen 8:51 AM - 29 September, 2004
i know the pioneer series aren't exactly considered audiophile but I was trying to make a comparison between two files not on the quality of the equipment being used.
Another test I might do is rip the files to my computer from the burnt cd and connect up my midiman card straight to my monitors, bypassing the mixer. This may be a bit better.

ta
s
bartaug 9:11 AM - 29 September, 2004
Quote:
Try listening to mp3s on some nice big electrostatic speakers. It's unbelievable how bad they sound.

I checked out mp3s on decent nearfields (ADAM P22A) and found only the highest bitrate I could encode (320kbsec) good enough. Even then it's a bit different. Maybe start spinning with wav's when the next generation of HD's are there.
radish 3:55 PM - 29 September, 2004
FLAC would be better than WAV....
bartaug 5:35 PM - 29 September, 2004
Quote:
FLAC would be better than WAV....

With the speed drives getting larger it almost makes no sense anymore to compess...
nik39 5:53 PM - 29 September, 2004
Hm, well to me it makes a difference, right now WAV is way to large to store it efficiently. And whether I can store only 1000 or up to 2000 songs (assuming FLAC gives a compression ratio of 50%), that makes a huge difference.

Well I read today of a DVD sized media which could store about 1TB... That would be nice having ;-)
radish 8:26 PM - 29 September, 2004
Quote:
Quote:
FLAC would be better than WAV....

With the speed drives getting larger it almost makes no sense anymore to compess...

Close but not quite. My CD collection uncompressed would be close to 1tb. That's still large by todays standards :)
bartaug 6:41 AM - 30 September, 2004
Quote:
My CD collection uncompressed would be close to 1tb. That's still large by todays standards :)

Yes, that means about three external drives at the moment. Will probably be one in two years :-)
Alexander 5:58 PM - 30 September, 2004
Quote:
Quote:
My CD collection uncompressed would be close to 1tb. That's still large by todays standards :)

Yes, that means about three external drives at the moment. Will probably be one in two years :-)


and also add about 10 pounds to your record bag! :(
tehfoiler 8:23 PM - 30 September, 2004
You still have to compress for practicalness of the situation. FLAC, as I suggested in the start would probably the best choice in terms of a codec, since it's both Windows and OSX compatible, and its open source. open source = goodness.

I can't wait for ogg/vorbis support.
Serato
Josh 12:29 AM - 1 October, 2004
Anyone tried the apple lossless encoder? that's cross platform also isn't it?
bartaug 7:51 AM - 1 October, 2004
Quote:
Anyone tried the apple lossless encoder?

Does it give better compression as FLAC?
theBrooke 4:12 AM - 25 October, 2004
Ok I know this thread has been sitting for a while.. but I'm curious if anyone has any info on ALAC. I'm trying to decide how to handle my digital files. So far I like .aif, but it would be nice to have some sort of compression...
SpinThis! 1:12 PM - 25 October, 2004
ogg is supported now in 1.2.
Stuart Ramdeen 2:08 PM - 25 October, 2004
Quote:
Anyone tried the apple lossless encoder? that's cross platform also isn't it?

yep, it's cross platform and seems to work very well between mac and pc.

hint hint

:-D
s
radish 3:35 PM - 25 October, 2004
Quote:
ogg is supported now in 1.2.

Only on PC.
radish 3:36 PM - 25 October, 2004
Quote:
yep, it's cross platform and seems to work very well between mac and pc.

hint hint

Why choose that over the Free FLAC?
nik39 3:38 PM - 25 October, 2004
Plus its an open format...
Alexander 5:46 PM - 25 October, 2004
Quote:
Quote:
ogg is supported now in 1.2.

Only on PC.


:( :(
nik39 5:49 PM - 25 October, 2004
Alex, dont bother, its not officially supported in this version... and mac will be available as well (has been said by some SSL-team guy) :)
Alexander 6:43 PM - 25 October, 2004
thanks for the pat on the back Nik I needed that! :)
Stuart Ramdeen 11:43 AM - 27 October, 2004
Quote:
Eventually I'd love to store all of my audio files in one place (my 60GB iPod.... it's coming :-) )


ordered :-D

apple.com

SEXY
Alexander 4:40 PM - 27 October, 2004
60GB damn!
Alexander 5:12 PM - 27 October, 2004
that is the iPod Photo 60GB that you ordered Stuart?? ....or is the iPod coming out with a 60GB model also.

That iPod Photo 60GB is damn sexy!!!!
tehfoiler 1:27 PM - 29 October, 2004
For 600 dollars, I could think of something better to buy, like a Rane Empath. :)
Revolutionary 1:56 PM - 29 October, 2004
Several external hard-drives?
Alexander 5:20 PM - 29 October, 2004
Quote:
For 600 dollars, I could think of something better to buy, like a Rane Empath. :)

Quote:
Several external hard-drives?



both very good other options!
Stuart Ramdeen 11:43 PM - 31 October, 2004
yep, the photo one Alexander. There is no 'audio only' 60GB iPod... yet. Apple have left the audio iPods at 4, 20 and 40GB

There's an estimated 3-4 week wait for mine in the UK. We all know that means 6 weeks! My new iMac still hasn't arrived and that was ordered WELL over 4 weeks ago :-(

will post pics when it arrives!

:)

s
Revolutionary 5:04 AM - 1 November, 2004
I feel your pain, man. Don't know when I will get my laptop back. Probably next year...
Alexander 10:39 PM - 1 November, 2004
damn Stuart nice setup you will have coming to your house! Went to check out the iPod Photo at the Apple Store and the screen is nice and clear....very impressive. Still I think it is too much money but that is just my opinion.

I would like to know how you find that iMac if you get the chance once it arrives?
Alexander 10:40 PM - 1 November, 2004
Rev how long have you been waiting for your PB when I took my PB to get repaired I was only without it for 4 days?
Revolutionary 4:48 AM - 2 November, 2004
I have no clue. It could take days, weeks or even months. Who knows? Not even the guys at the store knew. I've been waiting for some 5 long days now.
DJ 3pm 2:41 PM - 2 November, 2004
Quote:
I have no clue. It could take days, weeks or even months. Who knows? Not even the guys at the store knew. I've been waiting for some 5 long days now.

thats dookie. my company does warranty repair for apple and it should not be taking that long. we don't do some of the laptop work because apple doesn't reimburse enough for us to do, so we just send them to the apple mobile repair depot. our average turnaround is about 4 days: day 1 for us to get it, day 2 for transit, day 3 for apple repair, day 4 for transit. did you take this to an apple store rev or to an apple specialist?
Revolutionary 2:47 PM - 2 November, 2004
I have a PC. Took it back to the store where I bought it over here.
DJ 3pm 2:55 PM - 2 November, 2004
oops, read the wrong profile. thought you had a powerbook.
Revolutionary 3:41 PM - 2 November, 2004
Sort of my bad. Didn't read that PB in your message.
Alexander 2:47 AM - 5 November, 2004
Rev I thought you were talking about a Powerbook also! :)

Sorry you are still waiting for your PC to get back to you.
Revolutionary 5:35 AM - 5 November, 2004
Right.
Stuart Ramdeen 12:19 AM - 13 November, 2004
OOOOH BABY! I have a 60GB iPod in my hands!!!!!!!! IT IS SOOO SEXY. I have my iPhoto library on my pod! This is so friggin cool

I think Apple are a bit stingy not including the remote control even with their top of the line model though. Apart from that, it's all good!

s
iMac still 'delayed'. grrrrrrr
Revolutionary 8:47 AM - 13 November, 2004
How much did you pay for it, Stuart?
feniks 4:32 PM - 13 November, 2004
i peeped one of the photo ipods at the apple store last night. very cool...but i don't know if i would pay $600 for one.
Stuart Ramdeen 11:53 PM - 14 November, 2004
I paid significantly less than retail! That's all I can say! :-D I work for an Apple dealer ;-P

Man, I friggin love it. I've just come back from a meal with 6 friends and after dinner whilst we were having coffee I showed it off by passing it around to show off my pics from last saturdays outing to the ministry of sound. All you could hear was 'wow' and 'I gotta get myself one of these'

:-D

s
Revolutionary 5:24 AM - 15 November, 2004
Quote:
I paid significantly less than retail! That's all I can say! :-D I work for an Apple dealer ;-P

All I can say is "Wow"...
radish 4:18 PM - 15 November, 2004
Quote:
I've just come back from a meal with 6 friends and after dinner whilst we were having coffee I showed it off by passing it around to show off my pics from last saturdays outing to the ministry of sound

I could do the same with a stack of prints, much larger, higher quality images, and much much cheaper :)
Stuart Ramdeen 4:57 PM - 15 November, 2004
Quote:
I could do the same with a stack of prints, much larger, higher quality images, and much much cheaper :)


yeah, but how year 2000 is that? :-D lol

on a side note, I've just converted all of my lossless files to 256k mp3s using itunes. I've released 20GB of extra space back to my poor little 15" albook

it was a tough decision, but there was no way I could tell the difference.

s
fingas 2:25 PM - 18 November, 2004
We'd LOVE to see QUICKTIME support with the ability to output video via native firewire OR at least run video in a seperate window that can be run on a separtate screen.

Mark

[+] THE MARKSMEN
paid for hits ...
Guerrilla Music Production Network
nik39 2:26 PM - 18 November, 2004
yeahhhh :-) Me too!
DJ 3pm 3:52 PM - 18 November, 2004
agreed, thats what i did when i used www.megaseg.com
depakote 5:13 AM - 2 December, 2004
Yes, I'm totally down with video support. Sounds like you may have tinnitus like me Stuart! I can hear a ringing that is increased with other high frequency tones. For the money I would rather buy a iRiver PMP-140. They are 40gb but can play video too. They are also very sexy (or at least the girls in the ads are). I bet PMP is supposed to sound like pimp to make guys think it will increase their sex appeal. I have heard it's a bitch to get video into the compressed formats though. I don't think it has Mac support either. As much as I love Apple I do think they go overboard with their proprietary formats. I wonder if they can stay hot in the future. I just love Mac OS. The expose feature is the best. Windows really need window management like that. You'll have no idea how beneficial it is to have until you use it. When I use a PC I always trying to move the cursor to the corners out of habit. Even if Apple lose their appeal like they have in the past I will stay loyal. I'm the kind of guy that drives an old Saab. Too bad mine broke down...
DJ 3pm 12:12 AM - 8 March, 2005
what does this mean for the addition of ALAC in SSL?: craz.net
Serato
Josh 1:10 AM - 8 March, 2005
interesting, thanks for the link 3pm
tehfoiler 1:38 AM - 14 March, 2005
Any update on whether or not FLAC will be added as a list of supported codecs?
DJ Shady 12:18 AM - 16 March, 2005
Quote:
Try listening to mp3s on some nice big electrostatic speakers.

It's unbelievable how bad they sound.

Lucky for us clubs are hardly audiophile heaven.


You should listen to the new Turbosound ASPECT series speakers!

They use Hi-Fi like tweeters with the projection range of a compression horn driver. They call it a Polyhorn device. These can also achieve 146db!

End result is very sweet sounding speaker they can go very loud if need be.

www.turbosound.co.uk
Serato
Josh 12:38 AM - 16 March, 2005
I love turbosound speakers
ratte 7:39 PM - 3 May, 2005
i would only buy SSL when it supports
FLAC and APE
because most of my 800 gigs of collected music (losless) is in this formats. as dj i don't want to lose any percents of quality.

itunes is a piece of drm-shit , i don't like (as winmediaplayer too)

what is with musepack codec (www.musepack.net) ?

a tool like finalscratch or SSL should support any codex available. (and in minum the open source ones)
nik39 8:05 PM - 3 May, 2005
Quote:
a tool like finalscratch or SSL should support any codex available. (and in minum the open source ones)

Agreed.
DJ 3pm 8:39 PM - 3 May, 2005
800 gigs? i thought the point of ssl was so you didn't have to lug around crates of music? do you have a terabyte hard drive or something?
nik39 8:56 PM - 3 May, 2005
Well imagine you had to carry your crates which make up 800GB of music. ;)
s42000 12:52 AM - 4 May, 2005
Quote:
Well imagine you had to carry your crates which make up 800GB of music. ;)


For a CD dude, that would be 1000 CDs (800MB cds, straight up wav rips - no compression)

I do not want to even convert that to vinyl .... 12" singles !!!
cristianvogel 9:34 AM - 4 May, 2005
I want to see some dates about when at least Apple Lossless will be supported.

Next version? Ever ?


Sadly most of my already existing iTunes library is in AAC and Apple Lossless and i'm looking at having to reduce the lot to mp3 or expand them up to AIFF - which is a lot of data ...
DJ 3pm 1:23 PM - 4 May, 2005
Quote:
Sadly most of my already existing iTunes library is in AAC and Apple Lossless and i'm looking at having to reduce the lot to mp3 or expand them up to AIFF - which is a lot of data ...

can't you just convert your apple lossless to ogg or something?

Quote:
I want to see some dates about when at least Apple Lossless will be supported.

you catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar. its not nice to make demands of our already overworked software engineers. they get stuff done as fast as they can, and they don't give out dates out of a courtesy (if they can't make them). and when i get the chance to meet them, i shall buy them a pint to show my appreciation.
Revolutionary 1:58 PM - 4 May, 2005
Well put, 3PM! Well put...
SpinThis! 2:20 PM - 4 May, 2005
Quote:
Next version? Ever ?

www.scratchlive.net
tehfoiler 8:13 PM - 4 May, 2005
Yay, my thread is still going... anyway, does OGG work on the Mac yet? I remember they said it was PC only for the time being.
Serato, Forum Moderator
Sam 9:17 PM - 4 May, 2005
We hope to have support for OGG on mac in 1.4, which is coming soon. Other codecs will be coming, but we don't have dates yet.
tehfoiler 10:11 PM - 4 May, 2005
Awesome! Thanks alot guys... especially with the quick response.
cristianvogel 9:19 AM - 25 May, 2005
Quote:
Quote:
I want to see some dates about when at least Apple Lossless will be supported.

you catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar. its not nice to make demands of our already overworked software engineers. they get stuff done as fast as they can, and they don't give out dates out of a courtesy (if they can't make them). and when i get the chance to meet them, i shall buy them a pint to show my appreciation.


OK - I apologise for the abrupt nature of my demand - i was hoping to kick start this thread because i think CODEC support is the most important feature of SSL , or any digital music playback software. I mean, at the heart of the philosophy behind digital DJing systems, is the concept of data reduction without loss in quality - so we're talking coming close enough to the quality of vinyl , whilst reducing the ammount of physical storage medium you need to carry around with you...

AIFF - is fine, but as we all know its not the most efficient high quality digital music format available today. And we already have CDs.

Sam, what other CODECS might make it into 1.4 ? just curious....
nik39 9:27 AM - 25 May, 2005
I doubt that they will add any major new feature (a new codec is such one) into 1.4 final. 1.4 public preview 1 was intented to be the final release except for bug fixes, and 1.4 p/r 1 didnt have any additional codec.
SpinThis! 1:17 PM - 25 May, 2005
ogg is now supported on the mac with 1.4...
nik39 1:21 PM - 25 May, 2005
Doh, my fault! Thanks for correcting me, SpinThis! Thats what I call a good community. :)
nik39 1:22 PM - 25 May, 2005
What I meant was, you wont see drastic changes between 1.4 p/r 1 and 1.4 final.
Bri 11:40 PM - 31 October, 2005
I'd like to add my support for FLAC primarily, and anything that's losslesss (pref. for free too!) after that.

Please guys! I'm dithering whether to buy because of this kind of thing. Thanks.
NickNack 3:12 AM - 1 November, 2005
I vote for FLAC support as well. It seems to be the standard lossless codec...and as everyone above has mentioned, it is open source.
NickNack 3:31 AM - 1 November, 2005
BTW, check out this comparison of lossless audio codecs. It's an interesting read. Most importantly, look at the colored chart:

wiki.hydrogenaudio.org
nik39 12:01 AM - 2 November, 2005
Man, the HA guys rock... ;)
NickNack, is it you from skratchworx who did the SSL vs FS etc review?
Spell 7:53 PM - 14 December, 2005
I vote for Flac support! Its really need
dj dawn 9:39 PM - 14 December, 2005
I don't know much about FLAC, but which lossless format will probably be the next upcoming standard for digital music files? Is it FLAC or apple ALAC/ALE. You don't want to use a format if it's not going to be a well supported standard in the future!?

But Serato really need to support some kind of lossless however!!
DJ 3pm 11:03 PM - 14 December, 2005
Quote:
But Serato really need to support some kind of lossless however!!

like aiff or wav? ;)
Spell 1:32 AM - 15 December, 2005
I checked 2 formats : Flac & Ape.
Ape is not good, becouse when I played Ape file in my Winamp, I Have about 30-40% CPU Load. Its terrible, especially for Live.
When I played FLAC file, CPU load was about 13-15% Its Ok
DJ 3pm 2:32 AM - 15 December, 2005
that is the problem with any codec: you will always have a trade off.

*small file size * low processing power * high quality *

with just about any codec, you can pretty much pick 2 from the above.

wav/aiff = low processing power, high quality, large filesize
mp3= small file size, medium quality/processing
flac/alac = small file size, high quality, high processing power

semi off topic (but my inspiration for this analogy): when i was building theatre sets in college, we had a sign in the shop that went something like this:

Quote:
your set can be built

on-time
under-budget
high-quality
---------------
pick 2
tehfoiler 2:15 AM - 24 March, 2006
Been a few months since this has last been bumped, wondering if theres any new news on progress of future codecs?

thanks
acid2 3:26 PM - 27 May, 2006
Indeed, tehfoiler - I'm keen to here about Apple Lossless, personally.
M_Prime 1:24 AM - 14 June, 2006
For myself I'd also like these codecs: WMA and ACC in the next version of Scratch live. It would be useful for me because when I buy a CD, I always rip it in WMA on my computer. I use windows media player. Thats why I use WMAs. I would also need ACC because I have an iPod and I use iTunes. The usual codec of iTune is ACC. I know that we can change in the options of the ripping that we can change the codec but it would be very long for me to rip all my cds again.

In conclusion: Please, in the next version on Scratch live, put more accepted codecs !!

Thank you !
torontojack 5:04 AM - 20 June, 2006
Hello.

I'm a long time Mac/iTunes user.
I've ripped hundreds of CDs to AAC format.

Please put me down for AAC support.

Thank you.

jack
James Yanisko 6:39 PM - 24 June, 2006
AAC would be a wonderful start, since it sound 5billion times better than mp3.
deejayfatcat 2:07 AM - 18 July, 2006
I know that DRM is a longshot, but aac should be standard these days. Hook it up Scratch buddies!
Tony Tantrum 3:29 PM - 10 September, 2006
I'd like to toss in my vote for AAC codec inclusion as well. Although I primarily use mp3, the more universal the application, the better...right?
Toby82 12:37 PM - 12 September, 2006
I vote for FLAC :-)

Beacause with flac you will never ever have to reencode your complete library, because its lossless but supports tags, ...
Dale 6:17 AM - 13 September, 2006
OGG! Yes, its obscure. But the sound quality is good and it supports tagging. Yes, Serato has a known bug reading the track number tag in OGG, but that's minor.

For uncompressed files, I gave in and used WMA lossless. From any lossless format, you can convert to another lossless format. So just choose one and you can always convert (with no losses) later.
FaSho 9:37 AM - 11 October, 2006
another vote for aac.

for the hearing inclined aac sounds much better than mp3 & at a lower conversion which means less space taken on your hardrive.

and for the superselfish reason, i have 25 thousand aac files.. i've converted enough to mp3 to keep the dancefoor pounding, but there's no way i'm gonna convert my entrie library, which drags cause this leaves me limited when i want to grab certain things.

i know you've heard it a billion times, & here's a billion squared. final scratch has established a culture by playing aac files. you guys are making converts but you're forcing your converts to put in an unnecessary amount of time to convert already conveted files. is that progressive. you have a cutting edge application like scratch live, but it still has a foot in the dark ages. i'm not trying to offend or be mean. it just doesn't make sense.

until you guys make it happen i'm gonna toggle both traktor 3 and scratch live.. sorry.
Bambaata 3:37 PM - 13 October, 2006
So when is FLAC coming on board. What is holding it up? I need it bad!!!
Toby82 10:22 AM - 23 October, 2006
I think FLAC should be choosen as lossless format as it is an open standard, i think that is important!
Seasinz 8:43 AM - 24 October, 2006
Another vote for FLAC here.
djniceguyeddie@gmail.com 5:18 PM - 27 October, 2006
Has anyone found a way to use the music they BUY from iTunes as AAC and get it to work in Serato? I can burn it as an audio cd and then possibly extract back as mp3 but 60% of my iTunes colllection is AAC... Also does anyone have problems with the bpm not even showing up? i have even tried anotther set of records (bought another pair).

thanks and if theres no way to play aac files as it seems i dont see how rane can advertise full or better itunes library support... thats their default... now im importing new cds music etc as mp3 but whatever i buy from itunes sucks because i cant use it! someone help this is frustrating....

,... and the same goes for new $350 ipod, its all aac from syncing so nothing shows up in serator scratch live.. same for others...? i mean i can put mp3s on it directly but thats it, as storage only but i have an ext hdd.. thanks mass in advance for this serato newbie but old school computer user and dj... peace out.
djniceguyeddie@gmail.com 5:26 PM - 27 October, 2006
... and also most of my collection inside iTunes greys out the convert to MP3 option because its aac... the only work around ive found is burning them as normal audio cds and then importing as mp3 thats bull$hit for a dj with a large collection.. yah know??? anyone feel me? makes me wanna chalk itunes yet again...
nik39 7:38 PM - 27 October, 2006
djniceguyeddie@gmail.com 11:21 PM - 27 October, 2006
Quote:
ssl-wiki.help.bootlegs.de <- click.


thats basically what im doin but with over hundred gigs of music thats a pain... im also importing wax but just selected teh import at mp3 and all works out fine then.... its that damn aac and mp4 files..

any other ideas anyone? could we use os x automater and itunes to somehow automate thsi feature or burn the files to teh drive, like nero will do on a pc?

thanks in advance
dj nice guy eddie
resident, pacific moon
nik39 11:31 PM - 27 October, 2006
Well, no reason why you couldnt...... its just that someone needs to write an application which does what you need.
djniceguyeddie@gmail.com 5:53 AM - 28 October, 2006
true, i just dont really know how... ive used automater a little but im sure its a utlity/plug-in a lot of people would use or pay a few bucks for... anyone else?
nik39 2:05 PM - 31 October, 2006
Quote:
ssl-wiki.help.bootlegs.de <- click.

Great news.

dj holla has posted a solution ( here scratchlive.net <- click) which describes an automated solution. I've updated the wiki, so you can also find the info over there.
djniceguyeddie@gmail.com 4:38 AM - 3 November, 2006
thanks much bout to try it... the most annoying thing with our old solution is the aac files stays not only in your playlist but library and you have to sort by aac and delete and re-create playlist.. hopefully this fixes.. i'll repost afer getting a chance to try it.. thanks mass you guys :-)

even with serato, being great, but not perfect, im much happier than with final scratch and for $425 im a happy customer!

thanks again y'all

peace
Myzrael 12:16 PM - 17 November, 2006
Personally I'd really like FLAC suppport. DjDecks has it and it works perfectly while giving you a truly great sound. And FLAC supports ID3tags and that's a very good thing. Sadly it's not supported by a lot of program yet but I hope that will change in the future.
neut 6:45 AM - 27 November, 2006
ALAC would be tits as my music server is almost entirely ALAC. AAC seems to be a popular format with iTunes being so widespread (even though encoding bitrate is low) and an obvious choice for inergration. I have quite a few AAC files myself (especially on the 60GB iPod). :)
pres.kush 4:57 PM - 28 December, 2006
All these formats should have a codec written for SSL. People are moving away from lower quality mp3's to more advanced m4a's, aac's and compressed lossless flacs, apes, and apple lossless. Can't be THAT hard to write a patch for these formats if mp3 and wav/aiff are already supported ;) Just my $.02
mustgroove 6:31 AM - 6 February, 2007
Another vote for FLAC here... lossless is the way of the future and for Serato to have FLAC (and ALAC) support would make thing so much smoother :)
dj lazyk 4:21 AM - 11 February, 2007
So...moderator - any plans for supporting AAC in the near term?
m0nster 9:19 PM - 12 February, 2007
AAC? applelossless is killing the word lossless and ruining flac's lossless repuation, i am no flachead, but i would REALLY like to see flac supported.
dj lazyk 3:47 PM - 14 February, 2007
Agreed, m0nster, but either option would be a step up from MP3.
dj_soo 11:27 PM - 14 February, 2007
Quote:
AAC? applelossless is killing the word lossless and ruining flac's lossless repuation, i am no flachead, but i would REALLY like to see flac supported.


ALAC and AAC are different. Apple Lossless just has m4a filetype associated with it. ALAC is very much as lossless as flac or ape.
clumsyclem 5:14 PM - 15 February, 2007
+1 for FLAC
Dale 6:43 AM - 23 February, 2007
FLAC is my vote
ACME 4:01 PM - 25 February, 2007
another vote for FLAC
mflaw 5:24 PM - 25 February, 2007
unfortunately, it must support FLAC for me to make the purchase =(

i want to pick up the ttm57 badly, but i just cannot do it without FLAC.
AKIEM 8:16 PM - 25 February, 2007
FLAC yes!
vexkon 7:33 PM - 27 February, 2007
FLAC plz :)
m0nster 8:06 PM - 27 February, 2007
the only downside i see to flac, is with uncompressed or compressed music, you are just playing it, with flac you have to actually have to be decompressing it/decoding it on the fly....could that not get tricky with ssl? I guess not if they are doing apple lossless.
ACME 8:09 PM - 27 February, 2007
It would be the same with apple lossless... but they would need a licence. so stick with open format please!
Toby82 8:49 PM - 27 February, 2007
decompressing on the fly has also to be done with mp3's ;-)

And the fact that FLAC is open is an important point, i think.
Meezoid 7:23 PM - 1 March, 2007
Yep, i'd also like to see FLAC support.
dj_soo 10:01 PM - 14 March, 2007
ALAC plz (FLAC would be great also, but i'd like to see both)
Releaux 11:18 PM - 14 March, 2007
I haven't formally added my vote to this one, so count me in for both ALAC and FLAC as well.
SUBSTANCE 1:15 AM - 15 March, 2007
What about BWAV? (or broadcast wav). I've just been told that these are wav files with metadata attached.

en.wikipedia.org
SpinThis! 3:38 AM - 15 March, 2007
C'mon Serato... flac at least? I'll even twist your arm a little and provide a link to the developer documentation: flac.sourceforge.net
SpinThis! 3:49 AM - 15 March, 2007
twist the other arm here for alac: craz.net
DJ Jinnai 7:23 AM - 15 March, 2007
flac < wav
SpinThis! 2:17 PM - 15 March, 2007
^^ uh, we've leave that above comment alone since this is a feature suggestions forum...
dtism 7:35 AM - 16 March, 2007
One more vote for FLAC please
bumpsdick 11:59 AM - 8 April, 2007
Support for flac support for FLAC and ALAC would be great!
mikeTOOtall 4:28 PM - 16 April, 2007
Seeing as I have 355+ GB of FLAC.... PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE add some FLAC support asap!
djsimonse 2:19 PM - 31 May, 2007
Now when you can buy DRM-Free AAC files from iTunes with higher bitrate, I'm really cheeron for AAC-support in Scratch Live.
SpinThis! 2:33 PM - 31 May, 2007
Even that damn Zune has AAC support...
Evil_banana 10:00 AM - 1 June, 2007
+ for FLAC or ALAC, or both by preference. It's not so much the compression to gain drive-space... but Wav just doesn't have any decent tagging-ability's.
persyst 8:25 PM - 12 July, 2007
Please add AAC support. I just bough SSL last week, so this weekend I'll have to convert all my m4a's to mp3's and burn all my Not the worst thing in the world, but for the DJ's (me being one of them) that have a library full of m4a's, but it seems that it would be nice to not have to do the whole library conversion thing, or have a double library of m4a and mp3 copies.
LosMintos 8:42 AM - 13 July, 2007
Sorry, I stoped reading this thread in October 2004 when it becomec off-topic.

Support of FLAC would be the greatest step since releasing Scratch Live itself! Workaround could be an interface for any codec the user wants to use. But FLAC out of the box would be the greatest!
will c 11:10 AM - 14 July, 2007
Bring the FLAC support!!!
a DJ 4:09 AM - 15 July, 2007
Bring on AAC and FLAC support!
jokerjoe 3:47 PM - 16 July, 2007
Wow, considering getting SSL but it's been three whole years since someone suggested FLAC and nothing's happened!?! Surely it can't be that hard to implement!
Dale 12:39 AM - 17 July, 2007
Judging by the support of ogg (already in serato) additional codec support is challenging. Ogg is a great codec but has a smattering of bugs still in serato 1.7.2 like uncomplete tag support and autogain values don't save correctly.

But I'm sure that serato will listen as always and make a wise prioritization decision. Its like politics; he who has the largest lobby and biggest bucks gets the attention. And so the world turns... :-)
jokerjoe 9:50 PM - 17 July, 2007
I hear you and I'm not a software developer, but how long does it really take to fix up these issues? Even those Ogg problems you mention I find it hard to believe it'd take a single programmer more than a few days to fix.

Is there any feedback from the development team?
Konix 10:31 PM - 17 July, 2007
Does anyone even use OGG? Can't say I know anyone that does. I'd figure there'd be a hell of a bigger demand for AAC than OGG support.
m0nster 10:42 PM - 17 July, 2007
I think it's the live decompressing or whatever you would call it, basically from my understanding is the .flac is the same as the orginal wav, and you can even turn it back into one, i think when you listen that's what it's doing, just on the fly. Maybe it's more demanding on the system? i'm not sure, i think people use a 7 or 8 as the compression option on flac. So, if it's lossless but only because your pc is working harder to "unzip" the contents of the package back to the orginal....maybe i shouldn't post after gettin in from work and smoking the bong like a flute
jokerjoe 11:12 PM - 17 July, 2007
Maybe, but I imagined it'd only take a few seconds at most to decompress the average track to a 100MB max, which should easily fit into most computers' RAM, and from there it's treated just like a wav.
Dale 6:38 AM - 18 July, 2007
I was using OGG until I found that Serato (primarily) and other companies didn't have very good support for it. I don't use AAC because it reeks of the Apple monopoly...I mean the locked in nature of iTunes. Yea yea yea, I know it is MPEG-4 part 3, but it still gives me the *willies*.

I welcome any codec "better" than the 16 year old MP3. Even the 8 year old AAC. As long as its open, doesn't lock me into a platform or application, etc.
concorde_pilot 4:29 PM - 23 July, 2007
Quote:
Now when you can buy DRM-Free AAC files from iTunes with higher bitrate, I'm really cheeron for AAC-support in Scratch Live.
word!

please :)
x7tommy 5:44 PM - 1 August, 2007
Why does a program like MegaSeg which costs over $300 less than SSL support AAC formating? And yet Serato still hasn't figured it out.

Why does Serato continue to not support this and other file types when there is such a high demand from users? Shouldn't programs learn and adapt to how we use them??
LosMintos 9:24 AM - 2 August, 2007
FLAC is free and lossless, that's why I use it. And I really would like to use it in Serato too!!!!!!

The best for me after FLAC is Ogg Vorbis because it is free and it sounds quite good. But there are problems surrounding tags. There are not read by Serato (in my case, don't know, what's going on there ...)

So, I have to use MP3 wasting time in converting the hole stuff and loosing quality :-(

Please give us FLAC support in Serato Scratch Live :-) (It is absolutely free flac.sourceforge.net )
Meezoid 3:49 AM - 8 September, 2007
So - what's the official word on this at the moment? I know there's technical difficulties in terms of the decoding - but is it feasible or not? (FLAC support i mean)...
ophi 5:29 PM - 9 September, 2007
I would also like to request FLAC support. I will buy SSL if/when this is included.
Bambaata 11:49 PM - 19 September, 2007
Com'on its time for Flac!!!!!
AmphetaMarinE 2:53 PM - 30 September, 2007
On the AAC front...
The reason it hasn't seen support in SSL is probably licensing...
I would love to see AAC support in SSL, so here is a link to an open source AAC decoder.
www.audiocoding.com
The devs there also provide an open source AAC encoder, and source code is provided for both.
Konix 5:35 PM - 30 September, 2007
AAC support is coming in 1.8, maybe you didn't get the memo (check some other threads ;) ).
mikeTOOtall 10:52 PM - 21 October, 2007
Any word on FLAC being implemented in to the next version? I have about 400 gigs of FLAC and would love to be able to spin it in Serato without having to transcode it. Please please please can we get some FLAC support! Thanks!
nagra 9:31 PM - 11 November, 2007
Just another post about FLAC support! This is currently the only issue I have with SSL.
A commitment and roadmap from Serato would be nice. Thank you :-)
DJ Tom B. (Booty Shakers) 8:23 PM - 14 November, 2007
Wattabout MPC?
And hox do I record my vinyls in Wav and not in AIFF?
billycuts 12:52 AM - 10 December, 2007
Would love to see FLAC support soon...
Bambaata 11:48 PM - 7 January, 2008
Flac here too, its getting tedious! For me it is the biggest flaw the system has and is very irritating
Kenrick 5:26 AM - 13 January, 2008
Flac support would be awesome. As you know wav does not support id3 tagging and since I am apart of a pool and also buy a lot of music the tags help me keep things organized and find my music when I need to in SSL.

Thanks!
funktion6 12:20 PM - 23 January, 2008
Another faithful Serato user who would love to have FLAC support!
EvilCutz 5:06 PM - 4 February, 2008
Flac = a must
nuff said
aSiNe 8:35 PM - 7 February, 2008
Flac !
Releaux 8:44 PM - 7 February, 2008
FLAC FLAC bo blac, banana fanna fo FLAC, me mi mo mlac... FLAC!

Let's try ALAC!

ALAC ALAC bo bALAC, banana fanna fo flALAC, me mi mo mALAC... ALAC!


(I know... I've already posted in this thread, but I was really hoping for ALAC/FLAC in 1.8)
kinematics 1:53 AM - 20 February, 2008
just bought a SL1 after using a friends 57 for a year, and I love it,
buuuuut

I'd really like to see FLAC support as most of my encoded music is FLAC, and transcoding them is always annoying and timeconsuming.

Please add FLAC!
timdp 8:26 PM - 2 March, 2008
Hi, excuse n00b question. Does the AAC support in 1.8 include Apple Lossless?
nik39 9:18 PM - 2 March, 2008
No.
timdp 11:57 PM - 2 March, 2008
Ty Nik.
cjw296 8:19 AM - 4 March, 2008
Just thought I'd note here that I'd love to see *any* properly lossless format...
I'm currently running off wavs and aiffs for the important stuff and hoping that I don't run out of space ;-)
JoshuaBula 10:42 PM - 5 April, 2008
I just heard of a study that was done that compared lossy compression (like mp3) to lossless compression (WAV and FLAC) and the results were that even though mp3 compression is supposed to cut out only things that aren't audible, the compressed files didn't "feel" the same... they didn't elicit the same emotional reaction in the subjects compared to those who listened to the same music in a lossless format.

Therefore... I'm really hoping to see either FLAC support or Apple Lossless in 1.8.1!!! :)

Thanks!
AKIEM 11:13 PM - 5 April, 2008
no link?
cjw296 9:54 AM - 6 April, 2008
Oh, and just to add to what I was saying - I'd love it if whatever lossless format is picked is also supported by MixedInKey!
m0nster 12:04 PM - 6 April, 2008
Double blind listening test or bust....
cjw296 2:16 PM - 6 April, 2008
Yeah, but make sure you do that double blind test on a decent club rig...
nagra 12:00 PM - 18 April, 2008
The last official comment from a Serato on this thread is from May 4, 2005: almost 2 years ago!

I'm sure Serato is very busy with improving Video SL and getting Itch out, but there are a lot of people who would like to see FLAC support in the base product and it would only be polite from Serato to provide some kind of answer.
cjw296 1:58 PM - 18 April, 2008
Absolutely!
John Smith 9:30 PM - 27 April, 2008
flac please
mikeryan 4:28 PM - 2 May, 2008
FLAC please. borrowed a serato to gig a wedding (don't really feel like burning 30 CDs of crap music) only to discover that it doesn't play FLAC. WHY?! I had to convert hundreds to FLACs to MP3 and still retain the meta information. Total nightmare. The reasons from 2004 the dev team give don't hold up anymore - competing OPEN SOURCE products play FLAC, there's no reason Serato can't. If it played FLAC I would probably buy the product.

Also - unrelated - why is there no multi column sorting support in the library? Totally lame.
m0nster 7:01 PM - 2 May, 2008
you mean like sort by bpm, then sort by name, so it does lowest to highest bpm's, then lists them in alapha order after? like 90bpm a-z? or if you clicked name 2x it would do z-a bpm's in 90? etc
Brendon.gl 2:19 PM - 6 May, 2008
Yes I vote for FLAC support!
DJ 3pm 12:59 PM - 8 May, 2008
i don't personally have any FLAC files, but perhaps this could help: www.apple.com
simonak 2:11 PM - 22 May, 2008
drip drip go my tears onto my keyboard...1.8.1 lovely new version of ssl but still no flac files reconised in imported folders:(
have tried two links found here-dj 3pm above and aanother versio tracker-all to no avail
can anyone tell me how to get flacs plating on ssl?? with as little loss as possible!
Makiba 2:04 AM - 23 May, 2008
Flac plizzzzzzz!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
212121 12:25 PM - 31 May, 2008
At least tell us that there will never be flac support!

4 years after is enough! everyone knows we need flac!
Deejay Fusion 7:06 AM - 2 June, 2008
Auto update play lists & crates when you move files on your hdd. A possible rescan at the startup of Serato??

For the love of god, FLAC! Final Scratch has had it for 3 years.
DJ Tom B. (Booty Shakers) 8:35 AM - 28 June, 2008
Quote:
Wattabout MPC?
And hox do I record my vinyls in Wav and not in AIFF?


Forget dat one I converted to AIFF because of tags!!
soul 2:05 AM - 7 July, 2008
We need F L A C support!!!
212121 9:42 PM - 17 July, 2008
W e n e e d FLAC s u p p or t ! ! !
Andy S 11:23 AM - 21 July, 2008
all this time and still no flac support

all i can say is that obviouly the program cant handle it or they would support it


seems so weird
212121 4:54 PM - 27 July, 2008
of course there will be flac support! SSL is just looking really bad \ stupid not having this, so it's a problem for their image, in 2008 and still no support for a free (open source?), lossless codec! ahah
cjw296 7:49 PM - 3 August, 2008
Yep, just another +1 for FLAC support from me...
I wonder how we can make a better campaign of begging for this feature?
I don't believe 1 new codec can be that hard to add...
tommcm 5:55 AM - 4 August, 2008
another vote hear.... i was shocked to hear that apple lossless/flac is supported.

come on serato .... pls give us some indication when/if it will ever happen...

my aiff space consumption is killing me.
nagra 5:21 PM - 9 August, 2008
Let's create a petition on www.flacforscratchlive.net
212121 7:44 PM - 10 August, 2008
No need for that, serato \ rane ALREADY KNOW, but don't care about the clients, and don't say that i'm being rude, this is NOT a opinion, it's a fact, there as been no feedback, not even saying when we will have it!
Konix 8:23 PM - 10 August, 2008
You guys should know by now that Serato rarely ever comments in feature suggestions or tell if/when features are coming or give release dates. They don't want to promise something, then it doesn't come in version X.X.X. Under promise and over deliver is their way of doing things.
Serato, Forum Moderator
Nick M 11:38 PM - 10 August, 2008
Quote:
No need for that, serato \ rane ALREADY KNOW, but don't care about the clients, and don't say that i'm being rude, this is NOT a opinion, it's a fact, there as been no feedback, not even saying when we will have it!


Hi 212121,

Sorry to hear that you think we don't care about our clients. We care about our customers 100%, hence the reason we have open areas of the forum like this where customers can suggest and discuss future additions to the program. Konix is spot on when he says
Quote:
They don't want to promise something, then it doesn't come in version X.X.X.


Is FLAC on our radar? Yes, but we can't tell you what version it will be in sorry.
Keep the suggestions coming though guys, we read them all :)
Padu! 2:17 AM - 14 August, 2008
Quote:
No need for that, serato \ rane ALREADY KNOW, but don't care about the clients, and don't say that i'm being rude, this is NOT a opinion, it's a fact, there as been no feedback, not even saying when we will have it!


As Nick M said, Serato cares a lot on clients!

I decided to go with Serato after Traktor Scratch was out, first of all couse I was already at the forum for about 2 months before buyng and saw that they really care.

Of course there are some things that Serato software is still missing, but nothing compares to the stability and support we get.

I have a lot os spare time on weekends, and even dou, I'm not able to read all the post, imagine the ppl on serato that reads it all, and still have to work theyr asses out at the softwares??

Yes, I miss the FLAC support on Scratch Live, as we all missed the "Master Tempo" and the MIDI control... so... chill dude!!! And get rude on the most supportive post-selling service I've ever seen!!

Cheers for the Serato guys!!!
nagra 2:35 PM - 23 August, 2008
Quote:
Is FLAC on our radar? Yes, but we can't tell you what version it will be in sorry.

Considering the amount of people asking/waiting for this feature, any serious organization would at least have it in their roadmap.

Got to wonder what kind of product management process you guys follow... seems very "ad-hoc" to me (I guess this is a "normal" situation in our immature software industry).
nagra 2:51 PM - 23 August, 2008
Quote:
Yes, I miss the FLAC support on Scratch Live, as we all missed the "Master Tempo" and the MIDI control

I don't agree.... this is not about making the product easier to use.
Not having flac is like not being able _to use at all_ the product on your existing library and having to recreate one only for SL.

A radio station that has thousands and thousands of titles in their library will not re-encode everything because some DJs asks for SL.
djjohnmichael 3:05 AM - 1 September, 2008
.WAV support is killing me across the board. Downloading .WAVs without tags is already extra work, and no programs seem to tag them in a way that plays nicely. I can use something like DBpoweramp to tag them first, but then none of my programs read it properly.

FLAC support would rock, since I could still play with lossless quality files, but still use tagging that actually works.

In the meantime, I'm just going to keep describing everything in Serato, and then pray that converts to tag information. Hopefully, on a rainy day, I'll figure out a way to do this without duplicating efforts...
212121 10:35 AM - 7 September, 2008
They care a lot? Just because they say they do???

We are requesting something SO SIMPLE, to play a OPEN SOURCE codec, that MANY other digital djing software ALREADY support!

A codec that is all about QUALITY, mp3 is REALLY old news!

PLEASE :)
LosMintos 7:09 AM - 10 September, 2008
Please support FLAC and all of its comments.
ekwipt 1:17 PM - 10 September, 2008
Who cares about FLAC support, WAV can already have tags in Scratchlive, it's not really a big issue
polymorphic 10:58 AM - 26 September, 2008
It's a MASSIVE issue for me!

I'm currently evaluating which route to go down for digital Djing and the flac support alone is enough to turn me to Traktor.

Shame as I quite fancied the look of a VCI 300 + Itch :(

Unless someone can tell me a firm release plan then it's a VCI 100 + Traktor..
fmblend 10:26 PM - 6 October, 2008
Nick, thanks for the acknowledgment that flac is on the radar... I think most people just want confirmation that this is being seriously looked into. The advantages just make sense for djing... lossless quality, tagging support, more online stores are starting to sell flac files (which are often cheaper than wavs), and from there they are easier to download and store on laptops due to the smaller size. Please keep us updated, thanks!!
EvilCutz 10:22 AM - 9 October, 2008
Waiting for tooooo long now (1.4 TB Flacs on 3 Harddrives)
I have to convert every time I play a set this is very annoying. Already aiming at a rivalry product, hope to see flac in next update.
bumpsdick 8:08 AM - 15 October, 2008
+1 for FLAC support. Serato, please make this a priority. This is my most desired feature, please make it yours.
basscult 7:53 AM - 16 October, 2008
flac support please.
GabrielDC 12:17 PM - 16 October, 2008
Hi I registered this forum just to say that Im also waiting for FLAC support before I buy Serato Itch. I have a huge FLAC collection of music that I converted from CDs, currently I'm "playing" with a cheap controller + Traktor and watching the digital scene closely.

In my humble opinion mp3 or aac is not good enough for DJs and their big and full soundsystems so I beg you Serato people, you that are the leaders in professional digital DJs solutions, please dont let mp3s take over the DJ world.

My argument for the people that say mp3 are transparent enough: When I buy music I want it as close as possible to the original master track, if it has tiny glitches I want to hear it!!! If it has an illegal bass that my hear cant detect I want to feel it!!!

tnx
G.
GabrielDC 12:23 PM - 16 October, 2008
one more thing

I'm sure the guys at Xiph.org would be delighted to help you guys implement FLAC in serato, they did it with other companies didnt they? I just cant understand why so much time.....
boogie_man 2:10 AM - 18 October, 2008
Hi all,

I'm just about to buy SSL - it's got what i want - and how i want to use it.

I'm not a fan of MP3 at all - I dislike it's thinned out 'wall of sound' result, even at 320k.

I'd use WAV, but those files are still pretty darn big. Lossless formats look promising, but for me, my favorite (lossy) compression algorithm for a number of years has been the professional broadcast Q-Design MP2 format @ 384k. The sound quality of this type of file offers significantly more depth and definition than a domestic 320k MP3 - and while it is lossy, it's the closest sounding mpeg file to a WAV I've ever heard, with a file size just a little larger than a 320k MP3.

What i REALLY love about Serato is that it plays these files **PERFECTLY** - except for just one small thing. Serato does not recognise the .mp2 file suffix in the import procedure. But, if I rename all my .mp2 files to .mp3 instead, they import, load and play perfectly - including their id3 tags, but renaming files can get tiresome everytime new tracks are added.

My existing MP2 files play perfectly in my old PCDJ Red setup, it would be nice if Serato could add .mp2 to the 'valid file type' list, the rest of the work is done, playback already works perfectly and my files will work anywhere...! Finally I've found a product to upgrade to - and keep my treasured SL1200's turning!

Please Serato, just this one little request?

Cheers
Frankie_PC 1:14 PM - 18 October, 2008
How about an open source encoder/decoder as a plug-in so it can be detached on the fly in order to free up resources. I run MediaCoder live w/ Scratch and convert any codec on the fly without locking up.

The only time my machine locked up was when auto-convert finds that 1,860,476KB "Serato recording 1.aif" that was recording by accident.

PLUR - Frankie_PC


sjømmør 11:08 AM - 21 October, 2008
+1 for flac support - not for the size, but simply so that i can have tags on my wavs
sjømmør 11:09 AM - 21 October, 2008
tags that STAY and can be added in other programs than serato, that is
nik39 11:34 AM - 21 October, 2008
Quote:
tags that STAY and can be added in other programs than serato, that is

Have a read:
www.scratchlive.net <- click
alec.tron 10:25 AM - 31 October, 2008
I got a Serato unit recently & already spent quite a bit of time during the last week converting CDs into .flacs (favorite format for many reasons)... only to experience first hand & then find confirmation here as well that flac isn t supported by Serato/SSL...
Seriously Serato - WTF ?!
The top post requesting flac is nearly 4.5 years old...

Do I have to mention that I find this really bizarre for a company that prides itself with it's close ties to the community & their requests ?

0.02$
rebelmix 3:44 AM - 4 November, 2008
I have to say, since storage space has gotten WAY cheaper and computing power has increased significantly, flac AND alac support should really be in Serato now.

I rip CDs into alac and tag them in iTunes, but then I have to re-rip them into mp3, and find a way to keep the tags in sync, especially if I add some info later to one version or the other. A kludgey situation at best.

As others have pointed out, even some OSS programmes like MIXX can play flac, so the top-of-the-heap commercial programme really should have this. I'm also a software engineer so I don't buy any of the technical excuses- I mean if you can get video to jump through the hoops that Serato does, simple audio codes should not be any remote problem.

This is really a lack of a feature that has me exploring the competitors again.
mu 2:38 AM - 9 November, 2008
SAM - quote sep24 2004 ! Stuart, ALAC and FLAC have been suggested, and are being considered, but you wont see them any time soon.

Ok, so we wont be seeing them anytime soon ! But, can we at least get an idea of when. I have spent some time reading through this thread and find it hard to believe how little response its had from serato. We are just around the corner from 2009, is it possible to get some idea from u guys about it being incorporated during that year ? plse a reply - its been a long time since u got back to us on this issue which affects so many of ur clients. The issue is quality, which is what u are all about.
DJ Pirkka 1:43 PM - 10 November, 2008
+1 for flac/alac support
Conradaroma 4:20 PM - 10 November, 2008
Everyone is clamoring for FLAC, which would be good, though personally I'd be happier if Apple Lossless were supported before FLAC. my iPod doesn't play FLAC, so I would have to have two libraries of identical music in different formats once again, only this time one to play out with Serato, and one to play out on my iPod.

The iPod is important to me, as I would guess it's important to many others, as it's how I normally listen to all the new music that I buy. 100% seamless integration between Serato and the iPod is huge! FLAC support in serato wouldn't offer this advantage.

Still though, the best solution would probably be supporting both FLAC and ALAC, or else buy traktor scratch which supports all the formats instead....
alec.tron 9:52 AM - 12 November, 2008
Hi.
Conradaroma - IF you want to have .flac support on your ipod, and a bunch of other new features, try this:
www.rockbox.org
www.linuxjournal.com
It s coming from the open source & linux community, so per default it s not the most beautifull interface... but there's full customizability on top of more codecs & functionalities too...

And I too would hope to get some official statement within the next weeks where we are with flac support!

Thanks.
c.
nachopro 5:28 PM - 15 November, 2008
Please, FLAC SUPPORT!! WAV has no tags :/

FLAC Rules!

+1
sjømmør 12:46 PM - 17 November, 2008
a small diggression, but this might concern some of you:

after discovering how wav files actually can be tagged (www.scratchlive.net), with bpm and all, i found that my only problem was that there was no bpm counter program that wrote this tag. big hassle writing it in manually, so i solved it like this:

i wrote a small python script that uses the txt files that (most) bpm counter programs exporting bpm data to to put the calculated bpm in the filename, so that the filename mask can be used in tag&rename, mp3tag or any other music file tagging program to properly tag the id3 bpm tag. filename mask becomes [bpm] - [previous filename]. with mixmeister bpm analyzer, it works pretty fine for me. i can compile it for win32, so pm me if you want it!
Unrealistic 10:17 PM - 12 December, 2008
Yes, please, go for FLAC! (many web shops sells now flac files, would be nice if I do not have to convert them, now that itunes can play them)
212121 8:52 PM - 13 December, 2008
This is why I said serato \ rane \ whatever don't care about their clients

sorry!!! Love you long time, but really can't understand how this hasn't been done yet!
Unrealistic 10:35 PM - 15 December, 2008
Quote:
Is FLAC on our radar? Yes, but we can't tell you what version it will be in sorry.
Well, sorry, but one of your devellopper already mention in this topic ... in 2004 that flac was considered (even if his said it wouldn't be in a short term).

How can we then beleive it is really in your radar? I mean, it shouldn't take that long to implement a kind of codec (an open one that released all its specification).

I don't want to be agressive, but I'm a bit doubtful here to see anytime flac working with serato :-/.
ekwipt 3:26 AM - 17 December, 2008
Having flac support would open up too many problems for the developers plus i'm sure the cpu calculations would go up.
Toby82 8:03 AM - 17 December, 2008
no, flac decoding is quite efficient...
Makiba 7:48 AM - 27 December, 2008
FLAC of course!!!
cjw296 11:57 AM - 1 January, 2009
Hmmm, well, a new year and still not FLAC support :-/

Guess I'll just add this little post to whine about it more and see if anyone from Serato replies...
dj_soo 9:35 PM - 2 January, 2009
with all the FLAC heads on here, I'd still like to request ALAC support so I can tag/organize in itunes.
DJ Booshank 5:45 AM - 5 January, 2009
FLAC +1

would save alot of time spent downloading
212121 4:47 PM - 9 January, 2009
In 2009 we still have to play lossy mp3's! and serato wants to make this a PRO product?
nik39 5:06 PM - 9 January, 2009
Quote:
In 2009 we still have to play lossy mp3's! and serato wants to make this a PRO product?

1st of all, Scratch LIVE is already a pro product, cause it's being used by PROfessionals... guess why.

2nd ... you were able to play non-lossy files since day one. They are called .wav and .aif files.

Oh too much hardspace?? Guess what, pro's have enough disk space.
Bungle 4:15 PM - 10 January, 2009
ALAC +1 FLAC +1

The problem with WAV is not that it takes up too much hard disk space, it's that you cannot store metadata with the file which can be reliably read by other programs e.g iTunes.

Unless I'm missing something, this means you have to have all your digitized vinyl stored in WAV format to get the lossless quality through Serato, but have copies of everything in a tag compatible format (e.g. MP3 or ALAC) if you want to listen to it on your iPod.
nik39 4:20 PM - 10 January, 2009
Quote:

The problem with WAV is not that it takes up too much hard disk space, it's that you cannot store metadata with the file which can be reliably read by other programs e.g iTunes.

Doesn'T aif support metadata?
Bungle 5:20 PM - 10 January, 2009
It does but "not very well" :D.

In AIFF files the metadata is written into chunks at the start of the file (en.wikipedia.org). This is similar to the way that the WAV format can contain metadata (see here: www.scratchlive.net). This means that it's not well supported by other software.

To be fair it is supported by both Serato and iTunes which I wasn't aware of until you pointed it out so thanks for that. But because it doesn't conform to a common standard it's not a great long term solution.

The bottom line is that FLAC (and to a far lesser extent ALAC) have well documented standards for tagging audio files with "artist", "track", "bpm" etc which means that software support is widespread, making them good choices for creating a large digital archives of audio.
nik39 8:00 PM - 10 January, 2009
Quote:
In AIFF files the metadata is written into chunks at the start of the file

... what's the differnce compared to ID3+mp3 for example? They're also written into "chunks".
Bungle 9:24 PM - 10 January, 2009
Nothing really, except that ID3 was designed to work with MP3 and although it can be used with AIFF and WAV it doesn't seem common for audio software to support it. I've tried a few wav editors (Soundforge, Audacity) and none of them do.
JonathanP 7:34 AM - 13 January, 2009
I would love FLAC-support in Serato as well!

Can someone that works at Rane please let us know why this has not been implemented since it was first discussed in this thread in 2004? I'm sure there is a good explination to this...

Thanx for a great product!
212121 6:55 PM - 22 January, 2009
Maybe the explination is that they have already made enough money, and they keep selling, so why work and make a new version?

So many things we ask for... and new versions take months to come out, sad! :(
bervikk 5:03 AM - 25 January, 2009
i'd really like to see FLAC support. till that's missing, (for me) it's a showstopper for scratch live. all my lossless tracks are stored in FLAC format. it encodes fast, it decodes fast, it seeks fast, it's easy on the CPU, and compresses pretty well.

the FLAC libraries (which you actually need in order to support it) are released under the BSD license, just like the ogg vorbis libraries, so i DON'T understand why you haven't added support for this widespread format already, while you have for ogg vorbis!!

in a recent poll on an audio enthusiasts' site FLAC gained over 60% in the lossless section over other lossless formats...

so please, please, ADD FLAC SUPPORT!
cjw296 10:58 AM - 1 February, 2009
Yup, all I can do is +1 for FLAC yet again...
djbumrush 8:04 AM - 2 February, 2009
FLAC++
I'm about to undertake the project of ripping all my audio CDs and it would be nice to just rip them straight into FLAC or APE. They'll wind up as MP3s of course, but it would be nice to know I'm using lossless files in SL.
djaction 5:54 AM - 3 February, 2009
please add flac support damnit!!
EvilCutz 9:59 AM - 10 February, 2009
I'm waiting for this since ages, but now its a bye bye serato for me :(
cjw296 4:59 PM - 10 February, 2009
EvilCutz: what are you going to use instead?

oh, and while I'm here, another bump for the FLAC thread ;-)
fl0w 12:40 PM - 11 February, 2009
bumpy bump
EggZenBeanz 5:09 PM - 11 February, 2009
wow!!! a near 5 year old thread and no progress!

FLAC support is a must, either a reply to say yes its possible or not either way it would be nice to know.

FLAC support would make SL a near perfect dj product.
212121 1:48 PM - 16 February, 2009
No flac and no message from the staff, really hard to believe. They sure must be getting the money the want
cjw296 6:57 PM - 8 March, 2009
Indeed. FLAC anyone?
EggZenBeanz 10:40 PM - 11 March, 2009
1.9 is in beta, and due soon. Bet you flac or lossless support isn't included. Maybe in 2013, in another 4 years it maybe added!
Bungle 11:13 AM - 15 March, 2009
I just downloaded 1.9 beta 3 and guess what......no flac support. I'm not even that bothered - I have all my tunes in WAV format anyway, but the fact that noone from Rane is even acknowledging that people want this feature is a bit of a joke.
licks 12:41 AM - 18 March, 2009
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE could serato include support for FLAC in upcoming versions. I do not use mp3s. FLACs are so much better than wavs as I can store the info from them in meta-tags rather than a long filename. Not to mention filesize.
SUBSTANCE 3:24 AM - 20 March, 2009
^aiff does that too and is already supported.
Lossless is already supported by both wav and aiff formats.
C. William 4:57 AM - 20 March, 2009
Yeah...I use AIFF too and they integrate/work just like mp3's inside iTunes as well as Serato.

What is the advantage of using FLAC over AIFF?
Parabolic 6:13 AM - 20 March, 2009
Hey just got SSL and would like to voice my support for FLAC. Pretty please?
EggZenBeanz 9:54 AM - 22 March, 2009
AIFF offers bigger file sizes, plus it means encoding all my flac library to aiff. Flac support is a must!
serkan 2:06 PM - 22 March, 2009
+1 for FLAC

Since I had some time - it's sunday and the weather sucks :) - I counted the people voting for lossless codecs and here are my results:

1 - FLAC - 74 votes
2 - ALAC - 22 votes
3 - APE - 2 votes
4 - WMA-LOSSLESS & BWAV - 1 vote each

I tried to ignore votes from same people but I'm not sure if I could make it :)

...but I don't think it will be supported ever. This thread is like 4 years old, hundreds of people suggested the support for a lossless codec and we still don't see any progress with that.

And just for the record:
I REALLY don't care about ALAC - since it's not totally open source and licensed by a company - that is known for lacking support on other codecs.

Just another 2 cents... so I think we have one dollar in this thread by now :)
kinematics 10:00 PM - 24 March, 2009
FLAC.

5 years since it's been first requested.
15 Months since I last requested it.

I think the time has come to either incorporate it or at least give a damn good explanation why it's still missing.
studio17 3:10 PM - 28 March, 2009
FLAC NoW
Joshua Carl 6:34 PM - 29 March, 2009
yes please!!! +1
bervikk 9:43 AM - 30 March, 2009
Quote:
Yeah...I use AIFF too and they integrate/work just like mp3's inside iTunes as well as Serato.

What is the advantage of using FLAC over AIFF?


compatibility with a huge load of existing apps and hardware, for example
C. William 4:07 PM - 30 March, 2009
Quote:
Quote:
Yeah...I use AIFF too and they integrate/work just like mp3's inside iTunes as well as Serato.

What is the advantage of using FLAC over AIFF?


compatibility with a huge load of existing apps and hardware, for example


More compatible than AIFF which is supported everywhere??
MouseAT 3:31 PM - 2 April, 2009
The main benefit to FLAC is a significant reduction in disk space. Lossless files are large no matter how you look at it. If you can save space by using FLAC, you have a lot more space for more music. Disk space may be cheap, but laptop hard disks are still fairly small.
C. William 5:31 PM - 2 April, 2009
Ok cool. Finally someone gives me a good answer! I've got a 500 GB Seagate in my laptop so I have plenty of space. If I run out of room in a year or two I'm sure a 750 GB+ model will be available, and I'll upgrade again. Easy to do when you're on a mac.
Parabolic 5:48 PM - 2 April, 2009
Also, FLAC files formally support ID3 tagging. WAV files do, technically, but its not recognized as a standard.
soul 4:14 AM - 5 April, 2009
Can someone who knows coding maybe write us a mod to allow Serato to read FLAC, I've given up on the SLL team. They just don't care enough to get with the times. :(

There already is a script allowing itunes to play FLAC, maybe someone who knows how to code can use this:


The script allowing FLAC to play in itunes is called Fluke: www.macupdate.com
Parabolic 5:45 AM - 5 April, 2009
Really, even if someone else scripts it, whats to say it won't be reliable? Hackish stuff is rarely ever stable enough to be used in a production setting.
Parabolic 5:45 AM - 5 April, 2009
You know, the Mixed in Key folks are dragging their feet on FLAC support too. Hmm.....
bervikk 11:54 PM - 5 April, 2009
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
Yeah...I use AIFF too and they integrate/work just like mp3's inside iTunes as well as Serato.

What is the advantage of using FLAC over AIFF?


compatibility with a huge load of existing apps and hardware, for example


More compatible than AIFF which is supported everywhere??


ok, then: aiff uses about twice (or more) disk space. and has much fewer capabilites (metadata stuff).

you can say that you can buy bigger hdds. but hardware costs money, while lossless encoding is free (in the case of flac, it's free in every sense).

i think this *does* matter, especially these days... maybe not for you, but for a lot of other people...
212121 9:00 PM - 10 April, 2009
Does anyone understand or know why the staff hasn't done this yet?
Joshua Carl 9:29 PM - 10 April, 2009
maybe they are waiting on the sure-fire "next big thing"

ie blu-ray vs HD

it would suck for them to get behind a file-type prematurely and have it pushed
of the market by a better, widely based format...

then we are all stuck doing conversions...yet again.
Ive made that mistake few times, Remember the minidiscs?
or how about that DAT, and SACD?

until everyone starts seeking the "next Mp3" and its selling and trading as the norm
we might not see it...but who knows.
I know I wouldnt mind it.
storage is cheap, its not about spending money.
but who wants to lug a few TB drives everywhere.
Id probably have my EDM stuff on lossless... but everything else?
320mp3 sounds just fine for the sheep
Parabolic 11:56 PM - 11 April, 2009
But FLAC isn't the next mp3. The "next mp3" is something else. FLAC is the chosen standard for the audiophiles and we want to rock our sets with the highest quality files possible while keeping the footprint low.

FLAC is pretty much standard in the high-end open source crowd, overwhelmingly commonplace in the high-end Windows crowd, and competitive with Apple Lossless with the Mac users.

There is so much freaking fidelity lost with mp3 its not even funny. I actually found mixing harder with Serato because I was used to the dynamic range I got with my wax. There really is a difference.
bervikk 5:03 AM - 12 April, 2009
Jason: i don't think they're waiting for the next big thing. then why did they add ogg support? i would call it anything but the next big thing.

ps: i accidentally pressed report instead of the quote button at your post, sorry, i hope there won't be any problems, if the mods ask, tell them it was unintentional, i'll do the same...
serkan 4:05 PM - 12 April, 2009
we can discuss this like a million times. but we won't make any progress as long as anyone from the serato guys don't reply here. even a "not this year" will be ok, because then i wouldn't have to take a look at this thread like every day...
deejaysomething 10:20 PM - 12 April, 2009
+1 for FLAC, if you please.
Serato, Forum Moderator
Nick M 12:43 AM - 14 April, 2009
FLAC is still in development, - codec stuff is tricky, because getting it wrong can be disastrous - i.e crashing on certain files!

I'm not a developer myself, but am pushing for this to be included in an update soon. When? Hopefully this year, but no promises :)
JonathanP 5:49 AM - 14 April, 2009
Better late than never. Thanks for the answer Serato!

Now, why didn't you respond to this thread until now?
deejaysomething 10:35 AM - 14 April, 2009
It was me! Haha, been lurking on this thread for four years and the moment I post, Serato answer. I have special forum powers. =)
deejaysomething 10:35 AM - 14 April, 2009
Also, thanks Nick! Really glad it's under active consideration.
ekwipt 10:37 AM - 14 April, 2009
Serato 2.0 is going to be wild
serkan 7:03 PM - 14 April, 2009
Finally!... an answer :)
Thanks for that Nick! Keep on pushing the developers and tell them to take a look at this thread. I'm not shure about this but I think FLAC support is the most suggested feature right now (and for a long time now).

@deejaysomething
It had nothing to do with you :p

@ekwipt
Let's hope we won't have to wait till 2.0 ;) It will rock for shure. But I'm hoping for 1.9.1 now :D
DJMark 7:09 PM - 14 April, 2009
Quote:
FLAC is still in development, - codec stuff is tricky, because getting it wrong can be disastrous - i.e crashing on certain files!

I'm not a developer myself, but am pushing for this to be included in an update soon. When? Hopefully this year, but no promises :)


Very glad to hear this.

And I fervently hope Serato never NEVER abandons the "cautious" approach to software feature-additions.
nik39 7:11 PM - 14 April, 2009
Quote:
And I fervently hope Serato never NEVER abandons the "cautious" approach to software feature-additions.

+1.
serkan 7:22 PM - 14 April, 2009
amen :)
Serato, Forum Moderator
Nick M 9:52 PM - 14 April, 2009
Quote:
Now, why didn't you respond to this thread until now?

1.9.0 is now feature complete and the SL 3 is out. Now, we can start planning the next lot of awesomeness.... :)
serkan 9:59 PM - 14 April, 2009
sounds gooooooooood :)
ekwipt 12:48 AM - 15 April, 2009
Quote:
Quote:
Now, why didn't you respond to this thread until now?

1.9.0 is now feature complete and the SL 3 is out. Now, we can start planning the next lot of awesomeness.... :)


Sampler improvements? I think that's the main thing till 2.0
JonathanP 6:05 AM - 15 April, 2009
Quote:
Sampler improvements? I think that's the main thing till 2.0


Hey, start your own thread. ;) This one's about FLAC support.
ekwipt 6:01 PM - 15 April, 2009
Blah FLAC support is worthlesss by a second hard drive
ekwipt 6:57 AM - 17 April, 2009
FLACs not even supported by Apple OSX seem a majority of Serato Scratch users are mac owners how the hell is there going to be FLAC support?
Parabolic 7:13 AM - 17 April, 2009
FLAC is unsupported by iTunes. Or does Mac OSX simply look at FLAC files and say, "nuh uh, you can't copy that here"?!

There are plenty of Mac media apps that support FLAC. You can thank Apple for not pulling its head out of its ass and close-sourcing ALAC.

Obviously there's a lot of people demanding it FLAC support... it's been a longstanding request for years as far as I can tell, so it seems like there is certainly plenty of demand for it.
ekwipt 7:43 AM - 17 April, 2009
Serato is closely linked to Intunes for track management, i'm sure it's hard to implement it when this is the case. If apple suddenly supported FLAC i'm sure Serato would do the same
serkan 2:23 PM - 18 April, 2009
It seems like "ekwipt" has some problems with FLAC support. Maybe he thinks that any other option he's suggesting for is delayed while the developers are implementing FLAC support. As I counted in one of my last posts, there are a LOT of people just waiting for FLAC - and it will come soon. I'm pretty shure it will be by the end of the year... and I'll be happy as a pig in shit if I load my first FLAC-song into one of the decks.
Quote:

Serato is closely linked to Intunes for track management, i'm sure it's hard to implement it when this is the case. If apple suddenly supported FLAC i'm sure Serato would do the same

wtf? The iTunes support in SL is buggy since it's very first implementation. Apple woun't support FLAC within the next few years because they still think that ALAC has any chances in the lossless scene... But it is fact that FLAC is the most supported lossless codec.
btw
Second harddrive? I'm all for notebooks with an internal drive and I never want to carrie around extra harddrives with me, doesn't matter if HDD or SSD. So for me - who wants to play lossless on as many platforms as possible - FLAC is a great way to save up to 50% disc space without having to compromise in sound quality.
aSiNe 1:28 PM - 24 April, 2009
and flac supports tags :)

can't wait for FLAC support in SSL!
212121 7:10 PM - 27 April, 2009
THANKS A LOT! Nick M :)

But still shame about so many years with no flac support :(
cjw296 9:47 PM - 24 May, 2009
So, 1.9 is out, but *still* no FLAC support, or even a word on why there is no FLAC support from anyone in Serato. Very disappointing...
jasd834 3:58 PM - 27 May, 2009
FLAC would be fantastic. Gets file sizes down 60-80% of the WAV.
However I understand the technical difficulties of implementing such a codec.

I convert to FLAC for archiving so I would be delighted to see FLAC support!
Although it's a simple process to convert the whole batch back again
serkan 4:36 PM - 29 May, 2009
BUMP!
never forget flac support :)
Dj Destiny(Greece) 5:01 PM - 7 June, 2009
FLAC support please for scratch live immediately.
Evil_banana 12:19 PM - 8 June, 2009
I think FLAC/ALAC would be a good step forward as well. 1Tb harddisk comes with a box of cereals these days, so let's evolve with it and go lossless (no offence , but Wav doesn't cut it for me because there is no extensive tagging. Pretty useless if you ask me)

+1 guys
electric 9:02 PM - 8 June, 2009
FLAC would be a huge improvement for FS (along with other lossless codecs as bonus). I am currently moving entire library to lossless format. SSL will secure its place as the dominant dj tool if they go to lossless compressed CODECS. I currently do not have any other requests for the software except this.

+1

Electric
electric 9:04 PM - 8 June, 2009
meant SSL not FS above...shame on me ;)
Suta Mihai 12:04 AM - 13 June, 2009
any news about flac support ? i am sure guys work hard on it :)
thanks in avance
P.S : think this feature is by far the most wanted in top10 wanted features in serato.
Joshua Carl 1:24 AM - 13 June, 2009
Quote:
FLAC is still in development, - codec stuff is tricky, because getting it wrong can be disastrous - i.e crashing on certain files!

I'm not a developer myself, but am pushing for this to be included in an update soon. When? Hopefully this year, but no promises :)


it will happen....
serkan 10:21 PM - 15 June, 2009
in v.4.2? ;)
Parabolic 8:07 PM - 22 June, 2009
Well, I'd like to append an additional request for FLAC support when it comes out... can we some way of transporting the Serato and/or ID3 meta from the mp3 files into the FLAC equivalents?
bervikk 4:22 AM - 26 June, 2009
Quote:
FLAC is still in development, - codec stuff is tricky, because getting it wrong can be disastrous - i.e crashing on certain files!


that's a lame argument... the flac tools might be in development (the last release is 2 years old anyway), but the format is rock-solid since long-long years... there wouldn't be point to change the format anyway, that would break compatibility with all existing devices, so you must assume jcoalson is _really_ stupid...
Serato, Forum Moderator
Nick M 4:45 AM - 26 June, 2009
I wasn't referring to the FLAC development as a codec at their end. I was referring to our development process - incorporating FLAC into Scratch Live. :)
bervikk 5:07 AM - 26 June, 2009
mm-kay!
serkan 1:06 AM - 15 July, 2009
1.9.1 and still no FLAC support :(

Maybe in 1.9.2... or 2.4.3... or...
DJMark 5:11 AM - 15 July, 2009
Quote:
1.9.1 and still no FLAC support :(


But people in general do seem to be missing out on one particular addition....

Enough Said.



(I'll go drop a hint in the Public Beta forum for 1.9.1 since no one else seems to have even noticed).
deejaysomething 7:54 AM - 22 July, 2009
Whoo, ALAC support! Thank you so much, Serato.

As important as it is to support open standards, I've come to the conclusion that ALAC is more appropriate for me anyway, since I primarily use Macs. Now I can finally reclaim some space from all these WAVs! I'm sure there'll be plenty of people for whom FLAC is still a deal-breaker, but huge thanks from me for getting this far.
JonathanP 11:51 AM - 23 July, 2009
Quote:
Whoo, ALAC support! Thank you so much, Serato.


Wait, is ALAC supported now? In what release did they add this? :)
deejaysomething 12:55 PM - 23 July, 2009
Live in 1.9.1. It's mentioned in the release notes, but quietly. It says:
Quote:
ALAC encoded audio inside mpeg-4 containers will now import into your library.

IIRC there's no bitrate display, and I'm having some trouble with them not always showing up in the imported iTunes library, but the tracks that do show are playing fine.
Parabolic 9:11 PM - 23 July, 2009
Great, now to figure out how to transcode all my FLACs and try to keep overviews from the mp3s I was using.... :-/
Evil_banana 9:28 PM - 26 July, 2009
Quote:
Great, now to figure out how to transcode all my FLACs and try to keep overviews from the mp3s I was using.... :-/


Take a look at XLD, it works like a charm and has many options for batchprocessing your entire flac-archive.

tmkk.hp.infoseek.co.jp
Parabolic 8:47 PM - 30 July, 2009
Quote:
Quote:
Great, now to figure out how to transcode all my FLACs and try to keep overviews from the mp3s I was using.... :-/


Take a look at XLD, it works like a charm and has many options for batchprocessing your entire flac-archive.

tmkk.hp.infoseek.co.jp
I don't have a mac :-(
amitai 7:52 PM - 1 August, 2009
ALAC support? Awesome. I'll take what I can get for now.......


Still -- A BIG BUMP FOR FLAC, PLEASE! :)
djdsk 7:23 AM - 6 August, 2009
Waiting for flac i have already started ripping my stuff to .flac
Rico Uno 8:52 PM - 19 August, 2009
the alac support is much appreciated!!

Quote:


Still -- A BIG BUMP FOR FLAC, PLEASE! :)


I'm a resident DJ at Vancouver's newest club Fortune Sound Club which has the newest Funktion One sound system, where TOP sound quality REALLY REALLY matters.
www.funktion-one.com

Many DJs from Vancouver (and around the world) will be playing this club in the near future and FLAC support would really make a big difference to a whole city's worth of DJ's at the very least.

Looking forward to hearing about FLAC support!

-Rico
Firenze 2:43 AM - 22 August, 2009
+1 for FLAC. It really is a must and I'm surprised it has not already been supported. Crazy!
serkan 1:30 PM - 30 August, 2009
I don't think that we'll see FLAC in the near future since ALAC is supported now... IMO that's very sad b/c I don't want to use properitary codecs if I can get a free one that does the same.
Firenze 1:32 PM - 30 August, 2009
No-one encodes in ALAC and I am certainly not going through all of my collection to convert them just for Serato.
Evil_banana 7:11 AM - 31 August, 2009
Quote:
No-one encodes in ALAC and I am certainly not going through all of my collection to convert them just for Serato.

You can be stubborn about it as much you want revolting against proprietary blabla... I just ripped all my CD's in ALAC, so keep on using mp3 while I'll enjoy lossless.

I don't see what all the fuzz is about. ALAC is lossless and FLAC is lossless. So they have the same quality and the same capabilities when it comes to tagging. You can easily convert all the FLACs into ALACs and have no qualityloss at all. There are also tools that can batchconvert this stuff so converting "all of my collection" will take YOU 5 minutes. It's the computer that will be doing the numbercrunching for the next few hours. If it's about lossy formats, I agree, the basics should be supported because it's bad practise to convert from lossy to lossy. But lossless? Makes no difference.
Quote:
I don't think that we'll see FLAC in the near future since ALAC is supported now... IMO that's very sad b/c I don't want to use properitary codecs if I can get a free one that does the same.

True... but it's Serato that is paying the ALAC license. For you as a user, ALAC is just as free as FLAC is. I don't see how it makes any difference.
The advantage of proprietary is that there is an industry standard set which asures nore backward compatibility and such. As for open source which isn't standardized, there are no guarantees whatsoever.


Unless you can point me out a SERIOUS advantage to FLAC, one that actually affects you as a user, I would actually even say "no" to FLAC. Not because of FLAC itself, but because you're introducing yet another format, which WILL introduce instabilities. More formats, more problems. Look how long it took to get mp3 rocksolid. SSL is a stable program now. Do you want to spend the next year, waiting again for confirmation that SSL is 99.99% stable? I'm not, I want to DJ NOW and I want to start using lossless NOW.

my 0.02$
nik39 9:45 AM - 31 August, 2009
Quote:
I agree, the basics should be supported because it's bad practise to convert from lossy to lossy. But lossless? Makes no difference.

Good point.
dctucker 4:04 AM - 8 September, 2009
To Evil_Banana's comment:

As a software engineer, I look at input formats as a separate module from playback. This however may not be the case in Serato, and only a developer could speak qualitatively in regard to that. If playback is indeed separate from the input function of loading a file from disk into memory, it must then be the case that Serato uses some standard format in memory to represent files loaded from disk, which must imply that instability issues should not arise during playback. If for example a bad FLAC was loaded, since the FLAC loading functionality is separate and can fail independently of playback, the program should continue to function normally, and the FLAC loader should simply report an error and abandon loading the file or gracefully ignore the faulty data.

I'd really like to see FLAC in Serato since most of my files are in that format, and since I'm a purist when it comes to my data; that is, I prefer files that are stored in an open format... I know that not every cares about that philosophy, and that's fine. The main point is that it shouldn't be very hard to program in FLAC capability.

I'll be purchasing some equipment soon, and as a potential customer I'd be much less interested in Serato if it will not support FLAC in the near future.
Mishev 8:00 AM - 8 September, 2009
Quote:
They care a lot? Just because they say they do???PLEASE :)

Yes in a matter of fact they do.......or you just forgot how comfy are you with a free software updates.....you wanna go to VDJ or TRAKTOR feel free to start paying every 2-nd update or even worse buy new hardware maybe......complains ....complains.....maybe you should do your own software sell it to people and be that quick with everybody's requests FOR FREE
DJMark 10:47 PM - 8 September, 2009
Quote:
I'm a purist when it comes to my data; that is, I prefer files that are stored in an open format... I know that not every cares about that philosophy, and that's fine. The main point is that it shouldn't be very hard to program in FLAC capability.


I'm a "purist" when it comes to software that I depend on; that is, I prefer software that is subject to a careful, methodical, non-marketing-driven approach that assures I'm not having to constantly be paranoid about whether or not it will actually work for hours at a time in front of a live audience.

Obviously, since the conversation about FLAC and other formats has been going on for well over five years in this thread, properly supporting additional formats (in other words, doing that in a way that doesn't compromise stability) is a bit less trivial than some might assume.
Evil_banana 10:43 AM - 9 September, 2009
To dctucker's comment:

As a Software Quality TEST engineer for Digital Video Systems for broadcasters (yes that's right, I'm the type of guy that bothers your type of guy about all the things that are wrong with the software:o), I know from my experience with real-time AV processing that reality is far from theory in a lot of cases. Even if SSL would be programmed in seperate modules, it won't mean that errors can't flow from one module to another. It wouldn't if it would work perfectly, but if it would work perfectly, I would be out of job (and I'm burried with work).
The output is dependant of the input, so if the input is garbage, the output will be garbage as well. Of course you can implement a verification/evaluation mechanism, but that module can and WILL contain bugs as well. So all the development I'm talking about isn't necessarily about the ability to "read FLAC", but also to evaluate it and make the system bulletproof against any corrupt files that could freeze the system.
If the FLAC loader should "simply" report an error, then tell me why there were so many problems with mp3 crashing SSL? Why couldn't that "simply report an error"? I guess there's 2 possibilities:
1. SSL engineers are bad programmers
2. Theory is great only in theory
I think it's not nr. 1. Don't forget that realtime AV-processing is a VERY different deal compared to other types of SW. Don't get me wrong, you're right, it SHOULD work like that, but you know just as well as I do that's just not reality.

As for the other thing, being a purist has nothing to do with preferring open source. It's just about supporting open source community and going against company's who charge too much money for similar things, for software that should/could be for free. But now we're talking about the process, about HOW you get to the endresult. But the endresult itself, the FORMAT (in case for video and audio and others like communication protocols) should be standardized. Otherwise you are never sure about WHAT you are going to get. And you'll end up like all of us did 5 years ago when getting divx's from the internet... installing 15 codecs and add-ons on your PC and 6 different players and STILL not being able to play the video.

For me being a purist is about using lossless formats, and ALAC is lossless and it makes no difference at all for you as a user if it's open source or not, you can convert from one to another without any loss.
But it matters to me that it's standardized and doesn't remain within open source alone.
I wonder, would you like to be hooked up to a life support machine, which is running on un-certified trial-and-error created software? Not saying bad software, just un-certified and created through trial-and-error and best-effort by a few motivated guys...
Well, not me. And SSL is the same thing for me. SSL is the party's life-support and if it has too many hickups, it will die....

sorry if this comment sounds a little hostile, I'm a little pumped up on work. But I stand by the idea behind my comments.
nik39 11:42 AM - 9 September, 2009
Quote:
And you'll end up like all of us did 5 years ago when getting divx's from the internet... installing 15 codecs and add-ons on your PC and 6 different players and not being able to boot the computer anymore.

:D

Heard about the trojans and viruses which spread nowadays hidden in so called "must-have-codecs"?

---

So basically... you prefer proprietary, closed-source when it comes to live-applications?
dctucker 8:01 PM - 9 September, 2009
Quote:
If the FLAC loader should "simply" report an error, then tell me why there were so many problems with mp3 crashing SSL? Why couldn't that "simply report an error"?

I'm neither an SSL user nor developer so I really can't answer that question. I can however look at change-logs that point out that some crashes were due to ID3 tag issues. Related issues should be more readily resolvable given their gain in experience in dealing with a similar format (one that uses ID3 tags).

The question isn't about whether the FLAC itself has been tested thoroughly (I could digress about various software development practices), it's about how much testing occurs at the point of integration between the FLAC and SSL. I fully agree that there should be no FLAC-supporting release of SSL until its integration has been proven stable.

That said, I still think that FLAC support would be a worthwhile endeavor for this software, and I look forward to seeing it happen.
Evil_banana 1:57 PM - 10 September, 2009
@ Nik
You're twisting my words (... boot computer...)... but they're correct though :oD.
And no, I don't mean I prefer proprietary closed-source... I prefer a controlled format which is being developped following a standard or have been "frozen" in a standard specification with decent guidelines. That's a independent of open/closed-source.
MPEG4/H.264/AVC for example, was partially created in open source community's, a brilliant format and fantastic algorythms. But until a few years ago it was useless because it wasn't standardized yet, so everybody made their own flavour which forced you to install multiple codecs hoping one of them would play your downloaded video. So it was useless for professional/commercial applications like digital television as well. Now with the H.264/AVC part 10 ETSI specifications there are (more) strict guidelines to MPEG4 implementation which ensure compatibility between different types of hardware/software.
What I'm saying is, that for me it doesn't matter if it's open source or proprietary, as long as it is being developed through guidelines which lay out very clear how it is supposed to work. And that's something that I see happening for formats which have been standardized (originating from open-source or not), or have been developped within a company that use decent guidelines (e.g. apple), but I'm not too confident on this matter for formats that are completely open-source and unstandardized.

@ dctucker
yes, you're right, completely, and yes FLAC would be nice, no doubt about it. But right now I don't see the benefit in trying to push FLAC and waiting for it. When SSL supported Mp3, but not AAC, than I could relate to pushing AAC if you have your entire library in AAC since it's lossy. It would mean sonsiderable quality-loss to convert formats.
But since you can convert from FLAC to ALAC and back without any loss or side-effects at all, and as a user ALAC is just as free as FLAC:
- I don't see the use in putting your energy in trying to push FLAC
- I wouldn't like to be waiting for FLAC to happen, while you could be enjoying lossless audio right now
- and even though it's perfectly possible to introduce a new format, I'd rather not take the chance to introduce any extra riscs of instability because I can't see any benefits from it. ALAC is lossless and free as well, and conversion is not an issue.

That's what I mean.
I just converted all my FLACs into ALAC and I'm enjoying lossless right now.
nik39 2:12 PM - 10 September, 2009
Evil, gotcha.

Yes, I was misquoting you :-P
serkan 10:36 PM - 20 September, 2009
@ Evil_banana

I totally get your point. But FLAC is welll spread for quite a while now and that kinda is the problem. I have 2 portable media players (Sandisk Sansa Fuze & Trekstor Vibes) and when I bought them, FLAC-support was one of the must-haves. And also my favorite software player (FB2K) supports FLAC.
So I ripped all my CDs to FLAC and I'm also recording all my records to this codec. If I convert my music to ALAC for SL, I won't be able to use my portable players.
And if I had ALAC and FLAC on my HDD the whole point in those lossless codecs would've been gone since I could then decode all tracks back to WAV...
Evil_banana 7:00 AM - 21 September, 2009
@ Serkan
I know FLAC has been around for quite a while and widely spread, and it's a good format as well. But I stay by my previous argument, MPEG4 has been around for a long time as well and was spread more widely than FLAC... a LOT more. And it still was commercially useless because there was no standard and no guidelines.

I guess it comes down to the choice of staying with ALAC, or taking the extra riscs of instability in order to support an extra format to accomodate your media player.
I guess you know for me it's a no-brainer :o), I don't want to take the risc for that. I don't believe that's something Serato should take into account. There are people using WMA as well for their media player, but would you like to see that added to the list as well?


You know, I'm not discussing against FLAC. I'm especially saying "stop wasting your time nagging about it, enjoy it NOW!". Lossless has been requested for YEARS, FLAC and ALAC have been around for a very long time. And now they've finally decided to add Lossless, they went for ALAC. Do you really want to take the chance to wait for another 2 ~ 3 years to get a go with lossless? Just go buy an iPod and start enjoying lossless now.
And don't tell me it's not just because of your media player, because it is... Both formats have the same quality, both formats have the same tagging capabilities, both formats have similar compression results, both formats are free and you can losslessly convert from one to another. So there is NO added value in having both formats in SSL. Then the discussion must come down to external advantages like media players etcetera...

Besides, if you have your collection in FLAC, it seems that you're running a double collection already since SSL doesn't support FLAC. Want to continue doing that just for the sake of supporting your media player? 600$ SSL-box or 1400$ TTM57 vs 200$ Media player... my choice is easily made...

I see your point, but I just don't think it's worth your effort and time.
Bungle 9:48 AM - 21 September, 2009
@ Evil_banana

Nice argument :) I agree with a lot of what you're saying there. It is worth mentioning that FLAC does have much more support from software developers and hardware manufacturers. And there's a lot more 3rd party tools (for tagging etc) but I agree that since ALAC is supported, then why not start using it - it's definitely better than WAV!

I do hope there's a time when there's a standard lossless format which every piece of software and hardware supports. I've a feeling it will be FLAC but only time will tell.
Evil_banana 3:45 PM - 21 September, 2009
@ Bungle
Thanks for the complement :o). And you're right, I agree, FLAC is more widely supported in SW and HW. And it will probably stay that way since ALAC is probably tied more into the Apple-fanbase :o) which isn't appreciated by a lot of windows and Linux users.
I was acutally surpirsed myself to see that ALAC was supported in SSL because I was expecting FLAC. Then again, ALAC seems more logical afterwards. For one, because of the standards and guidelines.
BUT also since SSL supports iTunes-integration by reading the iTunes-library. Since iTunes does not support FLAC (and I'm not sure it will any time soon because they want to push ALAC), I don't think that SSL will support FLAC too any time soon either.

If FLAC will get standardized, I will cheer it for compatibility sake with other SW and HW. But until then, I'd prefer SSL to get 1 inputformat at the time and make absolutely sure that is 100% stable before going to the next. I'll just get myself an iPod in the meantime.

I feel the quality-difference with mp3 is noticable on high-end systems, so I'm not going to sit and wait for FLAC to happen. I could be run over by a truck tomorrow so I'm going to enjoy it NOW :oP
And if FLAC gets there, I might reconvert my entire library, it will only take me 10 minutes of configuring and 2 days CPU-processing.

Cheers dude!
serkan 10:32 PM - 22 September, 2009
Hi Banana :)

I can understand your point. But you're complaining about stability all the time but did you recognize any problems since OggVorbis is supported? For me really is important to have a lossless format that is supported by media players AND SL.
If I have both FLAC and ALAC on my HDD I will loose any advantages of those formats b/c then I can keep all tracks in WAV format - but I don't have so many space to waste, no matter how much space is on my drives. It just would be riddiculous to have 2 lossless formats.
Switching to an ipod? Never!
I want the support of gapless playback, SD cards, multiple formats (like FLAC and Vorbis), and the ability to use the player as a mass storage.
I'll stick with MP3 and Vorbis now b/c ALAC just makes no sense for ME.

And btw. I think we will see FLAC in the near future... at least I'm hoping for 2.0 :)
Bungle 10:33 AM - 23 September, 2009
serkan i think you've summed it up pretty well. The argument here is split between people who own an iPod and those that don't.

If you don't own an iPod there's no benefit to ALAC, other than to use it in SL. If you do, then you can use ALAC on your iPod too.

Of course, if Serato pulled their fingers out and introduced FLAC support there wouldn't be an argument :)
DJMark 10:55 AM - 23 September, 2009
Quote:
serkan i think you've summed it up pretty well. The argument here is split between people who own an iPod and those that don't.


No it's not.

The Serato developers are making the right decision in being careful about format support, and they explained the issue quite well earlier in this thread.
Evil_banana 1:29 PM - 24 September, 2009
Serkan, I am not "complaining" about stability. Right now it IS pretty stable and I would like it to stay that way. There's a difference.
That and the sober interface are the main reasons why I chose SSL over any other SW.

Did I see stability-problems after OGG? Not specifically after OGG, but there have been stability-issues with the handling of certain mp3's, there's no denying. Now with 1.9.1, I've had SSL crap out on me for the very first time in 3 years, damn thing stopped, froze up for about 10-15 seconds and shut down.
Luckily I wasn't in front of a crowd, but that is something that I would NOT like to happen live, it would be like sitting on stage with your pants down. Which is the reason why I would like it to be stable.

Keeping 2 formats would indeed be ridiculous, but than again waiting because of your aversity towards iCrap seems a waste of time to me too. But you know what my opinion is on that matter. You can wait if you want, but I want it today :o).

Not sure, but I think as long as iTunes doesn't support FLAC, SSL won't either any time soon.
I hope for your sake FLAC will be supported as well (as I said, I was initially waiting for FLAC instead of FLAC), but I hope they will do it format by format and not drop it in all at once. And I hope they will wait for it until FLAC has a specific set of guidelines towards FLAC-encoding. Otherwise it's a big risc in my opinion.

I'll cross my fingers for you while loading up FLAC in SSL ;o) (just teasing, but I'll cross my fingers).

@ Bungle. For me it's not a discussion between iPod owners and non-owners.
I don't have an iPod and I'm not an active user of iTunes either (I think iTunes is pretty good, even though it's getting bloaty, but I hate the file management)
I'm actually doing all my file-management manually in the folders, and all music-management in SSL. As MP3-player-software I'm using VLC or SSL-player itself :o).

I know there are more mp3-players that support FLAC than there are supporting ALAC. But honestly, I don't think it is THAT much.


Anyway, I think I made my point and there's not much more I can add. thanks for a great discussion :o)
EvilCutz 1:53 AM - 1 October, 2009
On monday I got a brandnew ttm57 (as a present) which I rly like for scratching but I wont use it with serato after replacing serato for "another product" in february which IS supporting flac, I thought I may use my new mixers functions if flac support is added....well it isnt. This is ridiculous, I have to attatch another device to the ttm 57 to play my format....
Please dont suggest to transcode all the stuff to alac because this is ridiculous since I keep all my stuff in flac for storage. 3.1 TB of music (some huge files there as well since I record 10 vinyls at a time,dont split/edit it and save it as flac as well, some 24bit recordings and music projects as well) on 2 externals and another 2TB external with backups for my vinyl rips(keeping everything twice + DL-DVDs as well).
You have to see it from the customers point of view. I have a certain workflow which works for me and I have 2 products, 1 works with my workflow but must be attached to my new mixer which "could" be an All-In-One solution for me.

As a customer I dont wanna hear why it doesnt work or someone posting on the forums that flac isnt necessary or too complicated. I go and buy at the company which delivers MY solution its as simple as that.

Had to add this statement to the techtalk above.

I wonder why serato cant add a format which another company supports, and to answer the question: the rival product never failed during a gig and has an outstanding soundquality aswell.

Will look awesome on saturday....a guy with a 57 but no serato on the stage :)
HoneyBrownBoy 6:56 PM - 1 October, 2009
+1 for flac support some day... until then i'll convert my flacs to alacs :/
T1 10:49 AM - 2 October, 2009
I would love to see flac and wma support. Outside of iTunes, Rhapsody is the second largest music download service. All their subscription based services use wma (with DRM) and it would be great to scratch with them. At the very least, supporting non DRM wma would be awesome as well.
serkan 10:52 PM - 5 October, 2009
Yeah. I used the competitor (for me there is only one to be taken serious) and I didn't like the GUI at all. But FLAC support? Lovely :)
I also liked the sync option - never thought I would but it's really cool^^

But I realized:
- I can live without auto sync
- I can't live without SL GUI (it's soooo much better!)
- I can't live without FLAC

Now... I have a problem. But I somehow managed to live without the perfect DVS. I'm wondering how long it will work?!

:D
DJMike_123 11:04 AM - 11 October, 2009
+1 on FLAC here too
kemuri 5:05 PM - 19 October, 2009
FLAC is a must, i need it! not just to have an argument against traktor
serkan 9:42 AM - 20 October, 2009
@ kemuri

I think you have someone in mind? ;)
Even if not: I want FLAC so bad that I start searching for ANY argument. People are requesting this for a loooong while now and it's still not implemented AND we don't get any response if it will at all.
This is very frustrating and at the end of a day you start looking at the competitors - even if you don't like them. They have lots of crap we don't want in SL but there is something what "we" want... and I don't think we have to mention it another time.

:(
Makiba 1:45 PM - 24 October, 2009
Flac, Flac, Flac, Flac, Flac, Flac, Flac, Flac, Flac, Flac, Flac, Flac, Flac, Flac, Flac, Flac!
ScottyOhh! 2:53 PM - 24 October, 2009
Aflac!!!!!!!!!!!
Evil_banana 10:40 AM - 29 October, 2009
Quote:
Aflac!!!!!!!!!!!

:oD I vote for that one!!!
Toni Be 10:30 AM - 30 October, 2009
Quote:
As a customer I dont wanna hear why it doesnt work or someone posting on the forums that flac isnt necessary or too complicated. I go and buy at the company which delivers MY solution its as simple as that.


I 100% agree with that! As a result, I sold my Serato 6 monthes ago and buy Tracktor Scratch Duo. I think Serato company makes a big mistake ingnoring FLAC users.
Evil_banana 12:09 PM - 30 October, 2009
Quote:
Quote:
As a customer I dont wanna hear why it doesnt work or someone posting on the forums that flac isnt necessary or too complicated. I go and buy at the company which delivers MY solution its as simple as that.


I 100% agree with that! As a result, I sold my Serato 6 monthes ago and buy Tracktor Scratch Duo. I think Serato company makes a big mistake ingnoring FLAC users.

If you sold your Serato 6 months ago, why are you still here argumenting on features? Don't take it personal. Serato isn't "ignoring" users. If they did that they would have ended up as Final Scratch, and not one of the most popular Vinyl emulators in the world. They just have to set priorities. Everybody wants something and it's impossible to deliver everything at once. And everybody thinks the company is making big mistakes for not implementing their feature. Nevertheless, somehow they became popular and they're user-base is expanding... they must be very lucky then if they're expanding while making such big mistakes.
ScottyOhh! 12:44 PM - 30 October, 2009
If you sold your Serato 6 months ago, why are you still here argumenting on features?



+1 LOL
WarpNote 5:11 PM - 1 November, 2009
Quote:
If you sold your Serato 6 months ago, why are you still here argumenting on features?



+1 LOL

He might want to go back...?
A very valid point IMO.
Evil_banana 5:53 PM - 1 November, 2009
Quote:
He might want to go back...?
A very valid point IMO.

Absolutely true. It was indeed a question, not to ridiculize. Altough if I would consider to go back I wouldn't probably sell my unit. anyway, he probably has his reason.

Nevertheless I stand by the rest. You could indeed consider this missing feature something vital to the software and reason enough to switch to another product. fair enough. Album artwork for example, is a pleasure killer for me. But I don't like Traktor's interface, so I'll just wait for Serato to implement.
But in any case, it's not personal. Serato isn't ignoring people. They aren't considered to have one of the best support because they ignore their users. It's just a matter of priorities. I can imagine, that they consider ALAC a reasonable workaround for now and will focus their attention to other requests.
Took us 2 years to get a confirmation that they are considering Album artwork and are implementing something. So they did hear us, they just don't have the time to jump into every thread/discussion. I'm sure you will see flac some day, but with the introduction of alac, I think it may take a while.
WarpNote 6:54 PM - 1 November, 2009
Banana, I absolutely agree with you. Also, personally, I don't miss FLAC.
I've been using 320k mp3 for a long while, however I'm considering switching to ALAC now.
In the process of ripping my back catalogue (about 10.000 cd's), and I don't want to do it twice...

Also, if he jumped ship, I understand why he sold, if it was a SL1.
If he went with that traktor thingy, he might be thinking there's new and better hardware once/if he want's to go back?
Evil_banana 8:05 PM - 1 November, 2009
true about the hardware.
I got kind of lucky, I've been out of it for a couple of years and restarting now, luckily ALAC was introduced by the time I started ripping my CD's so I could go lossless at once instead of having to redo the work again in x years.
I was waiting for FLAC too, but ALAC works just as well. It's lossless, takes half the space of WAV and supports extended tagging. That's all I need for DJ'ing. I'll just get myself an iPod if I want my alac's on the go.

You don't have to worry about doing the work twice. Since it's lossless you can convert the ALACs to whatever format you wish afterwards, so you may convert to flac too if you want to change later on. The annoying part is that you will have to rebuild your database :o).
nik39 8:07 PM - 1 November, 2009
Quote:

You don't have to worry about doing the work twice. Since it's lossless you can convert the ALACs to whatever format you wish afterwards, so you may convert to flac too if you want to change later on. The annoying part is that you will have to rebuild your database

Lost cue points, loops, and maybe some tags... :-(
Evil_banana 8:39 PM - 1 November, 2009
Quote:
Lost cue points, loops, and maybe some tags... :-(

oh right, forgot about those too, very annoying indeed. I'm wondering, if I'm not mistaken all these things are saved in the tags (somewhere). Shouldn't it be possible to export those, convert your file, and import again? If this would work, I think this could quite easily be scripted. And if the links in the database can be adapted you're all good... in a perfect world :oD
nik39 9:23 PM - 1 November, 2009
In theory this would work.
serkan 10:54 PM - 1 November, 2009
I think I'm getting it.
There are like 1500 people who want FLAC support. And there is Evil_banana who will argue till everyone of them is convinced to switch to ALAC.
Not because he wants to - it's because he needs to ;)

Sorry dude, but you're arguing that hard about this that it starts to seem kinda weird.

Just think about something that you really want... no matter what it is - e.g. ice cream with vanilla flavor :)
And then think about that guy who constantly tries to convince you that you don't need vanilla ice just because he is into chocolate. Would you actually care about his taste? I don't think so.

In conclusion: I want vanilla!
And I'm in this thread because here are people who want vanilla too because this is the place where people can wish their favorite flavor. And if people get the flavor they want, they just go to other places - but they don't try to convince people that ALAC tastes better :p
Evil_banana 12:07 AM - 2 November, 2009
:oD
Serkan, you're right about 1 thing. I do like a good arguement. And this is an interesting forum with intelligent people and in the feature suggestions thread we're basically discussing engineering requirements lists and feature designs. They're semi-technical discussions which don't go all nerdy. My favourites.

But you're wrong too. You haven't been reading my comments very well ;o).
I am not convincing you that ALAC tastes better. On the contrary, I have been saying FLAC and ALAC share the same capabilities, it's not even about different tastes since they do the same thing.

But to continue your analogy, the only thing I try to tell you is: don't be blind to other flavours. I prefer vanilla as well. But I'm not going to wait for another year or more on an empty stomach before eating some ice-cream. I'll get started with the chocolate in the meantime and enjoy that.

There's a difference. I don't try to convince you FOR alac, nor AGAINST flac. Just to open your mind to the possibilities and not focus ONLY on flac. that's it. Maybe 1500 people want vanilla, but several didn't even know about chocolate which they're enjoying now.
You know 'dude', the fact that I keep repeating it very clearly, but you still keep interpreting it your own way, starts to seem kinda weird as well, don't you think? Don't try to turn my words around.
WarpNote 3:42 AM - 2 November, 2009
Quote:
Quote:

You don't have to worry about doing the work twice. Since it's lossless you can convert the ALACs to whatever format you wish afterwards, so you may convert to flac too if you want to change later on. The annoying part is that you will have to rebuild your database

Lost cue points, loops, and maybe some tags... :-(

I'm sort of halfway through (about 4.500 cd's) ripping at 320k mp3.
And I'm probably not going to go back for lossless for those already ripped, anytime soon.
But considering switching to lossles for the rest, as you're saying, once you rip to lossless, you could always convert to another format later on.

Also, as I'm quite new to working with the ALAC format, could anyone recommend a good tagger for adding cover art/info (in addtion to iTunes of course...)

Sorry for threadjacking, send me a PM or point me to the right thread, I'm sure it's out there..
Evil_banana 7:40 AM - 2 November, 2009
@ Warpnote
I don't know about Mac, Haven't really found a great tagger for OS X, but MP3tag supports ALAC (could run it in a VMWare like I do). Not sure but I think Picard (musicbrainz) and jaikoz editor can work with it as well.
Maybe I'm wrong, but since AAC and ALAC use the same container, I guess they support the same tagging. So maybe any m4a capable tagger should be able to work with ALAC as well.
WarpNote 9:41 AM - 2 November, 2009
@ Evil_banana
I'm testing right now, seems that Media Rage works just fine :D

So far the only issue I'm having with ALAC, is from Rapid Evolution:
It won't write the analysed key into the key field (but it will write it to the grouping field)
I posted a note at the Rapid Evolution, so time will tell....
Evil_banana 11:27 AM - 2 November, 2009
Quote:
So far the only issue I'm having with ALAC, is from Rapid Evolution:

True, but I don't use rapid evolution since I found it to crash regularly. I would like to use Mixedinkey, but that only supports wav and mp3. Again, I think scripting could be a solution. Convert to wav or mp3, analyze, extract key-info from wav/mp3 and import into alac-tag... if only I would have to time to start learning to script and actually develop this. I need to get another job... :o)
nik39 12:55 PM - 2 November, 2009
Quote:
I think I'm getting it.
There are like 1500 people who want FLAC support. And there is Evil_banana who will argue till everyone of them is convinced to switch to ALAC.
Not because he wants to - it's because he needs to ;)

Sorry dude, but you're arguing that hard about this that it starts to seem kinda weird.

Just think about something that you really want... no matter what it is - e.g. ice cream with vanilla flavor :)
And then think about that guy who constantly tries to convince you that you don't need vanilla ice just because he is into chocolate. Would you actually care about his taste? I don't think so.

In conclusion: I want vanilla!
And I'm in this thread because here are people who want vanilla too because this is the place where people can wish their favorite flavor. And if people get the flavor they want, they just go to other places - but they don't try to convince people that ALAC tastes better :p

I've been following the thread as well and I don't have the impression that evil_banana is as evil as his name suggests ;) I don't see him trying to force his opinion on others. It's just a good (and civil!) discussion.
blackavenger 5:31 PM - 8 November, 2009
Quote:
Quote:
As a customer I dont wanna hear why it doesnt work or someone posting on the forums that flac isnt necessary or too complicated. I go and buy at the company which delivers MY solution its as simple as that.



I 100% agree with that! As a result, I sold my Serato 6 monthes ago and buy Tracktor Scratch Duo. I think Serato company makes a big mistake ingnoring FLAC users.


I'm not going to sell my SL3 anytime soon, but he makes a valid point.

What's it been now.......almost F-I-V-E years?

For Christ's sake, are we ever going to get FLAC support? FLAC is sold on just about every online retailer I deal with now-a-days. Other DVS' support it. As HDD space becomes cheaper and cheaper, it's only the natural progression to want to play higher quality tunes. But whatever, every argument favoring FLAC has been made in this thread, so I won't bore everyone with a rehashing of It's benefits.

Come on already........you don't want the competition to have one up on ya', especially for something so simple as codec support.
tron 2:09 AM - 13 November, 2009
Hi, can you please FLAC support sometime this decade? It would be greatly appreciated. Thanks much.
WarpNote 3:23 PM - 13 November, 2009
I understand why all you people want FLAC, but honestly, have any of you ever tried to convert a FLAC into ALAC? Convertion time is at least 4 times as fast as converting to mp3....
blackavenger 7:43 PM - 13 November, 2009
Quote:
I understand why all you people want FLAC, but honestly, have any of you ever tried to convert a FLAC into ALAC? Convertion time is at least 4 times as fast as converting to mp3....


It's hard enough keeping up with the organizational maintenance that my expansive library requires. If I had to take all the tracks I own and convert them to yet another format (after having already done them in mp3) I would suffer a massive stroke! ScratchLIVE was supposed to make DJing easier, but sometimes I think the contrary. Aside from the weight and upkeep of owning and spinning vinyl, DJing was much easier back in the day. Grab a stack of records, organize them a bit in your crate, go spin them at the club. That was it. Now, we have to convert them, and tag them, and organize them into folders.......it's soooooo tedious......baaaaa!

Naa, just about all digital shops sell FLAC now.......make out lives easier, give us what we want/need!
Evil_banana 10:19 PM - 13 November, 2009
@Blackavenger
You're right, I hear ya! Sometimes I feel more like a network-administrator than a DJ :o). It's mostly the cost-price of Vinyl that convinced me about Serato, that and practicallities like weight, volume, space...

But I'm afraid that's the Law of Conservation Of Misery :o) (not a joke, it's a phisical law). For every problem you solve, a new problem will be created. Every solution comes with a downside. It's just a matter of choosing which problem you want solved and which problems you can live with :o). I still think vinyl is the best, but serato gives me more opportunities so I'll live with the ripping/tagging/sorting/backup/maintenance/management.
nik39 10:39 PM - 13 November, 2009
Quote:
But I'm afraid that's the Law of Conservation Of Misery

That dude is awesome :)))
nicmac303 12:33 AM - 14 November, 2009
Quote:
Hi, can you please FLAC support sometime this decade? It would be greatly appreciated. Thanks much.

the decade's nearly over :p

+1 for the FLAC, all the decent shops use it now - bleep, beatport, boomkat, bTunes (sorry i made up that last one, it seemed funny at the time)
blackavenger 3:24 AM - 14 November, 2009
Quote:
but serato gives me more opportunities so I'll live with the ripping/tagging/sorting/backup/maintenance/management.


Likewise, but I'm not using ALAC......it's as simple as that. I'll wait for FLAC, or nothing at all. I just don't want anyone trying to convince me to convert, yet again. I think pretty much everyone agrees............it's way past the time to support FLAC.
tron 4:08 AM - 14 November, 2009
Quote:
Quote:
Hi, can you please FLAC support sometime this decade? It would be greatly appreciated. Thanks much.

the decade's nearly over :p


Lets hope it gets added in the same decade it was requested in!
serkan 8:35 AM - 27 November, 2009
Quote:

Lets hope it gets added in the same decade it was requested in!

Only one month left and right before xmas? Forget it!
:(
felixfuchs 8:30 PM - 27 November, 2009
flac or apple lossles is a MUST. especially since i have sl-3 now and it makes sense to play hi-re files. waves or aiff are taking up more space, but the worst is they dont allow tagging!
blackavenger 3:06 PM - 28 November, 2009
Quote:
flac or apple lossles is a MUST. especially since i have sl-3 now and it makes sense to play hi-re files. waves or aiff are taking up more space, but the worst is they dont allow tagging!



Sorry, but FLAC only. There are far more PC users than MAC users out there. Keep the codec neutral.
Dj.Fusion 12:21 PM - 7 December, 2009
Quote:
Hi, can you please FLAC support sometime this decade? It would be greatly appreciated. Thanks much.


Considering the first request was made for this on 8/7/2004. Highly unlikely. Maybe next year the Serato boffins will be kind enough to update us... ;)
bervikk 1:20 AM - 10 December, 2009
there's one simple explanation why SL is still lacking FLAC support:

THEY DON'T GIVE A SHIT.

traktor supports it (since 2005!!), ableton supports it, helloooo?! it would be really hard to find any professional music-related software which doesn't support it besides your product (and of course your direct competitor FS).

please, please, don't gimme that shit, "it's hard to implement", "it's in the works", blah-blah. no. you just don't care.

and the other shit: it would introduce new bugs! wow! what a great recognition! new features introduce new bugs! if you don't like that fact, don't be a software developer. geez....

thanks! i won't buy scratch live anytime soon. let me congratulate your devs/managers/whatever working so hard not to do anything about this.
DJMark 4:37 AM - 10 December, 2009
Quote:
it would be really hard to find any professional music-related software which doesn't support it


Doesn't get much more "professional" than Digidesign Pro Tools, and it doesn't support FLAC.

Not really worth replying to anything else in that post...
Kaos Effekt 6:31 PM - 10 December, 2009
I would love serato to support FLAC, so the powers that be, plz at least by next year get your development team in gear so the can have an update ready for the thousands of flac supporters that are forced to use audio formats that we don't like but are loyal to ssl, because some of us have alot of money invested in Rane Serato products like your mixers and SSL units....
bervikk 8:29 PM - 10 December, 2009
Quote:

Doesn't get much more "professional" than Digidesign Pro Tools, and it doesn't support FLAC.

Not really worth replying to anything else in that post...


i didn't ask YOU or anyone to reply (you talk like it was an honour), it's a self-contained point of view, but thanks.
jasd834 8:34 PM - 10 December, 2009
+1 for FLAC
Don't care about apple lossless, not all of us have an apple macintosh. But flac would be amazing!
Evil_banana 10:56 AM - 11 December, 2009
Quote:
+1 for FLAC
Don't care about apple lossless, not all of us have an apple macintosh. But flac would be amazing!

So by this you mean that apple lossless format only works on Apple Machines?
Strange, my crappy old Dell must be having an identity crisis then.
jasd834 11:59 AM - 11 December, 2009
I see your point, I wasn't clear. I'd rather keep all my stuff in WAV though than have anything to do with the democratic peoples republic of apple
serkan 8:43 PM - 12 December, 2009
Quote:

(...) which doesn't support it besides your product (and of course your direct competitor FS).

Direct competitor? FS doesn't really exist anymore. Even FS Open seems to be dead for a long time now (if it ever was alive though).

But on the other hand... SL is a direct competitor with a dead system if it comes to FLAC support :D
tron 3:03 AM - 14 December, 2009
Six years and serato can't give a single reason why flac support is being such a hold up. I mean, they can add video support but oh no, flac will destroy stability (or insert generic disregard reason here).
VJ Justin Allen 3:26 AM - 14 December, 2009
Here are a few reasons, pros and cons (wanted to be fair.)

FLAC

Pros
FLAC is portable to many systems
Open source and freely licensed
The encoding of audio data incurs no loss of information.
Hardware support & Streaming support
Extremely fast decoding
Supports multi channel and high resolution streams
Supports Replay Gain & cue-sheet (with some limitations)
Gaining wide use as successor to Shorten

Cons:

Compresses less efficiently than other popular modern compressors (Monkey’s Audio, OptimFROG)
Higher compression modes slow, for little gain over the default setting.

source: audiocodecs.wordpress.com
tron 7:21 AM - 16 December, 2009
I appreciate your wanting to be "fair," but as a paying customer, the last thing i would ever want to hear from a company would be pro and cons. To your average consumer, none of that really matters, they just want something that works for them.
VJ Justin Allen 11:36 AM - 16 December, 2009
lmao So to hell with any issues as to why something may or may not work...just give it to me now...

...if companies did that they would be out of business. When you provide something to your customers that you know is faulty then the company takes the punishment...not the feature.
T1 12:09 PM - 16 December, 2009
The reason for not implementing certain functionality is purely financial. I am sure Serato did their market research and the cost of implementing FLAC vs the return on investment did not make sense (for now, at least). Adding new functionality is always a business decision and should never be a technical one. If a firm has a competent dev team, as Serato does, adding new functionality will never destabilize the product, just add development cost.

I would love to see FLAC and WMA support, but I understand that those features only benefit a subset of the Serato user base. It makes sense that Serato spends time investing in functionality that all users can benefit from... just my 2 cents...
WarpNote 12:29 PM - 16 December, 2009
Quote:
It makes sense that Serato spends time investing in functionality that all users can benefit from... just my 2 cents...

AMEN to that!
CAW 2:48 PM - 16 December, 2009
Quote:
I would love to see FLAC and WMA support, but I understand that those features only benefit a subset of the Serato user base. It makes sense that Serato spends time investing in functionality that all users can benefit from... just my 2 cents...

The one flaw with this argument is that Serato has added playback of ALAC files, which are arguably far more niche than FLAC.
T1 3:07 PM - 16 December, 2009
A lot of Serato's users run on Mac, and it is a native codec to iTunes. To say that they support iTunes compatibility, adding ALAC support would be necessary. Again, maybe a business decision to be able to promote iTunes compatibility. I am just speculating though... Only Serato knows for sure :)
WarpNote 8:47 AM - 17 December, 2009
Quote:
A lot of Serato's users run on Mac, and it is a native codec to iTunes. To say that they support iTunes compatibility, adding ALAC support would be necessary. Again, maybe a business decision to be able to promote iTunes compatibility. I am just speculating though... Only Serato knows for sure :)

I switched from mp3 to ALAC a few months back, sure, files are bigger, but they actually loads faster in SSL, and cpu usage has gone down...
Evil_banana 11:32 AM - 24 December, 2009
Quote:
lmao So to hell with any issues as to why something may or may not work...just give it to me now...

...if companies did that they would be out of business. When you provide something to your customers that you know is faulty then the company takes the punishment...not the feature.

I was thinking about the same thing :o)

You know, I think we're starting to take Serato's efforts for granted. "as a paying customer I expect..." Well, you know, I pay for a lot of other stuff too, TV, iPod, computer, other software... and I get to have ZERO input in what the new features should be. Serato is one of the few companies that have an open discussion about features, issues, help requests... and there's a lot of communication from Serato as well. Most companies just hire some guy in China and give him a list with default troubleshooting questions like "did you plug in the USB cable?"

If you think about it, Serato really doesn't owe us anything as "paying customers" as they already sold us the hardware, the software is for free. At the time of my purchase they did no promise whatsoever about new features. You're buying the product for the features that it HAS.
But even so, they are still listening to our request and needs (at least most of them), spending resources to get them implemented and then they release them to us... for FREE...
We buy a 500$ interface + SW packet and we expect to get new stuff for the rest of our lives. Even though I think this is unrealistic, Serato is actually doing just that... How many companies provide you with the same service? How many pieces of software you bought, keep adding new and cool features for free?

I'm not saying I never get frustrated too, but I think it's damn nice the way serato handles it's business and the amount of free services they are providing to us.
As far as I go... cheers to Serato!!!
AKIEM 5:48 AM - 25 December, 2009
dito
snob dee-jays 12:16 AM - 26 December, 2009
flac please
ray peterson 2:08 AM - 26 December, 2009
haha, really laughable. 5 years and no progress. amazingly miserable. i'll surely go for scratch pro instead, which supports:

MP3, WAV, AIFF, Audio-CD, FLAC, Ogg Vorbis, non-DRM WMA, non-DRM AAC

and it is certainly more responsive. all these for roughly the same price.

and you can eat your alac support. pathetic, really. in case you want to jerk about alac being dominant, here are some poll results:

2006: www.hydrogenaudio.org

flac share: 52,66%, alac: 3,46%.

2007: www.hydrogenaudio.org

flac 59,42%. alac is not even on the list. other formats share: 8,87%, so alac usage is 8,9% at max.

2008: www.hydrogenaudio.org

flac: 65,59%, other: 3,3%

2009: img206.imageshack.us

flac: 67-68%, others not displayed but of course again are marginal.

so based on the preferences of the hydrogenaudio community (who are probably somewhat into the topic) flac is about 20 times (at least) more widespread than alac.

juno, one of the big fishes (62000 titles and growing each week) sells lossless in flac (it's an option when you purchase wav). (beatport is still too ignorant to compress their wavs). and c'mon, itunes is for ipod/iphone/iwhatever fags, not for DJs (you can argue that coz truth hurts sometimes, but i'm 100% certain most of the tracks which are to be purchased by DJs WON'T be found on itunes). and you can still say it with a straight face: flac is not that important. okay-okay, i understand, ignorance is bliss ;)

i guess serato looked at the wrong graphs, like this one:

forums.plexapp.com

note the vote numbers haha.

that's all. thanks serato for helping me making the right decision (eg. buying the NI product instead of yours). i almost made a big mistake :/

and please don't flame me (you are free to, but i just want to save your time), coz it is futile, i won't reply.
nik39 11:41 AM - 26 December, 2009
Quote:
and it is certainly more responsive. all these for roughly the same price.

I'll laugh at that statement.

They should rename that to Native Instruments - Marketing Pro.
aSiNe 1:15 PM - 26 December, 2009
So long as I can compress my tunes from wav without turning them into mp3 I'm happy :)

the only reason i don't like ALAC is that I have to use iTunes.

but am willing to suffer for the time being!

so props for sorting out some type of lossless serato :)
Evil_banana 3:42 PM - 26 December, 2009
Quote:

that's all. thanks serato for helping me making the right decision (eg. buying the NI product instead of yours). i almost made a big mistake :/

and please don't flame me (you are free to, but i just want to save your time), coz it is futile, i won't reply.

So at least you are aware that your statement is simply arrogant.

Glad you made the "right" choice.
bye!!! cheers! have fun! Toodeloo!
blackavenger 9:27 PM - 26 December, 2009
Quote:
haha, really laughable. 5 years and no progress. amazingly miserable. i'll surely go for scratch pro instead, which supports:

MP3, WAV, AIFF, Audio-CD, FLAC, Ogg Vorbis, non-DRM WMA, non-DRM AAC

and it is certainly more responsive. all these for roughly the same price.

and you can eat your alac support. pathetic, really. in case you want to jerk about alac being dominant, here are some poll results:

2006: www.hydrogenaudio.org

flac share: 52,66%, alac: 3,46%.

2007: www.hydrogenaudio.org

flac 59,42%. alac is not even on the list. other formats share: 8,87%, so alac usage is 8,9% at max.

2008: www.hydrogenaudio.org

flac: 65,59%, other: 3,3%

2009: img206.imageshack.us

flac: 67-68%, others not displayed but of course again are marginal.

so based on the preferences of the hydrogenaudio community (who are probably somewhat into the topic) flac is about 20 times (at least) more widespread than alac.

juno, one of the big fishes (62000 titles and growing each week) sells lossless in flac (it's an option when you purchase wav). (beatport is still too ignorant to compress their wavs). and c'mon, itunes is for ipod/iphone/iwhatever fags, not for DJs (you can argue that coz truth hurts sometimes, but i'm 100% certain most of the tracks which are to be purchased by DJs WON'T be found on itunes). and you can still say it with a straight face: flac is not that important. okay-okay, i understand, ignorance is bliss ;)

i guess serato looked at the wrong graphs, like this one:

forums.plexapp.com

note the vote numbers haha.

that's all. thanks serato for helping me making the right decision (eg. buying the NI product instead of yours). i almost made a big mistake :/

and please don't flame me (you are free to, but i just want to save your time), coz it is futile, i won't reply.



Though he made, what are clearly some asinine statements, some of what he ranted about, were valid points. I'm sorry, but FLAC integration will never be a tired argument for me. Come on already, get with the program............I want to play my FLAC files!!
CAW 9:47 PM - 26 December, 2009
I'd like to see FLAC support as well. But even the new CDJ-2000s don't support FLAC. At least we have ALAC, which the CDJ-2000s don't have, either...

Is FLAC support an issue of the license that the Ogg people distribute it under? I mean, they make the libraries for FLAC support openly available, don't they?
Evil_banana 9:52 PM - 26 December, 2009
@blackavenger
sure he makes a valid point, he has repeated what everyone else knows, there's no denial there. But he could have reproduced statistics with less attitude.

but yes, he's right of course. It's strange why FLAC hasn't been introduced yet. I went with ALAC since I had to start from scratch anayway with the lossless ripping, but yes... I suppose there's a reason for it, but I'm curious about what it is.
mor 10:54 AM - 13 January, 2010
Yeah I've had my serato box for some time now, but I'm about to sell it because of the lack of flac inclusion. Personally I've defended serato so many times to DJ's and others but the truth of the matter is this: mp3's don't sound like they should. I've played with traktor and while I don't specifically love the interface if it encorperates flac... I'm afraid thats where I must go. So long serato, it was fun while it lasted.
Evil_banana 12:59 PM - 13 January, 2010
@ Mor
I'd say hang on until after thursday's event. Seems like they will be releasing 2.0 with some major new features including Album artwork scrolling (One that I've requested a long time ago). No promises, but you might get lucky.
WarpNote 1:34 PM - 13 January, 2010
My thoughts too, they're working with Ableton, Ableton supports FLAC... maybe we get lucky?
blackavenger 4:26 PM - 13 January, 2010
Quote:
My thoughts too, they're working with Ableton, Ableton supports FLAC... maybe we get lucky?



Oh yeah! I didn't even think about that....Ableton does support FLAC, could it FINALLY come true?
blackavenger 8:15 AM - 15 January, 2010
No mention of it for 2.0, as of yet........ :/
Evil_banana 8:19 AM - 15 January, 2010
Nope, I'm afraid we're going to have to get our hands on the beta2.0 to find out. There's actually no detailed list at all of all the new things they have implemented.

Eagerly awaiting that beta!!!
serkan 2:57 AM - 10 February, 2010
To sum up the last 2.5 years...

"Is FLAC on our radar? Yes, but we can't tell you what version it will be in sorry.
Keep the suggestions coming though guys, we read them all :) "
by Nick M, 11 Aug 2008

"FLAC is still in development, - codec stuff is tricky, because getting it wrong can be disastrous - i.e crashing on certain files!
I'm not a developer myself, but am pushing for this to be included in an update soon. When? Hopefully this year, but no promises :)"
by Nick M, 14 Apr 2009

Any news?
Still planned?
Q3 2016?

:)
tron 2:28 AM - 14 February, 2010
Maybe on the 10th anniversary of this thread.
serkan 11:16 PM - 14 February, 2010
So Q3 2014?
Sure, at least better than Q3 2016.

btw:
I'm checking this thread every time I visit the forums but never realized that it's almost SIX years old... damn!
Jumbafri 11:12 PM - 15 February, 2010
what about support for a non apple lossless as well for all of us pc users who despise itunes!
Evil_banana 9:55 AM - 16 February, 2010
Quote:
what about support for a non apple lossless as well for all of us pc users who despise itunes!

Again... what the hell does alac have to do with being a pc user and hating iTunes? I use alac on a WINDOWS pc and I DO NOT use iTunes. Guess what...

IT WORKS!!!!
serkan 8:48 PM - 16 February, 2010
Quote:

I'm checking this thread every time I visit the forums but never realized that it's almost SIX years old... damn!

Acutally I did some thinking about this fact. And from the beginning it was like:
"ALAC will come soon, we don't know about other (lossless) codecs."
After that it took about 4-5 (?) years for ALAC.

In conclusion... I'll stop mentioning the support for FLAC because it hasn't changed anything in the past and I'm afraid it won't change in the near future.
It's a pity - and I'll be happy as a pig in shit if that special day comes.

In the meantime I'll use FLAC on my gear that already supports it and stick with lossy codecs on SL as I do now. And for all the ALAC users: I'm happy for you that you got what you wanted but it makes me sick that you are not able to see the issues from a "FLAC point of view", since it just makes no sense to use two lossless formats at the same time.

@ Evil_banana:
This was not about you. We had some misunderstanding in the past but I know that you just tried to show "us" that there is another way to use lossless music. I was thinking about the people that reacted a little to sensitive and took this topic as an offense.

I'm out (from this particular thread) for now... at least until v.2.1
Evil_banana 11:49 AM - 17 February, 2010
Quote:
@ Evil_banana:
This was not about you. We had some misunderstanding in the past but I know that you just tried to show "us" that there is another way to use lossless music. I was thinking about the people that reacted a little to sensitive and took this topic as an offense.

I'm out (from this particular thread) for now... at least until v.2.1

No problem man, it's all good :o) and never personal.
I hope 2.1 will do it for you and all others in need of FLAC.
RubixDigitales 1:51 PM - 25 March, 2010
I do think that it's strange that FLAC support is not offered. Regardless of how one chooses to encode ones own music from CD/Vinyl, flac THE lossless format offered on a huge number of digital download sites as the losless alternative to MP3.

I'm sure I'm not the 1st (or even the 100th) to point this out... stll, just having my $0.2 woth.
serkan 9:52 PM - 25 March, 2010
Since lots of DJ software (Traktor, Ableton Live, djDecks, PCDJ, Mixxx, RPM, Xwax - to name a few) already support FLAC I think there are 2 possibilities why we don't get any response to future FLAC support on SL:

a) Development is going on and Serato is being true to their philosophy not to give any information on something until it's ready to be released.
b) The plans have been discarded (if ever existed) but they think they don't need to, or they don't want to say anything about it.

This is what we have learned in the past: If you don't make any promises you can't dissapoint anyone. Either way we have to wait and see what future brings. If there is something to learn about this thread, then that it doesn't pay to ask about it anymore.
Unrealistic 1:16 PM - 26 March, 2010
Quote:
If there is something to learn about this thread, then that it doesn't pay to ask about it anymore.

I guess the more me ask, the more chance we have that flac developpment starts if it didtnt already.
alec.tron 12:34 PM - 28 April, 2010
Just to round up - I know it doesn't help you guys waiting for .flac, but maybe it makes people at Serato assining development-priorities look & think again...cos this can be a deal breaker for some. simple as that.

I bought Serato about 2 years ago out of an urgent necessity for a digital DJ system as I moved countries and couldn't get all my vinyl to where I live now....try shipping 3k+ records to New Zealand... eh.
When this became clear, I decided to switch to digital and build my library based on flac for many reasons and buy Serato once I got to NZ.
This was based on the fact that I 'played' (not worked) with Serato on several occasions before and liked the simplistic handling and what I heard about Serato; as in having a reliable, thought out product and on top of that a dev team, so the rumors were back then, that actually listened to it's user-base....
In hind-sight, what a joke! Just look at the address bar...
/discussion/161
161th thread... & SIX years.... seriously ?
I doubt you can imagine my surprise after installing Serato and finding out that flac, an established format for years back then even & embraced by a lot of audio professionals/radios/studios, is simply not supported...
To cut a long story short, I got me some shell flac to mp3 conbvertes & had to care & update 2 versions of the same llibrary for nearly 2 years now...
On top of that I found a few other software-design-philosophies in Scratch which I simply couldn't agree with and which wound me up to no end in the long run (save & export able playlists & data, data management in general, customizability)... so with the 'feature' lists for 2.0 coming out and flac still not being on it was actually the death-blow for me & Serato and I decided to sell the box which, I did in February.

So this was a stupid story of Serato loosing a customer whom they already had on their product, which by it's nature, requiring time & effort to set up, is quite binding, mostly thanks to not giving a sh*t about flac...
And this ex-customer will now think thrice if there's the Serato name on the box again.
That's actually quite an achievement.
Good luck to you guys waiting for flac still.
c.
blackavenger 6:44 PM - 29 April, 2010
^^ I'm already too invested in ScratchLIVE to sell it and move on. Though, I am growing VERY tired of not having FLAC support. I've had ScratchLIVE for almost 5 years now, and the argument was started long before that. What the ____ is taking so long?

Seriously!?!

Take a few members of the team, give them the assignment of coding FLAC & better KEYLOCK and we'll all praise you high into the heavens. Keep ignoring us, and who knows, you may just get a whole lot more peeps feeling like alec.tron!!!!!
serkan 11:37 PM - 26 May, 2010
Just bump
Just flac +1
Nothing else

:)
Mumpi 5:19 PM - 2 June, 2010
flac +1

So adding effects and whatever to 2.0 was easier than adding a widely used codec?
You gotta be kiddin'
AlphaTrion 5:24 PM - 12 June, 2010
Another +1 for flac.

Is kind of ridiculous it's taken this long while other software is supporting it. It wouldn't surprise me to see more people like Alec.tron switching over to a competitor over this.
serkan 12:04 PM - 13 June, 2010
Quote:
Another +1 for flac.

Is kind of ridiculous it's taken this long while other software is supporting it. It wouldn't surprise me to see more people like Alec.tron switching over to a competitor over this.

Could happen ;)
I just got me a Traktor Scratch certified mixer... and I'm going to get my copy of TS to have some deep testing.
DJ Brett B 7:52 PM - 14 June, 2010
Serato is usually wonderful about listening to what DJs want, but for some reason, they seem to have some sort of strong hatred towards FLAC.

Serato, you can EASILY implement a FREE and OPEN-SOURCE codec! We're begging you here! Of all the things you've done in the past few years (FX, sampler, Video-SL, updated GUI), you couldn't manage to find any time at all to add FLAC support? I'm not trying to sound like an asshole here, but it's seriously pathetic, and frankly, embarrassing (on your part).
vaskular 3:38 AM - 15 June, 2010
flac + 1
it´s by far the most used lossless codec
AKIEM 3:17 AM - 17 June, 2010
converting is easy
blackavenger 1:52 PM - 17 June, 2010
Quote:
converting is easy



We know.......so what!?!?
serkan 4:02 PM - 19 June, 2010
fail
AKIEM 5:23 PM - 19 June, 2010
just saying the current remedy is a very easy solution. takes just a little extra effort and can be undone very easy.

maybe its low on the list because there are other issues without solution that need to be dealt with.

or maybe Serato just hates people who use flac?
serkan 10:00 PM - 21 June, 2010
Quote:

or maybe Serato just hates people who use flac?

LOL :)

I think there are other things on the list being more important and more requested. And since 2.0.0 (even final) we have a couple of new bugs and issues... I think right now(!) there is more to do than implementing another codec.

And - to be honest - I gave it up to request FLAC support. I keep on checking and replying on this topic but after all these years it doesn't make sense to request it anymore. We want this feature for a long time now and I explained my reasons for FLAC and against WAV/Apple Lossless some times now. The guys at Serato know that there are some freaks wanting this and I'm pretty sure that it has been considered some time in the past. I hope that it's still on the to-do-list but I don't keep hoping for this.
blackavenger 4:09 PM - 22 June, 2010
^ I won't give up, and encourage everyone else to do the same ^
DJ Batre 7:20 PM - 25 June, 2010
.FLAC!!! Give us FLAC, please!!!
voxel 7:37 PM - 29 June, 2010
FLAC +1.
RubixDigitales 10:34 AM - 18 August, 2010
v2.1 and still no flac.... 2.2 please!!!
Mumpi 2:17 PM - 18 August, 2010
I wonder why no one of the dev team says something here.
serkan 1:51 PM - 19 August, 2010
Quote:
I wonder why no one of the dev team says something here.

It's Serato's policy:
Don't say anything until a feature is integrated.

It can come with 2.2, 3.0, 4.5, or maybe never.
Evil_banana 11:22 AM - 24 August, 2010
Quote:
Quote:
I wonder why no one of the dev team says something here.

It's Serato's policy:
Don't say anything until a feature is integrated.

It can come with 2.2, 3.0, 4.5, or maybe never.

that's not completely true. They have been giving hints about whether they think a request is interesting/useful or if they are considering. But they won't actually make any promises, since it's the best way to not break promises :o).

I think it's a bit strange though there have been so much comments/discussion on FLAC but no comment from the mods on it. On the other hand, the very second comment in this thread is from a mod, and talks about Alac... which they implemented a year ago, so perhaps they're considering 'lossless' as finished.

But you're right about the endresult, whenever or maybe never
Guy'Hom 9:22 PM - 1 September, 2010
+1 for FLAC support :)
I buy my music on juno, when downloading I can choose to get the files in FLAC instead of WAV but It doesn't make sense since I can't play them with SSL ...
blackavenger 11:55 AM - 2 September, 2010
Quote:
+1 for FLAC support :)
I buy my music on juno, when downloading I can choose to get the files in FLAC instead of WAV but It doesn't make sense since I can't play them with SSL ...


I'm starting to lose hope that this will ever be implemented. I think I may buy a used version of Traktor Scratch......evaluate it......if it's comparable to ScratchLIVE, I may just switch. This is getting fuckin' old now! I have been a loyal user of ScratchLIVE for 5 fuckin' years......buy all the freakin' CVs, give them free advertising, promoting it to EVERYONE that asks me about it...even those that don't.....but not so much as a peep about FLAC from any of the mods in over 4 years....seriously, that's just disrespectful!!!!!!!!!

It's pretty obvious we don't care about ALAC, so too, is it obvious that Y'a'll don't care about FLAC.....I hope losing valued customers is worth not implementing such a simple request.......fools!
SkyGroove 5:40 PM - 2 September, 2010
Quote:
+1 for FLAC support :)
I buy my music on juno, when downloading I can choose to get the files in FLAC instead of WAV but It doesn't make sense since I can't play them with SSL ...


+1 for FLAC. I'm new to Serato but only because I've waited years for FLAC support since that is what my library exists as. I decided to go in for a particular feature despite the FLAC limitation , but if it becomes much of a nuisance converting all the time, I will have no problems moving over to Traktor which is what most of my peers are using anyway (even though I think Serato is otherwise superior for what I need it for).

Please implement FLAC soon or at least give some insight into the issue/priority. I would prefer to stay with Serato but this open-endness about the issue makes it difficult.
Mumpi 9:39 AM - 3 September, 2010
Quote:

...but not so much as a peep about FLAC from any of the mods in over 4 years....seriously, that's just disrespectful!!!!!!!!!

+1
DJ Brett B 7:19 PM - 3 September, 2010
I'm beginning to think Serato's programmers can't figure out how to properly implement it. Pathetic.
Evil_banana 5:31 PM - 9 September, 2010
Quote:
I'm beginning to think Serato's programmers can't figure out how to properly implement it. Pathetic.

So... now you're hoping to get it implemented by insulting their coding-capabilities.
I'm with you on the no-peep-in-years, that sucks. But I think that if they were patheticly bad at implementing, that they wouldn't have generated the software you have today (bridge included).
nik39 8:17 PM - 9 September, 2010
*chuckles*
DJ Brett B 12:47 AM - 12 September, 2010
Of course I was being sarcastic.
Evil_banana 8:18 AM - 12 September, 2010
Quote:
Of course I was being sarcastic.

Backing up so soon?

"Final scratch is the best ever!!!" - now that's a perfect example of being sarcastic.

So if we apply that to: "I'm beginning to think Serato's programmers can't figure out how to properly implement it. Pathetic."

... you are actually trying to say something like: "I'm beginning to think Serato's programmers are the best friggin' genius-like code-wizards in the world! A True miracle!!!"

Can I assume that was what you were trying to say then?
DJ Brett B 12:44 AM - 13 September, 2010
Right. :)
Evil_banana 8:32 AM - 13 September, 2010
Quote:
Right. :)

Okay then, just so we're clear on that ;o)
Sorry for misinterpretation then
nik39 12:45 PM - 13 September, 2010
Quote:
Sorry for misinterpretation then

+1
Dj.Mojo 1:22 PM - 13 September, 2010
Could someone sum up real quick why flac isn´t implemented (yet)?
Evil_banana 2:33 PM - 13 September, 2010
Quote:
Could someone sum up real quick why flac isn´t implemented (yet)?

Actually, there hasn't been word from the mods on this.
But my guess would be basically because alac is already implemented
- alac is supported in itunes (which Serato wants to be compatible with)
- you can batchconvert all flacs to alacs without loss

I think that might be the main reason... Just a guess, not a fact.

And perhaps also because they have been spending a lot of time on the Bridge, VideoSL, built-in FX and natively supported controllers (CDJ's and stuff). Quite development-intensive features I think which force you to make a choice when developing. Taking into account iTunes-compatibility and possibility to lossless batch-convert, you could consider that the content of your flacs can be used without any quality-loss provided you take the extra step of converting them.

That only speaks for the DJ'ing purposes of course, not the preferences towards purchasing, portable player, media center, choice of standards etcetera...


Again,... that's my guess
blackavenger 6:16 PM - 13 September, 2010
Quote:
And perhaps also because they have been spending a lot of time on the Bridge, VideoSL, built-in FX and natively supported controllers (CDJ's and stuff). Quite development-intensive features I think which force you to make a choice when developing. Taking into account iTunes-compatibility and possibility to lossless batch-convert, you could consider that the content of your flacs can be used without any quality-loss provided you take the extra step of converting them.


Fundamentals, my friends. Serato is getting too big for their own britches. This is a request made nearly 6 years ago, long before those afore mentioned were even thought up. They need to stop worrying about keeping up w' Traktor, take a breath, and get back to providing the basics. Hell, they still haven't even tackled the ailing "key lock" issue.......Naa, before anything new is implemented, they need to fix the prior issues.......get ScratchLIVE back to being what it was famous for....stability!
nik39 6:49 PM - 13 September, 2010
Quote:
get ScratchLIVE back to being what it was famous for....stability!

Word.
serkan 11:29 PM - 13 September, 2010
Quote:

Naa, before anything new is implemented, they need to fix the prior issues.......get ScratchLIVE back to being what it was famous for....stability!

True that.
There are so many simple and foolish things still not working well (sorting the library for example) that it doesn't make sense to implement new things before the old problems are being fixed.
But on the other hand "we" became feature whores over the time. And when I say "we" I mean the human being on one side (everything has to better and faster and smaller and even fancier in any kind of way). And "we" as the ScratchLive users on the other. At first place it was just about carrying the vinyl feeling to digital music files. But after this time I couldn't live without the loops and the FX are getting more important with every usage. Others can't do it without Video-SL, others without the sampler...
I think Serato is going the right way. But it's also true that they're losing the focus in what SL made this famous: Stability.

@ Evil_banana:
Damn, your arguments are good! - honestly :)
Evil_banana 9:53 AM - 14 September, 2010
Thanks Serkan, I appreciate it. I guess I start to get a little insight in the process due to my job. But I think you and Blackavenger are hitting nails hard as well!

I think the problems are the following:
- "... doesn't make sense to implement new things before the old problems are being fixed."
Logically ... no, I agree. Marketingwise... absolutely! why? They already have the image of stability, people will say it's stable, and if it's not, a lot of people will still blame their computer or Windows for it, ignoring the real issue. But for marketingstrategy it's much more exciting to people to release a new cool feature instead of a boring-sounding "patch-release".
You shouldn't forget that Serato makes it's money on the hardware and Video-SL license, not on the software. After a while "most people" have a SL1-box or a TTM57, so income will drop eventually. That's why they need to push new hardware, and the only way to push new hardware is through new features for you to need this hardware! How many peopple would upgrade their SL1 to an SL3 if they would still only get 2 virtual decks? I think that partially covers the reason why they are really pushing features right now.
Doesn't mean they're ignoring stability on purpose, but maybe they're not realizing how painful it is for people.


And I think the other side of the problem is indeed that
- "But on the other hand "we" became feature whores over the time."
(Very true! Especially with serato giving out free software updates and allowing us the open discussion on feature requests)
And that's hard to converge with
"I think Serato is going the right way. But it's also true that they're losing the focus in what SL made this famous: Stability."
Why?... because of "the law of conservation of misery"
(don't laugh, it's truly a physics-law :o)
It means "for every problem you fix, you will create another one".
A problem could be a bug, an issue, but also something that is missing or limited resources.
* A problem could be the lack of a 3rd deck, fix is to implement it, new problem created = stability issues.
* So the problem is now stability, fix is to spend time to check code and test, new problem created = time-demanding so resources are used so no new features could be implemented
* New problem is that people not having flac are getting in trouble,...
and so on...

See what I'm saying? Every problem you fix, will create another. And every choice you make, will cause another choice.
That's why it's almost impossible to get both feature-complete software and for the software to be 99% bug-free at the same time. For that you would need to get a lot more people, which cost money. And money will have to come form us, and so on and so on...

The question is "what problems can and can't we live with" and "which choice will please most people?"

And don't say stability will please most people, because the way people have been going crazy over the Bridge the last year, they couldn't care less if it worked half-assed or not. As long as they could get their hands on it!
But once they DO get their hands on it, the pressure is off and suddenly stability DOES become an issue.
Maybe not for you, maybe not for me, but you know this adds up for most people! :o) (unfortunately)

Altough I'm happy with just relative mode, cue-points, looping and artwork browsing... I still think that Serato is following the right way as well. My guess and my hope is that, they will be releasing the Bridge soon, so the pressure is off and people have got a major feature-addition, SL3 is supported, 68 is supported and dicer is supported. Patch release for the bridge first and then take some time to get working on all those basic bugs and start refining the basic features and the stability.

Again... I know shit, I don't work at serato so it's not the truth. But that's my calculated guess.


You're screwed for flac unless you convert to alac (as I did, I don't care but you know that already :o) ), but for stability... I guess there's no other way than reverting to an older version. But I couldn't live without artwork browsing so that's a no-go for me :o)
serkan 8:39 PM - 14 September, 2010
Nothing left to say here... still want FLAC though ;)
Evil_banana 9:00 PM - 14 September, 2010
Quote:
Nothing left to say here... still want FLAC though ;)

That's a different subject :o). Whether or not I'm right, and whatever the reasons for no flac are,... yes, the result stays the same. you're stuck without it.
lunaros 3:51 AM - 9 October, 2010
Serato will have signed a deal with Apple in order to use ALAC as the ALAC codec is owned by Apple. Apple wants to lock consumers into their world of closed platforms and closed codecs. Apple will have told Serato if they want to use ALAC they are not aloud to implement FLAC. They is why Serato have not said another word about FLAC since ALAC was implemented. (THEY ARE IN BED WITH APPLE)
DJMark 9:43 AM - 9 October, 2010
^^^ + eleventyjilliongazzoozle

I hear the Taliban, Sarah Palin and Meg Whitman are also mixed up in The Evil Plan To Deny (a tiny minority of) Serato Users Their God Given Right To Use All Their Pirated FLAC Files Without Transcoding.

When this case blows open, it'll be the next Watergate!

Impeach Steve Jobs now! Televised trials for all the Serato developers for the sake of justice! Torches and pitchforks!

(oh and, uhh, by the way, copy/paste crossposting to at least four different threads was totally lame).
blackavenger 3:37 PM - 10 October, 2010
Quote:
The Evil Plan To Deny (a tiny minority of) Serato Users Their God Given Right To Use All Their Pirated FLAC Files


Are you kidding me? A tiny minority? More like a small majority. Just look how long this thread has remained relevant, which attests to that fact.

And as for wanting to play out "pirated" FLAC files......I don't know where you buy your tracks from, but I know that where I buy mine from, they don't offer ALAC as an option for purchasing. They do however offer FLAC!!!! I only purchase FLAC files now....have been for years, hence the reason for harping on this issue for so long now.

Serato.....

If what Lunaros said is true, just come clean about it. There has to be a reason why Y'all have not responded to our request for FLAC. By not disclosing the reason, you only invite speculation, sometimes bordering on conspiracy theory.
Parabolic 8:03 PM - 10 October, 2010
Wow... every FLAC is pirated... I take it someone's never used a real CD ripper before (not iTunes)? EAC for life, homes :-)
DJMark 2:57 AM - 11 October, 2010
Quote:
There has to be a reason why Y'all have not responded to our request for FLAC. By not disclosing the reason, you only invite speculation, sometimes bordering on conspiracy theory.


They disclosed the reason a couple years ago, and I think it was in this very thread. Something along the lines of "supporting new codecs isn't as trivial as it may sound, and doing it carelessly may have serious negative effects". With all the other stuff the Serato developers have been busy doing, there may be nothing more to say on the matter.

I see plenty of other feature suggestions that get little or no "official" responses, so I can't see where there's any special prejudice applicable here.

Obviously I'm well aware that there's some people using FLAC for "non-pirating" purposes, but I think there's more than a grain of truth to what I said.

Pirated or not, I still don't get why transcoding seems like such a hardship to people. Don't most people preserve/archive the "original" files of whatever they purchase/download, and make copies to add to their library anyway? (If not, they should).
blackavenger 11:04 AM - 11 October, 2010
Quote:
With all the other stuff the Serato developers have been busy doing, there may be nothing more to say on the matter



.......arrghhh, and so the query remains!
Parabolic 5:05 PM - 11 October, 2010
Quote:
Quote:
There has to be a reason why Y'all have not responded to our request for FLAC. By not disclosing the reason, you only invite speculation, sometimes bordering on conspiracy theory.


They disclosed the reason a couple years ago, and I think it was in this very thread. Something along the lines of "supporting new codecs isn't as trivial as it may sound, and doing it carelessly may have serious negative effects". With all the other stuff the Serato developers have been busy doing, there may be nothing more to say on the matter.

I see plenty of other feature suggestions that get little or no "official" responses, so I can't see where there's any special prejudice applicable here.

Obviously I'm well aware that there's some people using FLAC for "non-pirating" purposes, but I think there's more than a grain of truth to what I said.

Pirated or not, I still don't get why transcoding seems like such a hardship to people. Don't most people preserve/archive the "original" files of whatever they purchase/download, and make copies to add to their library anyway? (If not, they should).

The transcoded alternatives are not completely ideal. Key tags are missing in ALAC, for example. (Though I posted a support thread on the matter and they were quick to ask for more information and a sample file.) WAV files are huge, and my comp (Mac, w/ just 2 usb ports) needs room for all the other stuff (production, work, gaming, etc) so its not really something I want to do.

The problem is, no one format is de facto standard like MP3. FLAC is great but it wont play in iTunes, Serato, or on an iPod (unless you use ml_ipod). ALAC seems OK, it plays in iTunes+iPod+Serato, but its proprietary and Windows support is spartan at best. WAV works, but there is no official metadata standard, and the files are obnoxiously large
serkan 5:10 PM - 11 October, 2010
Quote:

They disclosed the reason a couple years ago, and I think it was in this very thread. Something along the lines of "supporting new codecs isn't as trivial as it may sound, and doing it carelessly may have serious negative effects". With all the other stuff the Serato developers have been busy doing, there may be nothing more to say on the matter.

Really?
April 2009:
Quote:

FLAC is still in development, - codec stuff is tricky, because getting it wrong can be disastrous - i.e crashing on certain files!

I'm not a developer myself, but am pushing for this to be included in an update soon. When? Hopefully this year, but no promises :)

For me this sounds like: We're working on it but it will take time.
Sure, implementing a codec is pretty hard in professional live software. But it was hard with MP3, OGG Vorbis, ALAC, AAC, and video too, but they did and it runs as it's supposed to be.
Quote:

Obviously I'm well aware that there's some people using FLAC for "non-pirating" purposes, but I think there's more than a grain of truth to what I said.

I REALLY disagree on this.
AFAIK "people" (f****n' filesharers) use lossy formats, mostly MP3, because it is MUCH faster to download. FLAC (and other lossless codecs) is pretty much only used by audiophiles, musicians and other music lovers who care about music and downloading or ripping originals.
Quote:

Pirated or not, I still don't get why transcoding seems like such a hardship to people.

Transcoding FLAC to MP3, AAC, etc.:
Lossy which is pretty much that what the lossless people don't want.
Transcoding FLAC to ALAC, AIFF, etc.:
Lossless but a huge waste of space if other soft- and hardware is used with FLAC only. And this is (for me) the deal breaker when it comes down to FLAC vs. ALAC. Ableton Live, Audacity, Foobar, WD HD TV, Sansa Fuze: Hardware and Software that I use with FLAC files. Absolutely no need of another lossless codec for me.

I still don't see why some people keep bashing the FLAC threads. Sure, what "lunaros" did was seriously annoying. But if there is someone who doesn't care FLAC, why bother and comment in here?
I never needed and probably will never need video support or a sampler but I didn't bith around in those threads because I didn't care. If people are happy with it: Fair enough as long everything runs smooth (which is the case for some years now).
LosMintos 9:15 PM - 18 October, 2010
Quote:
Obviously I'm well aware that there's some people using FLAC for "non-pirating" purposes, but I think there's more than a grain of truth to what I said.

Pirated or not, I still don't get why transcoding seems like such a hardship to people. Don't most people preserve/archive the "original" files of whatever they purchase/download, and make copies to add to their library anyway? (If not, they should).


I absolutely agree with serkan. When MP3 is supported, why there should be any issue with FLAC and piracy??

Why FLAC? It's free, lossless and it seems to be the quasi-standard in archiving music. Well, one can transcode everything to MP3 and use in Serato (as I do). But there's a limitation: Once I created the MP3 any change/addition in metadata is hardly to tranfser from FLAC to MP3. The same vice versa: How to pass the metadata from MP3 to FLAC? For me, it's useless to store two versions of my music: FLAC and MP3 with then different metadata. Backing up is another issue, of course I have a backup.
Evil_banana 11:10 PM - 19 October, 2010
Quote:
Quote:
Obviously I'm well aware that there's some people using FLAC for "non-pirating" purposes, but I think there's more than a grain of truth to what I said.

Pirated or not, I still don't get why transcoding seems like such a hardship to people. Don't most people preserve/archive the "original" files of whatever they purchase/download, and make copies to add to their library anyway? (If not, they should).


I absolutely agree with serkan. When MP3 is supported, why there should be any issue with FLAC and piracy??

Why FLAC? It's free, lossless and it seems to be the quasi-standard in archiving music. Well, one can transcode everything to MP3 and use in Serato (as I do). But there's a limitation: Once I created the MP3 any change/addition in metadata is hardly to tranfser from FLAC to MP3. The same vice versa: How to pass the metadata from MP3 to FLAC? For me, it's useless to store two versions of my music: FLAC and MP3 with then different metadata. Backing up is another issue, of course I have a backup.

what's keeping you from using ALAC? If you're willing to transcode everything into MP3 and maintain 2 databases, why not transcode into ALAC and maintain only 1 lossless database?

Not a comment, just a question.
LosMintos 12:24 PM - 20 October, 2010
Quote:
what's keeping you from using ALAC?
Apple losslees (ALAC) is not free and supported only by a limited number of software and hardware. As far as I know, iTunes is required (I don't like iTunes) to encode to ALAC.

FLAC is widely used (outside the `iWorld' and Serato ;-)) ) and owns nice features, such as replay gain and cuesheets. It uses vorbis comments, an open standard for metadata. There's a command line tool available. And so on. (Maybe some of that is also true for ALAC?)

Well, on portable players FLAC is not so often, too. Fortunately, my favored player, Cowon's D2, supports FLAC, but doesn't support ALAC.
DJMark 8:15 PM - 20 October, 2010
Quote:
As far as I know, iTunes is required (I don't like iTunes) to encode to ALAC.


Incorrect.
Evil_banana 10:52 AM - 22 October, 2010
Quote:
Quote:
what's keeping you from using ALAC?
Apple losslees (ALAC) is not free and supported only by a limited number of software and hardware. As far as I know, iTunes is required (I don't like iTunes) to encode to ALAC.

FLAC is widely used (outside the `iWorld' and Serato ;-)) ) and owns nice features, such as replay gain and cuesheets. It uses vorbis comments, an open standard for metadata. There's a command line tool available. And so on. (Maybe some of that is also true for ALAC?)

Well, on portable players FLAC is not so often, too. Fortunately, my favored player, Cowon's D2, supports FLAC, but doesn't support ALAC.

Well, maybe Serato pays a license fee, I don't know for sure, do you? Even so, that isn't hurting me so I got no problem there.
True, iTunes sucks balls, then again you don't need to use it :o). I use XLD on mac, and I know there are other apps on windows as well that encode ALAc (just don't remember what names now).

I don't think it supports the cue-sheets, but I'm not a big fan of them anyway (don't quite see the use for it honestly?). Replay gain is available as well.
Wel, actually, most tagging options for FLAC are available for ALAC as well (except for Key which is why I use the comment-field for that).
The options for ALAC are actually the same as for AAC. They both use the same m4a container, just a different codec for the actual audio.

My question wasn't so much about why you want FLAC, that's more than clear, but more about why not using ALAC in the meantime? You are prepared to go through the hassle of re-encoding and maintaining 2 libraries where 1 is in MP3 (lossy), while with the same effort you would have the same resulting situation (2 libraries), but just lossless if you'd use alac in the meantime. That's what I was curious about.

I mean, yeah, proprietary sucks, but that's not enough incentive for me to do everything lossy now and redo the whole thing when FLAC would become available :) (yeah, lazy me, I know). Of course, ALAC was about to release when I decided to change my entire library and rip all my CD's again, so going with alac was kind of the obvious choice. And, all the FLAC's I had only took a short time to batch-convert to ALAC, so the decision was made quickly for me.
LosMintos 7:07 AM - 27 October, 2010
Okay, I found dbpoweramp is encoding ALAC, however, you have to pay for dbpoweramp.

Quote:
My question wasn't so much about why you want FLAC, that's more than clear, but more about why not using ALAC in the meantime? You are prepared to go through the hassle of re-encoding and maintaining 2 libraries where 1 is in MP3 (lossy), while with the same effort you would have the same resulting situation (2 libraries), but just lossless if you'd use alac in the meantime. That's what I was curious about.
LosMintos 7:16 AM - 27 October, 2010
Wrong button ... sorry ... I opted for FLAC for the archive and for listening/playing without Serato by various reasons. Then I went to MP3 for use in Serato because it has the best support there, it gives rather small files, the quality is sufficient, and, there are many MP3s anyway, e.g. by promotional services. I won't encode the FLACs to ALAC for use in Serato, because A) I don't like Apple's stuff ;-) and B) that would waste enormous disc space.

As and final statement from me (very nice discussion, anyway!!!!): I'm a bit disappointed and sad, that Serato doesn't support FLAC. I can't see the reason on that decision, however, I accept it. MP3 is fine for my DJ use, and if some day I opt for new hardware, I will have the choice to buy other products, that are now as stable as Serato had been many years ago.
blackavenger 7:58 AM - 27 October, 2010
Quote:
I will have the choice to buy other products, that are now as stable as Serato had been many years ago.


Hear that Serato? He's right! Perhaps you should re-think your position on FLAC?
Pior_187 11:00 AM - 21 December, 2010
<-- Wants FLAC implementation, too!!
Dj.Mojo 12:04 PM - 21 December, 2010
Thanks for the info Evil Banana!
AmpItThere 3:25 PM - 22 December, 2010
This thread has been around for what? 6 years? There also hasn't been a single comment from Serato since then.
What's going on with this. I love to use Lossless formats, WAV is fine, but with no proper tagging it becomes a little frustrating.

What's the update on this? Is it even in development?
blackavenger 5:15 PM - 22 December, 2010
Quote:
What's the update on this? Is it even in development?


ROTFL!!!

That's the BIG question now, isn't it?!?
serkan 10:41 PM - 22 December, 2010
To be honest... for me I'm 100% sure FLAC will never make it into Scratch Live. It's not that I now ANYTHING. But if there is no response on a topic for more than two years (not 6... but does it even matter?) than there are only two possibilities left:

a) It will come but it's still that far away that it makes no sense to say about it now

b) It will not come (for whatever reason) but they're afraid to lose customers to the big competitor NI so they can't admit that it won't. The competition between Serato and NI is going on for many many years now and it is just as hard as it was back then. And we all now that this "fight" is pretty much like David vs. Goliath = the uber-strong NI with all their money and the little underdog Serato with limited possibilities (when compared to NI).
AmpItThere 11:29 PM - 22 December, 2010
WHAT?!
I got my FLACs working in Scratch Live....

What I have:
Scratch Live (Most Recent)
iTunes 10
Fluke plugin for iTunes (to import FLAC into iTunes)
Video-SL Demo

Scratch Live thinks these are videos in the playlist (video icon appears) but loads them just fine!

Odd.... time to test this out to see if anything crashes...
alec.tron 12:15 AM - 23 December, 2010
Quote:

Scratch Live thinks these are videos in the playlist (video icon appears) but loads them just fine!

Odd.... time to test this out to see if anything crashes...


haha.
to get my conspiracy theories & schadenfreude out as I'm still holding a grudge against Serato for this, I wished they had to add flac codec support in order to be able to play certain movie codecs, and now they've broken an exclusivity contract with apple to only support apple lossless codec.
that'd be well funny.
but seriously, I hope the people still waiting for this will finally get flac support. I've been checking back into this thread over the last years and shook my head in disbelief every time...
c.
blackavenger 3:37 AM - 23 December, 2010
Quote:
Quote:



Scratch Live thinks these are videos in the playlist (video icon appears) but loads them just fine!

Odd.... time to test this out to see if anything crashes...


haha.
to get my conspiracy theories & schadenfreude out as I'm still holding a grudge against Serato for this, I wished they had to add flac codec support in order to be able to play certain movie codecs, and now they've broken an exclusivity contract with apple to only support apple lossless codec.
that'd be well funny.
but seriously, I hope the people still waiting for this will finally get flac support. I've been checking back into this thread over the last years and shook my head in disbelief every time...
c.


As have I.
serkan 8:24 PM - 9 January, 2011
...just bumpin'...
serkan 2:15 PM - 11 January, 2011
I have an idea...
A lot of people were guessing that Serato and Apple are involved in any kind of way - especially when it comes to codec support. I really don't think there is any truth to that... but what if there is? Maybe Serato uses the QuickTime libraries for their codec implementation?

I already dropped a product feedback message on Apple's homepage. But I thought it was important not to mention ScratchLive or Serato at all... just let them know, that FLAC would be huge on...

...iTunes: www.apple.com
...Mac OS X: www.apple.com

Maybe it'll help... maybe it'll not... We will see.
Gazzinho 5:20 PM - 11 January, 2011
+1 from me.


I've skimmed through most of the comments (yes I was bored this afternoon!), so appologies if I've missed the posts on this, but people seem to be missing a vital part of this argument:


- Where can you buy ALACs?


Yes, I know you can get SOME tracks from iTunes in ALAC, but the vast majority of DJable club tracks on there are sub-320KBps mp3s. Bandcamp is another one, but mainly consists of independent artists in genres not generally connected with the DJ world.

Yes, I also know you can buy WAVs from the majority of digital club music vendors, but they come without any tags at all, so you have to add all of them yourself and most don't even give you the artwork as part of the download (Beatport really gets my goat on that point!).

The fact is more and more places are offering FLAC as their lossless codec of choice (if they offer lossless at all) and with VLC supporting both FLAC and ALAC on pretty much every platform you can think of (including OSX and more recently iOS) and for free, the argument of not being able to play them anywhere is a moot one. [Just for balance, ALAC conversions from WAV are almost identical in size to FLACs (a few KBs, maybe half a MB here or there isn't gonna make much difference), so the disk space argument is also moot.]

At the moment I buy my tracks in WAV or FLAC (or CD, remember those? lol) and convert them to ALAC. Then I have to tag them, add artwork and analyse them with SSL before they get added to the box. So -especially if you're a bit OCD with this like me!- there is a tremendous amount of (precious!) time wasted in coversion and tagging, decreasing the usability, especially for the less technical users. Literally the only reason I do this is because of SSL.
Purchased FLAC files are generally pre-tagged and ready to go (except for analysis).

So, in short, FLACs are quite common these days -ALACs are not, and a lot of Serato's competitors support FLAC, so the business case for supporting them is, in my opinion, extremely strong and this should be massively prioritised over any other major new feature support (short of a fourth deck, but that's another argument!).

I appreciate that stability is supposed to be the number one priority, but this has been high, if not number one, on most people's most wanted feature list for a very, very long time now.


And, for completeness and to sum up some of the suggestions from above (because this post isn't long enough already!), here's just a few FLAC vendors I use or have been suggested (I'm sure you guys can come up with some more):

- JunoDownload.com (purchase as WAV, download as FLAC)
- bleep.com
- Boomkat
- Digital-tunes.net
- Addictech

not to mention a lot of the record labels' and artists' own sites.
serkan 8:05 PM - 11 January, 2011
For me it's Junodownload.com and djshop.de

Anyone saw the new Traktor teaser video with Martinez Bros? TSP is getting coloured waveforms and a more "ScratchLive-like look". Definitely gonna check the new upgrade kit here since I have a Traktor Scratch certified mixer (Denon DN-X1600).
DJMark 2:45 AM - 12 January, 2011
Quote:
Maybe Serato uses the QuickTime libraries for their codec implementation?


What do you mean "maybe"?

They started using QuickTime when Video-SL was introduced...and *THAT* is why AAC and ALAC support were added. It was nothing more than providing the needed codec support for video.

Think this is maybe the fifth time I've mentioned this very simple fact?

I guess people will believe whatever they want to believe though, regardless of facts.
serkan 4:11 PM - 12 January, 2011
So you don't think there might be a teeny tiny possibility that not everyone is reading every single post of yours?
blackavenger 4:24 PM - 12 January, 2011
Quote:
So you don't think there might be a teeny tiny possibility that not everyone is reading every single post of yours?


Everyone who's been tracking this thread throughout the years has.
LosMintos 10:56 PM - 14 January, 2011
Quote:
JunoDownload.com (purchase as WAV, download as FLAC)

Ah funny thing, some time ago, juno was selling MP3 and Wave. I asked for FLAC and got an interesting answer. They stored the files as FLAC and when a costumer bought Wave, the file was converted from FLAC to Wave on the server before download. Long time ago ...
studio17 11:11 AM - 16 January, 2011
Quote:
Hi, can you please FLAC support sometime this decade? It would be greatly appreciated. Thanks much.

+1
serkan 1:04 AM - 17 January, 2011
Forget it. It didn't come in the last decade... so I keep my hopes low for this one.
dirtydevious 11:35 PM - 27 January, 2011
Would be great to see RANE/Serato be professional about this and at least make a statement about it.
No news is still news in my books.
RANE/Serato please at least provide some kind of service and respond to the endless posts, instead of ignoring us, hardly professional in my books.
There is obviously a good reason why flac is not supported, so please just make a statement and shut us all up. If its a case of legality with Apple fair enough just tell us.. I'm thinking there is a legal binding and that binding is either for life or a hell of a long time. Either way please can we have an official post or statement.
Serato, Support
ChrisD 11:41 PM - 27 January, 2011
Quote:
If its a case of legality with Apple fair enough just tell us..

It's not. It's a technical issue.

FLAC support is a well known request and is prioritized accordingly along with everything else.

I can't give you a timeframe at this stage.
blackavenger 1:20 AM - 28 January, 2011
Quote:
FLAC support is a well known request and is prioritized accordingly along with everything else.


Well, if that is the case, then surely it must be pretty damn high on the list! At least one would think so, seeing as how long, and how many requests have been made regarding it's implementation.

Still, Bravo.....it was quite a shock to see anyone from Serato commenting on anything in this thread!!
Serato, Support
ChrisD 3:57 AM - 28 January, 2011
Quote:
FLAC support is a well known request and is prioritized accordingly along with everything else.

FYI, there are all manner of things which determine priority.

Some of those things are obvious, such as requests made publicly in our forum. But some of those things are not so obvious and are not necessarily fit for public discussion.

Just saying :-)

But we're well aware that a good deal of people would like FLAC support.
blackavenger 4:38 AM - 28 January, 2011
^ Cool ^
serkan 9:02 PM - 28 January, 2011
Finally... now I can give it up :(
LosMintos 10:18 AM - 2 February, 2011
Quote:
I can't give you a timeframe at this stage.
Hhhhhmmmmm. Within this year (2011)?

Could you comment more on the technical issues? I'm just curious; I can't help ;-). Since others support FLAC, I'm just wondering what are the limiting issues with Scratch Live. Are there possible drawbacks or side effects when implementing FLAC?
Unrealistic 12:01 PM - 8 February, 2011
Hi again.

FYI, on the recent survey there is a interesting question :

If you are a Scratch Live DJ, which of these features is your number one requirement:
...
FLAC Support
...

Go on and vote!
Unrealistic 12:02 PM - 8 February, 2011
Sorry, here is the survey:

www.serato.com
LosMintos 12:20 PM - 8 February, 2011
Done, thank's for the hint!

(We learned from that question that Serato put Flac within the first eight missing features. And from these eight, only two are new features in fact [syncing and FLAC]; the others being improvements of existing functions. This makes me really hopeful^^).
Dj.Mojo 1:37 PM - 8 February, 2011
Quote:
Sorry, here is the survey:

www.serato.com

How did you find the survey?
Evil_banana 2:27 PM - 8 February, 2011
Quote:
Quote:


Sorry, here is the survey:

www.serato.com

How did you find the survey?

Serato newsletter
AKIEM 5:23 PM - 8 February, 2011
I voted for better library management
blackavenger 5:56 PM - 8 February, 2011
Quote:
Sorry, here is the survey:

www.serato.com


I'm going to be pissed if they add typical track "sync" to ScratchLIVE. I'm pretty sure the amount of posts I've read throughout the years suggests that this feature is not only unwanted, but unnecessary as well. However, adding "sync" to the SP-6 makes all the sense in the world. Yet, it wasn't even suggested as an option in the survey!

TSP 2.0 is going to have this functionality. And seeing as how they've had 4 deck operation for years, yet they are dropping it for "synced" sample players, does it not make for the argument that this is the most logical way to implement this technology?

Come on, Serato......this makes MUCH MORE sense!!!
Unrealistic 6:12 PM - 8 February, 2011
Actually, there is already the sync function with the bridge... I'm definetly not looking for a "typical sync" as well, I won't use it anyway. ... 'til we can deactivate that function, I don't really care.

Who knows, "typical sync" could lead to double the sale of serato boxes and ... brings more money to the development to finally add the flac feature :-) .
blackavenger 6:31 PM - 8 February, 2011
Quote:
Who knows, "typical sync" could lead to double the sale of serato boxes and ... brings more money to the development to finally add the flac feature :-) .


LOL!
SkyGroove 6:33 PM - 8 February, 2011
voted for flac. pleased to see the recent serato activity on this thread and the survey option. please vote for flac.
serkan 2:30 AM - 9 February, 2011
Did my vote... FLAC first, improved Keylock at second.

It really bothers me that the other DVS (the one not being good) already has these things.
But... I think there is a teeny tiny possibility that we might see FLAC in 2011. But on the other hand, if FLAC doesn't get enough votes, it'll be likely that we will never see it in SL, ever.

I'm just glad there is no "what feature would you NOT like to see in SL/ITCH".
I know we have like a hand full of users that would love to see us STILL requesting here in 2021 ;)
Mumpi 12:58 PM - 10 February, 2011
Quote:
Did my vote... FLAC first, improved Keylock at second.


That's what I did!
serkan 12:08 AM - 11 February, 2011
That's the most obvious with SL :)

Keep voting everyone!
I already posted a link to the survey on several networks.
0boz0 9:46 AM - 11 February, 2011
Flac +1
blackavenger 10:24 AM - 11 February, 2011
1. FLAC
2. Keylock



[ 3. Tempo-Sync'd SP-6 ;) ]



now come off that NS-6........lol.
WarpNote 11:20 AM - 14 February, 2011
Quote:
I voted for better library management

Yeah me too and, better key lock as second priority...
blackavenger 1:39 PM - 14 February, 2011
Quote:
I voted for better library management


There are workarounds for Library Management, but none for FLAC, or Key Lock!

www.youtube.com
AKIEM 1:56 PM - 14 February, 2011
work arounds
key lock - no
flac - yes

highest importance = library management

I use dl flac all day. Converting is one of the EASIEST steps in my file management. I spend FAR more time doing other crap.
WarpNote 2:00 PM - 14 February, 2011
What Akiem said, I just use XLD and convert the FLAC to ALAC, its fast too...
tmkk.pv.land.to
blackavenger 2:02 PM - 14 February, 2011
Since implementing this ( code.google.com ) , Library Management has been a breeze for me!

Yes, you can convert FLAC to ALAC, but at this stage in the game should we really have to?
AKIEM 2:04 PM - 14 February, 2011
I say the same thing to all the file management work.

one really is a breeze, and the other is actually not (no mater what outside system)
blackavenger 2:05 PM - 14 February, 2011
Honestly, since I purchased ( www.dbpoweramp.com ) FLAC conversion is really fast and easy......I admit that! It just annoys the piss out of me that I even have to do it. That's why I can't let it go.

Now for Key Lock, there is no other viable option......this MUST be addressed sometime soon!
AKIEM 2:08 PM - 14 February, 2011
even if key lock was perfect - I would not use it (much)

I like to pitch my records up a little
blackavenger 2:12 PM - 14 February, 2011
Quote:
even if key lock was perfect - I would not use it (much)

I like to pitch my records up a little


You must not do a lot of cross-genre mixing. Try mixing Trip.Hop, Glitch.Hop, Hip.Hop, Chip.Tune, Experimental, Electro, DnB, & Dubstep together without Keylock and tell me how that works out for you.
AKIEM 2:15 PM - 14 February, 2011
thats true - I dont
but Ive also been spinning for over 20 years and never needed it
blackavenger 2:24 PM - 14 February, 2011
Quote:
thats true - I dont
but Ive also been spinning for over 20 years and never needed it


I find I only use it when mixing many different genres together, and for mixing old R&B tracks w' Triphop. I too have been mixing quite a long time, and didn't use it before ScratchLIVE. Listen, technology is here to enrich our experience, why shouldn't we get the most out of it?

Embrace the technology.


I'm outta here....see Ya'll in another few weeks/years, as I'm sure we're all pissing in the wind by continually requesting that these features be implemented. However, I just can't stop asking for them....been doing it too long now...LOL!
WarpNote 2:32 PM - 14 February, 2011
Listen, syncing folders with crates I can do, when talking about library management, for the most part I'm thinking about duplicate identifiers...
AKIEM 2:41 PM - 14 February, 2011
I do embrace technology - just not technology that I dont really need.

file management - and tagging takes up a huge amount of time for me - even when I try to keep down the number of files I am am importing. That time could be SO much better used.

converting from flac is actually lovely compared to other crap
AND there are so many other things I would hope they took care of first.

converting flac is E A S Y !
nik39 3:20 PM - 14 February, 2011
Quote:
Listen, syncing folders with crates I can do, when talking about library management, for the most part I'm thinking about duplicate identifiers...

I thought we were done with this ;)
LosMintos 3:23 PM - 14 February, 2011
Quote:
converting flac is E A S Y !
Ack, but I don't want to convert. I use FLAC by other reasons and I want to spin also FLAC. Think of having FLAC and ALAC (or MP3) side-by-side with synced metadata. Easy?

Library management is NOT having folders as crates (why using crates, when they just show up your folders?). Library management concerns on flexible playlist/crates or filter mechanism based on metadata like genre, style, mood, key, ratings etc. (including costum field names)
Armtone 4:16 PM - 14 February, 2011
Quote:
Quote:


even if key lock was perfect - I would not use it (much)

I like to pitch my records up a little


You must not do a lot of cross-genre mixing. Try mixing Trip.Hop, Glitch.Hop, Hip.Hop, Chip.Tune, Experimental, Electro, DnB, & Dubstep together without Keylock and tell me how that works out for you.


+1000
For example, check out my mix - soundcloud.com
Mix is excellent, but sound always has a little drops, because i used keylock.
I vote for Flac & Keylock equally.
serkan 10:36 PM - 15 February, 2011
Quote:

I use FLAC by other reasons

Stop lying!
You can always convert, even if all your other devices do not support ALAC...

JK :)
marko.m 3:44 PM - 22 February, 2011
Just to sa

Give us the FLAC support
Weblee 9:39 AM - 13 March, 2011
I ould also like to add my 2c.

please add .FLAC support asap!!!!

now even.
Weblee 9:40 AM - 13 March, 2011
*would
serkan 8:12 AM - 15 March, 2011
We should stick to this thread since this is the one getting any responses at all.
kinematics 2:26 AM - 23 March, 2011
checking in for my yearly request for FLAC support!

besides that, SSL is pretty much perfect for me.

But please, add FLAC!
serkan 11:14 AM - 23 March, 2011
The day (year?) will come :D
Pior_187 6:38 AM - 24 March, 2011
decade...
serkan 4:49 PM - 24 March, 2011
To be honest. I kinda had the feeling it will never come.
But something (someone?) inside me really believes that FLAC support will come this year. We will see what happens within the next 9 months. If nothing - I honestly will (you can trust me!) never ask for it again.
And just to make it clear:
This is not a "I-give-Serato-nine-month-or-I'll-leave" post.
It's just what I think.
LosMintos 10:06 PM - 24 March, 2011
Quote:
It's just what I think.
Me too: Sometime I'll switch to Traktor.
Pior_187 8:02 AM - 25 March, 2011
Same with me... I'ma give up my hopes now! Fretful...
Parabolic 3:32 AM - 29 March, 2011
Checking in with my yearly FLAC request. I am already dreading how the hell I am going to transfer the SSL meta from my converted MP3s back into their orig. FLAC backups
blackavenger 2:12 PM - 29 March, 2011
Quote:
Checking in with my yearly FLAC request. I am already dreading how the hell I am going to transfer the SSL meta from my converted MP3s back into their orig. FLAC backups



What? You didn't keep the original FLAC files?
serkan 2:56 PM - 29 March, 2011
Quote:

Checking in with my yearly FLAC request. I am already dreading how the hell I am going to transfer the SSL meta from my converted MP3s back into their orig. FLAC backups

I'm gonna use Mp3tag (installed on a virtual machine with Win XP)
:)
Quote:

What? You didn't keep the original FLAC files?

You should read it again.
blackavenger 3:06 PM - 29 March, 2011
Quote:
You should read it again.


Ahhh, I see what you're saying now ;)
elitesounds 1:31 AM - 30 March, 2011
Would like to see CD + G files supported in with VSL. Getting more and more requests for karaoke which I personally can't stand but more mid week gigs would come of it. Would like to work off of one system for Karaoke, Videos and Audio. Thanks!! If there is a way to at least create a Preset through Handbrake to convert CD+G files to the proper codec would be nice too. Tried other sources and graphics never showed up as audio played within VSL. :(
DJ ROC HOUND 7:04 AM - 30 March, 2011
Flac +1
blackavenger 7:47 AM - 30 March, 2011
Quote:
Flac +1



haha.
LosMintos 8:50 AM - 30 March, 2011
Quote:
I'm gonna use Mp3tag
Do you transfer ID3-Tags from MP3 to Vorbis-Comments in corresponding FLAC-Files? In an automated manner? Could you give us some more details?
serkan 5:12 PM - 30 March, 2011
Exactly.
Mp3tag is by far the most powerful tagging tool in the market but sadly only available on Windows computers.
You can simply do everything that belongs to tagging in audio files - not just MP3s.
In the case of MP3 -> FLAC you just load all MP3s into the application, select all, copy the tags, and paste them to your selected FLAC files. To be honest: I don't know if the programme also copies the meta data from ScratchLive (since we don't have FLAC support yet and I didn't try with AAC, OggVorbis, etc.). But as far as I know the SL-meta is written directly into the tag and Mp3tag has the ability to copy the whole tag and to convert it from ID3 to Vorbis-Comments.
So I pretty much think that it will work but we can't be sure until Serato gives us the opportunity to find out.

btw: You can automate every command in Mp3tag with scripting but I'm doing it manually since the app is very easy to use (and I don't have a clue in creating scripts or batch files).
I would recommend you to download Mp3tag (it's totally free) and to test it on your machine. I'm so impressed by it that I installed it on a virtual machine on OS X (with Oracle's Virtual Box, which is also free) alongside with MixedInKey and foobar2000.
LosMintos 9:18 PM - 2 April, 2011
Quote:
In the case of MP3 -> FLAC you just load all MP3s into the application, select all, copy the tags, and paste them to your selected FLAC files.
They have the same file names? Same folder structure?

Consider you have an MP3 were no accompanying flac exists. Does ist work?

You might look into a FLAC afterwards bei ``metaflac --list <filename.flac>'' in cmd.exe.

That's going to be off-topic ... Private discussion is welcome ...
D.Jayme 9:31 AM - 5 April, 2011
Guys, just buy Traktor.
It supports FLAC out of the box, without any problems; MUCH faster and more accurate then Serato can.
serkan 7:46 AM - 6 April, 2011
Without any problems? So tell me why NI can't fix the issue with the first second of any FLAC file being missing? They had this from the very first introduction of Traktor and still have it in 2.0.1
And that's only ONE of lots of points why I stick with ScratchLive. We at least know that Serato does things right - and that is why Traktor is "just" very good software while SL is professional.
D.Jayme 11:26 AM - 6 April, 2011
Well it's not traktor, I've been using FLAC files and Traktor for the past 2 years and I never had any playback issues. Maybe the problem is your FLAC encoder.
serkan 12:14 PM - 6 April, 2011
No. It's a known issue.
This is what the documentation of TP2 says about it:
Quote:

- When loading a FLAC file a couple of ms are being cut at the
beginning of the track, which may lead to a wrong beat grid.

And exact that is the issue I have with every single FLAC file with Windows XPH SP3 and Mac OS X 10.6.6
lunaros 12:26 PM - 7 April, 2011
Just put my 2 V7's on ebay. Sick of waiting for FLAC. Good bye Serato.
greg_lynch 11:35 PM - 18 April, 2011
yup, me too - goodbye serato.
serkan 9:04 PM - 10 May, 2011
Just saw djDecks recently hit V.1.0 at Skratchworx and decided to try the demo...
djDecks was my very first DVS 6 years ago before I switched to SL in early 2008.

I haven't did anything with DJD since then and was really impressed with what it became during the years. It's much more stable. There is a beta working on Mac OS X. It plays video. It has a sample. The effects sound much better than they did back in time.

But those are all things that SL does in a more professional and easy-to-setup way for some time now. But the thing that bugged me the most is...
Well, take a guess :)
voxel 4:31 PM - 13 July, 2011
Sold my SL-3. Main reason is the lack of new features. FLAC was the #1 feature for me.
blackavenger 7:03 PM - 13 July, 2011
Quote:
Sold my SL-3. Main reason is the lack of new features. FLAC was the #1 feature for me.


So far 7 of my friends have dropped ScratchLIVE for Traktor. If ScratchLIVE 2.3 doesn't offer sync'd SP-6, I'll be following suit. Enough is enough!! The waiting game, and blatant disregard for our requests is getting really fuckin' old now!!

I'll keep my NS6, because I see ITCH as, at least, a step in the right direction. But if they don't speed up it's progress, I'll sell that as well.

I'd say we've been MORE THAN PATIENT waiting on new features. It's been nearly a year, Serato.....when are we going to get some new features? Ones that we actually want? Not silly bullshit like Album Artwork, Day/Night GUI, VFX-1 Control for ScratchLIVE effects, or Online Playlists.........We want Sync'd SP-6, we want FLAC support, we want better Keylock Algorithm....you know, shizz that professionals desire.

Why do I even bother......it's falling on deaf ears/blind eyes!?!?!?
serkan 9:59 PM - 18 July, 2011
FLAC = Fail? = Fail!
Fatsak 6:33 PM - 20 July, 2011
BLACKAVENGER FOR PRESIDENT!!! Let's get it moving serato. Both Sl and Video sl are way behind. Look at Mix Emergency, same price as v-sl but a much better product. STEP YOU GAME UP OR YOU WILL LOSE ALL OF YOUR SUPPORTERS....
dirtydevious 6:12 AM - 10 August, 2011
For FLAC sake still nothing done about this. What the hell is going on serato, I was going to upgrade to SL4, i'm now looking elsewhere.
pasik 10:53 PM - 12 August, 2011
FLAC +1 .. it's about time!
SkyGroove 2:41 PM - 19 August, 2011
Would be really great if there was any word on the results of that poll they conducted a few months ago about features we would most like to see in future versions (like FLAC). Wouldn't be surprised that they won't reveal it, but how about it Serato Product Management?
icb 6:47 PM - 19 August, 2011
FLAC support needed. pls make it happen.
nachopro 3:17 AM - 24 August, 2011
hey guys! 7 years!

It's time, FLAC FOR EVERYONE!
Sporadik Styles 9:29 PM - 24 August, 2011
+1 for FLAC support
LosMintos 8:24 AM - 25 August, 2011
Well, I do not expect anything regarding FLAC since this request is lasting for so many years. However, to emphasize FLAC's relevance look at these to polls
2009 www.hydrogenaudio.org
2011 www.hydrogenaudio.org (currently open)
At least in the hydrogenaudio community FLAC ist the far most important lossless codec. In lossless it has even a higher 'market share' than MP3 in lossy.

That might not be typical for SSL/Itch users, because there's a bias to iTunes and Mac, but for sure, FLAC is relevant and the most important competitor to Apple lossless.

I'm disappointed and have really no clue why Serato is not willing/able to implement FLAC for almost seven years now. We might close this chapter. There are alternatives available (even those, that does not require new hardware for vinyl control).
alec.tron 11:46 AM - 31 August, 2011
Quote:
I myself love SSL but even after demoing it extensively, I still refuse to buy it, or its competetors, until we get some good lossless audio codecs for them.


Anniversary!
7 years & 7 weeks. ish.
c.
Transportman 2:24 PM - 3 September, 2011
well, what about FLAG support?
djPhysicist 1:59 AM - 27 September, 2011
+1
SkyGroove 12:30 PM - 1 October, 2011
I was thinking about telling some friends who aren't DJs about Serato DJ Intro to get their feet wet. Then I remembered this thread. I will not be recommending it now due to the lack of FLAC support. Seems like the only leverage I have here against Serato on this issue LOL.
AKIEM 3:40 PM - 1 October, 2011
Just don't understand why people are so adement against using such an simple work around - convert them. For me converting flac files is even quicker then moving them to my external drives. Problem solved.

Yes using SSL you have to do prep work - next these people will be demanding wherever they are getting files from build the over views for them.
SkyGroove 4:04 PM - 1 October, 2011
Quote:
Just don't understand why people are so adement against using such an simple work around - convert them. For me converting flac files is even quicker then moving them to my external drives. Problem solved.


1. RIP CD to FLAC for archiving (but before I can put them in the FLAC archive I have to keep track of which ones I haven't converted to ALAC yet just to use with Serato, if I want to have parity between both collections). So I accumulate FLACs in this"temp" location until I get around to converting to ALAC and then move the FLACS to their proper archive locations.

2. Copy over to Serato laptop (since I don't have enough space on my usb harddive for both my FLAC archive AND the ALAC copies just to use with Serato)

3. Convert FLAC to ALAC on Serato instance.

That's why: cuz it ain't simple. Maintaining two copies of a music library is a time suck and a waste of resources for a feature that is reasonable to find in other offerings in the year 2011.

*I* don't understand the detractors who are so critical of the demand for support of a Free Lossless Audio Codec that is common and would rather rationalize away the inconvenience.
AKIEM 6:28 PM - 1 October, 2011
I don't see the inconvenience (or much of one)
Why do you archive in flac instead of alac (or wav, aif)?
How big is your USB drive?
SkyGroove 6:52 PM - 1 October, 2011
Respectfully, it shouldn't matter (but it's huge). I don't think I should have to throw hardware at it due to the lack of a reasonable Serato feature. In fact, when I move to a NAS for archival, I'll likely still keep it in FLAC.

My library was ripped with the open FLAC standard long before I ever had to consider apple's proprietary, redundant ALAC format (then I chose Serato and here we are). I could bulk convert but eventually I know I'll run into a use-case where something doesn't support ALAC (speculative of course, but I don't feel like finding out the hard way). Haven't had that problem with FLAC in my current workflow. If it ain't broke ...(except for Serato LOL)

So I'll admit that my inconvenience is based more on principle than a practical block (and a few unknowns that I'm not interesting in confirming), but that's fine. It's still a reasonable feature to request, given the playing field, so as a consumer I will continue to request it.

I'm not interested in arguing about this, just clarifying my position. It ain't changing. :)
blackavenger 6:52 PM - 1 October, 2011
Quote:
Just don't understand why people are so adement against using such an simple work around - convert them. For me converting flac files is even quicker then moving them to my external drives. Problem solved.

It's not the conversion that's the problem. It's having to maintain 3 files for each track that I have issue with.....(1) FLAC file for Traktor/Ableton, (2) ALAC file for ScratchLIVE/ITCH, (3) Mp3 file for my iPod.
SkyGroove 6:59 PM - 1 October, 2011
Quote:
Quote:
... Mp3 file for my iPod.


shoot, I totally forgot about the third mp3 conversion in my explanation. Same issue here.
AKIEM 9:21 PM - 1 October, 2011
Sure its a perfectly reasonable request. I just think some people in this thread are getting unreasonably upset. And I dont understand making a principalled stand when there are options and the issues is bound to just work itself out eventually.

I think the issue is entirely drive space - otherwise why would we use compressed files in the first place? I used to convert my flac to aiff then alac, but now I just leave it aiff because my drive space is expanding so cheaply and rapidly. Yes thats just me - but eventually there will be no reason for compression.

I dont know how many songs you are dealing with but you should be able to fit 40 to 50 thousand uncompressed songs on a 2tb drive. who needs compression?
SkyGroove 10:32 PM - 1 October, 2011
True, but can't embed tags/album art into a wav though so that's not a good option for me either. Unless we're talking about using a different container, but then we're back to conversion again, so why not FLAC. :)
deejaysomething 6:46 AM - 28 October, 2011
Well, I did not see that coming.
apple.slashdot.org
Stuart Ramdeen 8:03 AM - 28 October, 2011
Not sure if this has been posted elsewhere, but ALAC just went opensource :-) about bloody time.
blackavenger 10:39 AM - 28 October, 2011
Quote:
Well, I did not see that coming.
apple.slashdot.org

Quote:
Not sure if this has been posted elsewhere, but ALAC just went opensource :-) about bloody time.


WOW!!

Didn't EVER think that would happen!!!!
LosMintos 12:25 PM - 1 November, 2011
Apple could have just used FLAC if they would care in open source. I think, they only want to put ALAC as a/the standard for lossless audio.

IMHO, for those few you still wait for FLAC in Scratch Live this is the end of the story (e.g., FLAC will never come to SSL).
serkan 10:20 PM - 2 November, 2011
Quote:

IMHO, for those few you still wait for FLAC in Scratch Live this is the end of the story (e.g., FLAC will never come to SSL).

100% agree!

I think it makes more sense now to wait for hardware and software developers to update their firmware and applications. I don't think they will need 7+ years to do so.
Come on Ableton! :)

But I didn't expect this either. And it somehow makes me sad after all the efford was taken into FLAC by the open source community and how they got hit from their back now.
LosMintos 12:24 PM - 3 November, 2011
Quote:
I think it makes more sense now to wait for hardware and software developers to update their firmware and applications.
Update for what?
serkan 8:25 PM - 3 November, 2011
ALAC support?!
But I officially jumped ship today.

Why?
- With ALAC getting open source I think it will win over FLAC within the next two years.
- Within those two years I don't expect FLAC in any Serato product.
- Now I can start dealing with iTunes and use it's intelligent playlists: No need to ask for better smart crates in Serato products anymore.
- I got me an Apple TV 2 last month because of it's Wi-Fi support. It replaced my WD HD TV as a stationary FLAC player.
- I decided to get an iPhone 4S in January which also has native support for ALAC and AirPlay (to connect with my Apple TV 2)

- After having made all these decisions I started converting my FLAC files to ALAC and now am copying the tags from my MP3s to the ALACs. After that I will delete the redundant MP3s and merge my lossless and lossy libraries.
FYI:
I copy the tags with Mp3Tag and it DOESN'T copy the Serato analyze information, cue points & beat grids :(

BTW:
I bought an iPod nano on my way home from work. I'm COMPLETLY on the dark side now.

@Serato:
You should know that I'm hugely and honestly dissapointed with your behavior on FLAC support!
AKIEM 9:36 PM - 3 November, 2011
Maybe Serato heard in advance that ALAC was going open?

FLAC community should be proud to have forced apple to open ALAC.
serkan 10:47 PM - 3 November, 2011
Quote:

Maybe Serato heard in advance that ALAC was going open?

Since 2004?
People were always saying Serato & Apple are in bed (which they are not).
But if they knew ALAC was going open source in 2004 they were not just in bed - they were doing some really nasty stuff ;)
Quote:

FLAC community should be proud to have forced apple to open ALAC.

They really should be. Apple always haven been the opposite of open source software and now they're giving up a proprietary codec? Big day!
AKIEM 11:19 PM - 3 November, 2011
well no, not since 2004
nasty stuff :)

I have no idea if they knew in advance or how far in advance - but it might explain it.

maybe not
LosMintos 10:29 AM - 7 November, 2011
Quote:
FLAC community should be proud to have forced apple to open ALAC.
Why should they? It's a business move from Apple and in the long run there's nothing good for FLAC (however, FLAC is independent from any other codec and they don't have to make money).

Quote:
I'm COMPLETLY on the dark side now.
Me too, but with NI rather than Apple. *jokingly*

Quote:
I copy the tags with Mp3Tag and it DOESN'T copy the Serato analyze information, cue points & beat grids :(
Hm, I would ask in their forum ... On the other hand: Is it in principle possible to copy those information to a different audio format?
AKIEM 10:37 AM - 7 November, 2011
Quote:
Quote:
FLAC community should be proud to have forced apple to open ALAC.
Why should they? It's a business move from Apple and in the long run there's nothing good for FLAC (however, FLAC is independent from any other codec and they don't have to make money).


not sure what you are saying
LosMintos 11:29 AM - 7 November, 2011
IMHO there will be a growing market for lossless music and apple wants to be a big player. Therefore, they publish their own codec to increase acceptance and hardware support and bind people to their own devices. This is nothing for the FLAC community to be proud of it (anyway, they can be proud of their own codec).

Remember, in order to support an open source lossless codec Apple could have integrate FLAC into iTunes (both support and selling music).

IMHO it is still open, which lossless codec will be dominant in future. Apple don't want FLAC to be the dominant codec (like MP3), because there's no special relation to their hardware. This is how I understand the publication of the ALAC sources.
WarpNote 12:07 PM - 7 November, 2011
You do realize that Apple would have to integrate FLAC into all ipods, ipads, quicktime, final cut, motion etc, right?
blackavenger 3:26 PM - 7 November, 2011
My guess is that within the next 3 to 5 years, ALAC will replace (or at least have an equal footing) FLAC at all the major Digital Music Retailers...such as: Beatport, Stompy, TrackitDown, Juno, TraxSource, DJDownload, Digital-Tunes, etc.. Bandcamp already sell FLAC & ALAC of their releases.

It sure would make managing my Serato Library easier....no more 3 copies per file ; )
LosMintos 9:49 AM - 8 November, 2011
Quote:
You do realize that Apple would have to integrate FLAC into all ipods, ipads, quicktime, final cut, motion etc, right?
Would it be a problem? At least there's no licensing issue (as far as I know, with software patents one can't be sure). By the way, is MP3 available (at least a decoder) on these divices/applications? If yes, then why not FLAC?
WarpNote 10:30 AM - 8 November, 2011
Los Mintos, are you serious?
You do realize how many different platforms that would have to be done?
AKIEM 10:30 AM - 8 November, 2011
Quote:
IMHO there will be a growing market for lossless music and apple wants to be a big player. Therefore, they publish their own codec to increase acceptance and hardware support and bind people to their own devices. This is nothing for the FLAC community to be proud of it (anyway, they can be proud of their own codec).


Maybe "proud" was not the best choice of words, just the easy way to get the point across.

I dont see how opening ALAC binds anyone to apple devices. seems like maybe the oposite, if you have an ALAC library it will become easier to migrate to more hardware that starts to support ALAC.

If FLAC did not persist in doing so well apple would not need to open ALAC - imo


Quote:

Remember, in order to support an open source lossless codec Apple could have integrate FLAC into iTunes (both support and selling music).


Sure they could have. But instead they have opened ALAC

Quote:

IMHO it is still open, which lossless codec will be dominant in future. Apple don't want FLAC to be the dominant codec (like MP3), because there's no special relation to their hardware. This is how I understand the publication of the ALAC sources.


Right but isnt open ALAC the same as FLAC now?

Really I dont care what format is dominant, I just want shit to work easy. ALAC being open is better then it being closed. Im glad FLAC persisted.
serkan 10:39 AM - 8 November, 2011
There is news on my front btw.

I transcoded all my FLAC (level 5) files to ALAC (1200+ songs) and it took way more space.
And even though I replaced some of my FLAC devices to Apple ones I still had huge compatibility issues with hard/software I'm using.

So I opened Time Machine and restored all my lovely FLACs (gotta love my Time Capsule!) and deleted the ALACs.
Now I have 2 libraries again.

1 MP3 only for streaming, portables, DJing, etc.
1 FLAC for back-up, producing, etc.

SL supporting FLAC still will be a huuuuge step forward but NOT the solution.
Let's see how it will look in the next 2-3 years.
I'm absolutely sure one lossless codec will rule the whole market but I still don't know wich one.

I think it will be decided by the online music retailers.
If the online stores switch to lossless, which codec will the use?
I think...
Amazon = FLAC
Google = FLAC
iTunes = ALAC

iTunes has by far the biggest share in the market but the competitors could have the chance to catch up if they are being (much!) faster with lossless music.
So I really believe that "the decision" between FLAC and ALAC will be made between these 3 above.

What do you think?
We keep whining and bashing for some years now.
And it didn't help. It's all up to Serato now.

But why not discuss about lossless?
Do you share my opinion?
I also think that even after 5 years when we have super-duper-max-HD TVs and 20-channel-surround systems it's still possible that the people will still listen to fu**ed-up 128kbps MP3s from the youtube converter which have been transcoded 10x times. And that's not even my worst case scenario :)
AKIEM 10:45 AM - 8 November, 2011
Quote:
I also think that even after 5 years when we have super-duper-max-HD TVs and 20-channel-surround systems it's still possible that the people will still listen to fu**ed-up 128kbps MP3s from the youtube converter which have been transcoded 10x times. And that's not even my worst case scenario :)
WarpNote 10:49 AM - 8 November, 2011
Quote:
I still had huge compatibility issues with hard/software I'm using.

What software/hardware are you using Serkan?
LosMintos 4:18 PM - 9 November, 2011
Quote:
Los Mintos, are you serious?
You do realize how many different platforms that would have to be done?
Again, why should it not be possible with FLAC? If it is possible with other codecs (ALAC, MP3, not to mention those for video), it's possible with FLAC too. It's just a choice---and apple decided to develop and use an own codec. Sorry, I'm not getting your point.

Quote:
I transcoded all my FLAC (level 5) files to ALAC
Which encoder, what platform? Apple opened the source, but I couldn't find an encoder (for windows); only the reversed engineering one. And, Serkan, you could have done that years before, ALAC encoding is available for long time.

Compression of FLAC vs. ALAC should be almost the same, wiki.hydrogenaudio.org.

Quote:
What do you think?
I agree. There will be a market for lossless music and beside iTunes Amazon will be the most important player (because now they are the biggest CD seller worldwide AFAIK). Which codec will Amazon use? I'm not sure ... If they would offer FLAC, I would buy (if it's available in my country, *lol*).

And, by the way, IMHO it's still a shame not to have FLAC in ScratchLive.
serkan 9:44 PM - 14 November, 2011
Quote:

What software/hardware are you using Serkan?

Hardware:
Apple iPhone 4S, 32GB = ALAC
Apple iPod nano 6G, 8GB = ALAC
Apple TV 2 = ALAC / FLAC (jailbroken)
WD HD TV = FLAC
Sansa Fuze 4GB & 8GB = FLAC

Software:
Serato Scratch Live = ALAC
Serato ITCH = ALAC
iTunes = ALAC
foobar2000 = FLAC / ALAC
Audacity = FLAC
Ableton Live = FLAC
XBMC = FLAC

And I use them all (if not on a daily basis).
Quote:

Which encoder, what platform? Apple opened the source, but I couldn't find an encoder (for windows); only the reversed engineering one.

I wanted to use the original encoder by Apple so I used Auditry to convert from FLAC to WAV and iTunes for WAV to ALAC. Then I copied the tags with Mp3tag (using Windows XP in Virtual Box).
Quote:

And, Serkan, you could have done that years before, ALAC encoding is available for long time.

I know but I started using FLAC years ago but got my first Apple Device (MacBook Pro) just one year ago. The Apple TV, iPod, and iPhone within the last 2 months.
Quote:

Compression of FLAC vs. ALAC should be almost the same, wiki.hydrogenaudio.org.

Yeah, almost :)
Every single ALAC file was larger than FLAC level 5. Some of them only a couple kilobytes, others up to 5+MB. I haven't compared the total size 1:1 but with 1200+ lossless tracks it really made a difference. You might think it doesn't make much of a difference if you are maintaning lossless music but hey, why waste space if both are 100% lossless?! :)
blackavenger 10:52 PM - 14 November, 2011
Quote:
Every single ALAC file was larger than FLAC level 5. Some of them only a couple kilobytes, others up to 5+MB. I haven't compared the total size 1:1 but with 1200+ lossless tracks it really made a difference. You might think it doesn't make much of a difference if you are maintaning lossless music but hey, why waste space if both are 100% lossless?! :)


This has been my argument for years.
Nodd 10:17 PM - 28 November, 2011
Serato & FLAC: A Story Full of Lost Hope!
It could make a great title on the evolution of sound formats in some manufacturer.
Shame in 2011 almost 2012 ...

Sorry but this post needed to be remind.
LosMintos 9:36 AM - 1 December, 2011
+1
blackavenger 3:03 PM - 1 December, 2011
Quote:
+1

LOL.
Serato
Glenn M 4:12 AM - 27 December, 2011
I'm gutted for you guys. It seems I've got the only copy of Scratch Live in the entire world that has FLAC support. Lucky me : )

Jokes aside, I'm pushing to get some backing to put FLAC support into something after SSL 2.4. We have to implement tagging properly and make sure that sample accurate seeking is working correctly. It's one thing to for a developer to just 'throw the code in there' but naturally many get nervous when a chunk of new code gets introduced. There are a lot of things to test, and this takes a lot of time away from our current work (which is quite significant).

There's a perception that FLAC is not hugely desired by the majority of our users, but one could say that's because we don't support it. Personally I don't have any FLAC encoded audio beside the files I've converted for use in this dev work.
blackavenger 7:30 AM - 27 December, 2011
Quote:
I'm gutted for you guys. It seems I've got the only copy of Scratch Live in the entire world that has FLAC support. Lucky me : )

Indeed....LUCKY YOU ; )

Quote:
Jokes aside, I'm pushing to get some backing to put FLAC support into something after SSL 2.4.

You would go down in Board History as a champion....GET IT DONE, Glenn!!!!!

Quote:
There's a perception that FLAC is not hugely desired by the majority of our users, but one could say that's because we don't support it. Personally I don't have any FLAC encoded audio beside the files I've converted for use in this dev work.

Well, despite the fact that I have been a ScratchLIVE user for right around 6 years now, and throughout that time Serato products have not supported the Free Lossless Audio Codec, I have nearly 600GBs of Lossless music, irregardless. I could cut that total by more than half if I were able to delete the unnecessary ALAC stuff (only kept as my FLAC alternative within Serato products).

It is true that both ALAC & FLAC are lossless so it shouldn't matter, but what seems to be ignored time & time again is the fact that ALAC files are larger (for the exact same content) than their FLAC file counterparts. When you amass a large library of FLAC content like I have over the years, this wasted space (having FLAC & ALAC for the same file) begins to negate the entire reason for choosing FLAC over .WAV in the first place......saved space!!!!

Please, Serato try to make this happen (for all Serato products) before 2013....
Serato
Glenn M 9:58 AM - 27 December, 2011
Quote:
You would go down in Board History as a champion....GET IT DONE, Glenn!!!!!

Ha! No pressure. Well, I just got decoding working on SSL 2.4 for mac, but I still have to wire up...
* Database writing
* Tag reading and writing (overviews, cues, loops etc)
* Make it work on windows. I've done this before, so hopefully it won't take too long.
* Someone has to test the heck out of it.

There is no way this going to make it into SSL 2.4 of ITCH 2.1.
serkan 9:37 PM - 27 December, 2011
Witch FLAC anywhere on the horizon is there a special reason why SL/ITCH are only able to read key tags (written by Mixed In Key) from MP3?
Since you are a coder from the dev team (who made the mistake to lay me a bait here :) I want to ask you for adressing this issue as well.

But that'll be all for now... I won't distract you from working ;)
Serato
Glenn M 9:40 PM - 27 December, 2011
Quote:
Witch FLAC anywhere on the horizon is there a special reason why SL/ITCH are only able to read key tags (written by Mixed In Key) from MP3?

Yeah, sorry about that. We're supposed to use iTune's "initial key" atom. I can take a look.
WarpNote 9:44 PM - 27 December, 2011
Quote:
Ableton Live = FLAC
Ableton works well with ALAC too...

Serkan, on another note. I use MIK myself.
Are you able to read those MIK key tags for AAC/ALAC in other apps?

Thanks, WarpNote
serkan 11:43 PM - 27 December, 2011
Quote:

Are you able to read those MIK key tags for AAC/ALAC in other apps?

I spent the last half hour testing but have only one result.

foobar2000 (WIN)
AAC=yes, ALAC=yes

But with iTunes, QuickTime Player, djay, and VLC I wasn't even able to show tags in MP3 files.
serkan 11:46 PM - 27 December, 2011
btw: iTunes, QuickTime Player, djay, and VLC = all on Mac
WarpNote 11:52 PM - 27 December, 2011
Oh ok, thanks, I was more curious about other DVS software and MIK...
serkan 12:02 AM - 28 December, 2011
I have Traktor Scratch Pro 2 (with super-duper MK2 timecode records) here but deleted it from my hard drive. I'm trying to return it to NI but their support didn't answer my queries for 4 weeks now.

According to the "connect with DJ software" tab in MIK 5's setup:

Key tag in MP3 = supported by Scratch Live, ITCH, Traktor, Rekordbox
Key tag in MP4 = supported by Traktor only
WarpNote 5:22 AM - 28 December, 2011
Ah, thanks Serkan. Not about to switch software, just curious if the tag was "transferable"...
serkan 4:40 PM - 29 December, 2011
Quote:
Ah, thanks Serkan. Not about to switch software, just curious if the tag was "transferable"...

I didn't even think you would switch.
I just wanted you (and anybody else) to know how bad I think Traktor is :)
WarpNote 11:02 PM - 29 December, 2011
Lol, yeah I spent way to much on Rane hardware to switch. And grown very accustomed to the SSL interface. So much, I don't even care much for Itch. Mainly the 4 deck layout in Itch (not able to just show 2 decks with NS6, and don't get me started on the channel renaming) and lack of info on the virtual deck circles are a mistake imo.

Anyway enough ranting, I love my SSL, just wish it could read ALAC key codes. Its actually the main reason I still use mp3 320k's in SSL the most part. I ripped all my cd collection to ALAC...
serkan 2:05 AM - 30 December, 2011
Quote:

lack of info on the virtual deck circles

I hate that too.
But I don't think they will change this ever.
Have you had the SL 2.0 betas with ITCH-style virtual decks?
Serato is planning on fcking up the circles for quite a long time now ;)
Quote:

Anyway enough ranting, I love my SSL, just wish it could read ALAC key codes. Its actually the main reason I still use mp3 320k's in SSL the most part. I ripped all my cd collection to ALAC...

I actually encode AAC-Files from iTunes to MP3 because of the lack of key results. This coming from someone who wants FLAC... I really have to cut myself down in quality terms :(
Serato
Glenn M 2:20 AM - 30 December, 2011
Quote:
I actually encode AAC-Files from iTunes to MP3 because of the lack of key results. This coming from someone who wants FLAC... I really have to cut myself down in quality terms :(

Do you save 'initial key' info to the FLAC files? What does it call the xiph comment id? I know audacity has used "INITIAL KEY=A12" when I converted an mp3 using the same info, so I might just use that.

We're supposed to be putting in com.apple.iTunes:initialkey into SSL 2.4. I'm not sure if it will go into ITCH 2.1 (people get nervous when devs add stuff in at the last minute). That will mean key reading for all mpeg4 containers (so your iTunes tracks for example)
WarpNote 3:40 PM - 30 December, 2011
Re-encoding lossy files is a bad idea...
Serato
Glenn M 7:24 PM - 30 December, 2011
Quote:
Re-encoding lossy files is a bad idea...
Well, it's ultimately pointless and boosts the file size but it was good for testing purposes.

Kids, don't try that at home. You'll make the support team laugh.
serkan 10:18 PM - 30 December, 2011
Quote:

Do you save 'initial key' info to the FLAC files? What does it call the xiph comment id? I know audacity has used "INITIAL KEY=A12" when I converted an mp3 using the same info, so I might just use that.

Do you mean INITIALKEY or INITIAL KEY (with space)?
And: Does it actually say 12A (as in MIK) or A12?
It might be a problem to have compatibility in both ways.

As far as I know there is no standard key tag within Vorbis Comment specifications.

See:
www.xiph.org
age.hobba.nl

I did a small test with the transcoding/copying of the INITALKEY tag:

MP3 with INITIALKEY tag written by MixedInKey.
MP3TAG on Windows XP.

1. Convert MP3 to FLAC using Auditry on Mac OS X 10.7.2 Lion
> Track has the standard tags but no key tag at all.

2. Copy the tag from MP3 to FLAC using Mp3tag on Windows XP Home SP3
> Track has INITIALKEY tag as in the MP3 file.

And while speaking about iTunes in SL/ITCH:
ITCH: New iTunes logo (blue dot with note)
SL: Old iTunes logo (CD with note)

:)
Serato
Glenn M 10:57 PM - 30 December, 2011
Quote:
Do you mean INITIALKEY or INITIAL KEY (with space)?
And: Does it actually say 12A (as in MIK) or A12?
It might be a problem to have compatibility in both ways

Yeah, it's gone INITIAL KEY=A12

We could essentially 'encourage' a standard and do INITIAL_KEY or INITIALKEY and only read Ebm or 12A or whatever. I don't see there being much reason why MixedInKey wouldn't eventually support FLAC because after all, I'm sure they have to decode the audio into raw PCM so they can analyse it. Then it's just a matter of tag writing. I guess we could email them.
serkan 1:41 AM - 31 December, 2011
FLAC is already supported in MIK 5.0 for Windows.
On Mac it's announced to be supported in 5.1.
LosMintos 12:32 AM - 6 January, 2012
Quote:
It seems I've got the only copy of Scratch Live in the entire world that has FLAC support.
Would you like to share?

Quote:
tagging properly
Take a look at foobar and MP3Tag. Would'nt it be nice to use costum columns and search expressions? Vorbis comment is flexible as hell ... follow that way.

Quote:
Personally I don't have any FLAC encoded audio beside the files I've converted for use in this dev work.
Let me know, it you need more ...

Is there really a lil' bit of hope? Can't believe ...
serkan 10:35 PM - 8 January, 2012
@ LosMintos

Also check here:
serato.com

The more feedback we give the more attention we will get.
Glenn M is working on it but it seems like he's pretty much alone in that field.

There were times in this forum when we had quite some FLAC requesting users. Now when the threads get some attention nobody is here. Some haters did quite a good job scaring people away (just read the linked thread and you'll know what I mean :)
CINELLI 10:45 PM - 8 January, 2012
Glen, I'm working on it as well. If you'd like to collaborate on it send me and email and we'll discuss our progress.
Serato
Glenn M 10:53 PM - 8 January, 2012
Quote:
Glen, I'm working on it as well. If you'd like to collaborate on it send me and email and we'll discuss our progress.

Umm, what are you working on exactly?
Rob Alahn 2:43 AM - 9 January, 2012
lol @ Glenn
Rob Alahn 2:43 AM - 9 January, 2012
ya can't be too careful
LosMintos 3:05 PM - 9 January, 2012
Quote:
There were times in this forum when we had quite some FLAC requesting users.
Yeah, of course, those guys who really want to use flac had to leave the serato world years ago. And not everybody of them is still reading here. Just my guess ...
blackavenger 3:21 PM - 9 January, 2012
Quote:
Yeah, of course, those guys who really want to use flac had to leave the serato world years ago. And not everybody of them is still reading here. Just my guess ...

Actually, I know this to be a fact.......some peeps that used to be quite active on this site, are no longer so, because they left for Traktor w' it's FLAC support.
CINELLI 5:55 PM - 13 January, 2012
Can someone post a dmesg log after running SSL from WINE? I'm in the process of repairing my mixer so I can't get an accurate reading but I can see that WINE is registering the SL1 and both tables after a week of tables..
Paul Seow 4:52 AM - 19 April, 2012
still no news on flac?
kinematics 5:01 PM - 22 April, 2012
here I am again for my yearly FLAC request.

Please give us FLAC support!

Also Glenn, great to hear that you're working on implementing it!

I still have hope that FLAC will come one day.
daeman 6:27 AM - 27 April, 2012
We need FLAC, I am not pleased to be spending a lot of time transcoding my audio files just to have them play in Serato
Unrealistic 2:41 PM - 5 May, 2012
Quote:
here I am again for my yearly FLAC request.

Please give us FLAC support!

And so I do !

PS: I wonder if it's a good argument to say that each year : Serato's designer will think "ok, they are staying with us anyway" ;-)

But... sitll a pain to convert flac files, it would be far more easy with flac support. From the time the topic was open, they developped the bridge, mixtape, video sl,... I guess flac is less than a priority to serato. Oh well.
LosMintos 8:05 AM - 7 May, 2012
Quote:
From the time the topic was open, they developped the bridge, mixtape, video sl
... and I bought Traktor ;-)
Sporadik Styles 3:14 PM - 11 May, 2012
I wonder if purhaps they're waiting for 3.0 which is hopefully 64bit before implementing FLAC. Still unacceptable its taken this long, but I wonder if that is why¿
aSiNe 9:16 AM - 20 June, 2012
back on the flac tip! bring it!
Unrealistic 11:14 AM - 5 August, 2012
Haha, 7 years old topic now. :-)
AmpItThere 8:32 PM - 13 August, 2012
Giving you flak for flac!
Fala Messenger 2:13 PM - 24 August, 2012
We need FLAC support!!!
phatbob 2:24 AM - 25 August, 2012
blackavenger 2:40 AM - 25 August, 2012
Quote:
serato.com


hele-fuckin'-lua!!!!!!!!

serato.com
blackavenger 2:43 AM - 25 August, 2012
Alright, Glenn.......you will never hear a peep outta' me again. I can't say that I won't argue with the rest of the staff, but you........you are the freakin' man!
Serato
Glenn M 11:04 PM - 26 August, 2012
FLAC is now available in the latest maintenance releases.

Quote:
Hi, everyone. We'd like to share that Scratch Live, ITCH and Serato Video maintenance releases are now in public beta. If you'd like to try them out, here are the links to their forum areas.

Scratch live + Serato Video: serato.com
ITCH + Serato Video: serato.com

Thanks.
Rob Alahn 4:28 AM - 27 August, 2012
Quote:
FLAC is now available in the latest maintenance releases.

Quote:
Hi, everyone. We'd like to share that Scratch Live, ITCH and Serato Video maintenance releases are now in public beta. If you'd like to try them out, here are the links to their forum areas.

Scratch live + Serato Video: serato.com
ITCH + Serato Video: serato.com

Thanks.


WOOT WOOT!!!!
serkan 6:30 AM - 27 August, 2012
OMG!

I made the switch to ALAC and will not go back...
But I'm really happy for all the ones who have waited.

Had to calm myself for not shouting out loud - it's 08.30am here and my neighbors would've killed me :)
SkyGroove 11:18 PM - 25 September, 2012
There better be a party thrown in this post now, after allll of this. (Soundtrack spun on FLAC of course). lol

I really can't believe this. I cannot wait to nuke my ALAC lib once I try it out.

Big THANK YOU to Glenn and any other Serato employee who helped bring this!!!
icb 6:09 PM - 26 September, 2012
Great news, waited so long for this ;)
Sporadik Styles 10:02 PM - 27 September, 2012
I didn't know I could back flip until a few days ago when 2.4.3 dropped!
karacho_ 12:05 AM - 28 September, 2012
very very cool, thanks!!!!
Unrealistic 4:56 PM - 7 October, 2012
took 8 years... but better late than never :-)
aSiNe 7:35 PM - 8 October, 2012
Quote:
There better be a party thrown in this post now, after allll of this. (Soundtrack spun on FLAC of course). lol

I really can't believe this. I cannot wait to nuke my ALAC lib once I try it out.

Big THANK YOU to Glenn and any other Serato employee who helped bring this!!!


I'm down with that party.

Big ups.