Serato Software Feature Suggestions

What features would you like to see in Serato software?

FLAC support???????

caine b 11:58 PM - 8 December, 2011
Hello, does anyone know if Serato will have FLAC support in the future?

Thanks
serkan 7:45 AM - 9 December, 2011
We all know but we are not going to tell you ;)
caine b 7:37 PM - 9 December, 2011
haha cheers...
caine b 7:38 PM - 9 December, 2011
would help to know so I don't start converting all my FLAC files...
caine b 9:32 PM - 9 December, 2011
plus if it's not going to be supported then I will look at programs that do...
serkan 9:32 PM - 12 December, 2011
If SL is the only reason to go with FLAC = try Apple Lossless.
discjockeyR 9:23 AM - 13 December, 2011
hi guys,
so, the sratchlive can import FLAC or not?

Thanks
serkan 8:02 PM - 13 December, 2011
Any guess?
caine b 11:19 PM - 13 December, 2011
Serkan, why don't you stop been a nob? this is a forum, it was a simple question.

Can you not just give a simple answer?
VJ Justin Allen 2:17 AM - 14 December, 2011
No.
VJ Justin Allen 2:17 AM - 14 December, 2011
caine b that would be no, it does not import FLAC. not no I cannot give you a simple answer :)
discjockeyR 10:00 AM - 14 December, 2011
Thanks VJ Justin. you answer out question. Caine is correct as serkan from the begin of the thread just answer to complicate the things. Forums are just to help each other and not complicate things
serkan 5:29 PM - 15 December, 2011
Sorry guys I really don't wanted to be a dick here!
It just seemed to me like you (no one specific) didn't even try to find an answer.
If you search for FLAC you'll find hundreds of threads. But you don't even have to search because there is a FLAC related thread on almost every page.
Ask VJ. I'm one of the biggest PITA's when it comes to FLAC support but after looots of years I gave up requesting - all you need to have is a LITTLE effort to find out for yourself.
caine b 7:27 PM - 15 December, 2011
Thanks for the input
Serato
Glenn M 6:40 AM - 26 December, 2011
At the risk of making people prematurely excited, yes, we have intentions to have at least basic FLAC support.

Just a little bit of back story. FLAC (supposedly) doesn't (or didn't with older versions) allow for very fast seeking, meaning that if you did a needle drop, it took a while for a FLAC encoded files to quickly start decoding from the new location in the file. The result would be dropping the needle to a new location in the file and it taking a while for the audio to start. This percieved weakness of FLAC meant that we never added support for it, it then became low priority as there were other lossless filetypes available for the audiophiles.

But....

I've got some prototype code that does FLAC decoding and it seems fine. Decoding is one thing, but we then also have to implement tag writing (for all overview, cue loop data etc) and then have to make sure that many types of FLAC files work, i.e. FLAC inside OGG containers.

In short, there is quite a lot of work to make sure we implement it correctly, especially if we intend to officially support it, in which case if us developers don't do it right, the poor support team get hammered with bug reports.

I know, for example, that I had to run a specific command line tool called metaflac (flac.sourceforge.net) to create a seektable. It's this tool that will allow faster sample accurate seeking. We actually do something similar with mp3 files but it's very Serato specific meta data.

I've been championing FLAC support in the Serato office, but we're so busy with other aspects, that FLAC is always bumped down in priority.

Sorry I can't give you guys better news.

Cheers

Glenn
Shanghai Ultra 2:34 AM - 27 December, 2011
Glenn,

Many thanks indeed for taking the time to let scratch live's userbase know that FLAC support is in the pipeline. Also appreciate your explaination of the technical difficulties faced in adding support for this codec - that is something most people, including myself, were totally unaware of until now.

I think FLAC support would be a real asset to scratch live, I know of at least one friend who opted for traktor scratch because it supported FLAC. But for me scratch is the superior piece of software and more faithful vinyl emulator. So I hope you can argue to put FLAC support higher up the priority list, as you can see from the forums there are many of us out there asking for what I have to say is a fairly basic feature request, technical difficulties aside - after all, FLAC is working fine on your competitor products, it would seem to me to be a no-brainer to nail FLAC once and for all - its good for your product, and its good for your userbase.

Thanks again.
VJ Justin Allen 4:15 PM - 28 December, 2011
Personally with all of the option out there to get around FLAC I am a bit disappointed that they are spending time working on this issue vs working on more important issues.

I guess we will see how it all ends up.
Serato
Glenn M 7:27 PM - 28 December, 2011
Quote:
Personally with all of the option out there to get around FLAC I am a bit disappointed that they are spending time working on this issue vs working on more important issues.
Bear in mind, I'm spending my Christmas break doing this FLAC thing. This better has make FLAC suddenly one of the most popular audio formats of all time.

It seems to work pretty good. What I converted in Audacity is seeking/need dropping very fast. I'm just wiring up all the tagging, which is using xiph styled comments.
VJ Justin Allen 8:34 PM - 28 December, 2011
+1 Glenn...you work too hard :)
Serato
Glenn M 12:19 AM - 29 December, 2011
Out of curiosity, do you guys have FLAC encoded audio inside FLAC containers or inside OGG containers.

i.e. do you guys have FLAC files as .flac or .ogg/.oga ?

Also, what tools do you tend to use to create the FLAC encoded audio, or what sites do you download from? I'm wondering if it's worth Serato's while to make more a song and dance about supporting it.

Cheers.
serkan 4:35 PM - 29 December, 2011
FLAC container only because of wide support in hardware and software.

For encoding I use foobar2000 on Windows and Auditry on Mac.

I buy single tracks in any lossless format (mostly WAV/FLAC on beatport.com, djshop.de, junodownload.com) and full artist albums on CD and convert to FLAC.
Reason mentioned in first sentence.
blackavenger 7:43 AM - 30 December, 2011
Quote:
Bear in mind, I'm spending my Christmas break doing this FLAC thing. This better has make FLAC suddenly one of the most popular audio formats of all time.

Oh believe me, as I said before you'll go down in Board History, for sure!!!!

Quote:
Out of curiosity, do you guys have FLAC encoded audio inside FLAC containers or inside OGG containers.
i.e. do you guys have FLAC files as .flac or .ogg/.oga ?

personally, I ONLY have FLAC containers. It's how they are when I buy them, so I do the same for when I make my own.

Quote:
Also, what tools do you tend to use to create the FLAC encoded audio, or what sites do you download from? I'm wondering if it's worth Serato's while to make more a song and dance about supporting it.


I use JetAudio & dBPowerAmp on Windows to make my FLACs. I never use my MAC to do the conversion, so I can't speak to that.

I buy from Beatport, Digital-Tunes, Stompy, Addictech, Juno, Track-it-Down, Traxsource to name a few.

As far as whether it's worth the time & effort.......are you kidding me?!?!? There is a 6 Year old thread, full of defectors to Traktor which proves that it is!! Everyone I know that switched from ScratchLIVE to Traktor, did so because of FLAC support! Isn't the point that your number one competitor supports it reason enough?
VJ Justin Allen 4:56 PM - 30 December, 2011
Quote:

As far as whether it's worth the time & effort.......are you kidding me?!?!? There is a 6 Year old thread, full of defectors to Traktor which proves that it is!! Everyone I know that switched from ScratchLIVE to Traktor, did so because of FLAC support! Isn't the point that your number one competitor supports it reason enough?


Serato supports video and Traktor doesn't. See logic works both ways.
Companies that get caught up in "keeping up with the Jones'" end up keeping up with nobody and losing their way.

I expect Serato to set the trends...not copy someone else.
blackavenger 5:00 PM - 30 December, 2011
Quote:
I expect Serato to set the trends...not copy someone else.


Cool, then the defectors will increase.........good business strategy ;)
Serato
Glenn M 7:34 PM - 30 December, 2011
Quote:
I expect Serato to set the trends...not copy someone else.

It actually works both ways. The key is to improve on someone elses ideas.

Some would disagree with me here, but the ITCH beat grid is a good example of this.
blackavenger 8:33 PM - 30 December, 2011
Quote:
Some would disagree with me here, but the ITCH beat grid is a good example of this.


Nope, as an ITCH user too, I completely agree with that statement. It's been a minute since I've owned Traktor Scratch, but from what I remember, FLAC wasn't perfect on their shizz either. Sometimes there was a delay when you would first put the needle on the record. If it's still that way, and you have found a way around that, then I suppose your argument for improving upon a competitor's ideas would be relevant and worth pursuing.

Looking forward to the day when Serato can compete/surpass in all areas, Traktor's functionality.
LosMintos 3:24 PM - 9 January, 2012
Quote:
do you guys have FLAC encoded audio inside FLAC containers or inside OGG containers.
FLAC container, only.

Quote:
Also, what tools do you tend to use to create the FLAC encoded audio, or what sites do you download from?
To encode I used to use flac.exe v1.2.1. Later I switched to dBPowerAmp for ripping CDs, not sure about the encoder therein, but it's flac v1.2.1 (perhaps the same as flac.exe). For vinyl rips I'm still using flac.exe. Recent foobar2000 versions require flac 1.2.0 (you should not worry about older versions).

When downloading it's either flac (usually generated with flac.exe) or wave (afterwards processed by flac.exe).

Quote:
I'm just wiring up all the tagging, which is using xiph styled comments.
Yes, and for me the vorbis comments are much more flexible and easy to understand than ID3 tagging scheme. ;-). (But I can imagine, that you got headache to implement waveforms/overviews and the like. However, you can embed everything into FLAC (cover images, cue sheets ...) so why not overviews, loops, cue points etc.?

Quote:
I'm spending my Christmas break doing this FLAC thing.
You are my hero (no joke)! But it's still a shame for Serato IMHO.
Serato
Glenn M 8:51 PM - 9 January, 2012
Quote:
so why not overviews, loops, cue points etc.?

Done. But it's in a horrible 64bit encode and so totally not human readable. We're working on a better way to represent Serato tags in a human readable way, but that's ages away.

Still have to do album art and verify that it all works on Windows (it did once upon a time).

Note: Don't expect this to happen in SSL 2.4. Try not to get too excited just yet.
serkan 10:09 PM - 9 January, 2012
All I'm hoping for is 2012 :)
blackavenger 1:11 AM - 10 January, 2012
Quote:
All I'm hoping for is 2012 :)

+1
studio17 9:23 AM - 10 January, 2012
Quote:
All I'm hoping for is 2012 :)
LosMintos 3:28 PM - 10 January, 2012
Quote:
Don't expect this to happen in SSL 2.4. Try not to get too excited just yet.
I'm looking forward and I very much appreciate your communication here, that makes your efforts transparent! At least, we know that someone is working on FLAC.
Shanghai Ultra 2:25 AM - 12 January, 2012
Great work Glenn. I'm using mediamonkey 4 to convert wavs into FLACs. Not sure what engine its using, but mediamonkey is a popular audioplayer especially for guys with huge digital music collections, it can use a plugin to use discogs.com to make tag info 100 accurate, awesome piece of software. So I imagine a lot of users are going down this route for making FLACs.
_Sigma_ 6:39 AM - 31 January, 2012
Man, I would love FLAC support in SSL! I must admit that I have considered switching to a different product solely because of FLAC support, but I never made the jump.

All of the music I've ripped myself from either vinyl or CD is in FLAC format (1.2.1 @ level 8 in FLAC containers). Apple Lossless is OK, but it's a bit of a pain to work with if you're running Windows and it forces you to install Quicktime to get the files recognised in Serato. I don't really want to switch from FLAC when my phone, MP3 player and all software based music players and editors on my PC either support it or can easily be made to support it, so this news is very encouraging!
Forayem 9:16 AM - 31 January, 2012
Well done Glen,

Keep pushing this idea, been wanting FLAC for so long!
Nikolai Weibull 4:27 PM - 3 February, 2012
Great news, Glenn! Thank you for taking your time to work on this!
dusso 12:26 PM - 8 February, 2012
Pushing up this topic too because I came here later.

I'm using linux commandline tool Abcde (a better cd encoder, lly.org ) to create most flac's. I also download from digital-tunes.net and bandcamp.com .
karacho_ 3:18 PM - 9 February, 2012
great news!

i encode cds with eac, not sure what engine they are using..
i dont rip vinyl, i guess audacity would be an option though ?
fmolina 1:41 AM - 15 February, 2012
traktor using flac, and the best (serato) no, it's a shame
SkyGroove 3:52 PM - 11 March, 2012
Thanks for communicating about this Glenn, it's much appreciated and eagerly anticipated.

- I use .flac, no other containers. version 1.2.1
- I rip CD to .flac using Exact Audio Copy
- I record vinyl in Audacity and save as .flac.
- I convert .flac/.alac formats with dBpoweramp Music Converter
- I edit flac tags in Mp3Tag (probably irrelevant but including it anyway)

Please let us know if there's any more info we can provide to help. I too hope we see could this in 2012.
AKIEM 8:43 AM - 19 March, 2012
nice
lx66 4:54 PM - 19 March, 2012
lol, dont bet your ass on that it will be this year... or this decade. Its obvious they dont care.
blackavenger 12:44 AM - 20 March, 2012
Quote:
lol, dont bet your ass on that it will be this year... or this decade. Its obvious they dont care.

Normally I would agree with you, but Glenn appears to be different amongst the fold....I take him at his word.......for the moment :)
Kelvin Yap 10:26 AM - 22 March, 2012
Would it be possible to maybe release a beta plugin sort of thing for Serato Scratch Live which allows FLAC support?

Anything is obviously better than nothing, and I'm sure we don't really need any of the metadata tag support yet (you guys can always clean that up and release that in newer versions of Serato), so long as Scratch Live can PLAY FLAC files!

We just need basic FLAC support like:
- Actually playing the FLAC file
- Can read simple Metadata like Album Artist, Track Title and Genre
- No need for artwork and all that stuff for now

Just a thought!
Emkay Tooz 4:09 PM - 29 March, 2012
I have so many flacs, organized to perfection, from my CDs, and thousands of my own ripped vinyls (corrected) and then some... The second Serato supports flac I buy the whole kit. Been waiting for this for years. Thanks.
asfjkl 6:28 AM - 14 April, 2012
Hello all. I've come to this page in search of seratos unsatisfactory approach to flac support...... hoping to see if there is any sceric or glimmer of insight as to when they will update their crap or make some sort of plug in (software or hardware) to start supporting flac.
I can't believe this hasn't been done already. It's an outrage that serato still doesn't support flac. FLAC is almost as popular these days as the mp3 format. I paid all this money for serato over the years and it won't even support flac in 2012? Give me a break. It's not about "ooo I wish serato would support flac" or "how good would it be if serato supported flac in the future" or this crap: "Personally with all of the option out there to get around FLAC I am a bit disappointed that they are spending time working on this issue vs working on more important issues"

I see morons like this VJ Justin Allen trying to defend them on many threads and and serkan being a smart ass at the start of this thread like the topic is some sort of joke. You're the joke you smug little prick

"VJ" Allen, I don't want to work around and convert all the files I have bought, I want to play music files on scratch live. It's vinyl emulation hardware and software, I don't think I should have to convert music files to other formats of music file to play. It's like me buying and loading cubase and it telling me to convert all my wav files to mp3 because it doesn't support wav. Then people like you telling me on the forum "well it supports video and pro tools doesnt" I couldn't give a hoot if SL supports video and traktor doesnt, I don't want to dj video I play vinyl. I've searched this topic and on a number of threads and there you are swaning around like you own shares in serato. Get off Rane's cock you fucking parrot. This quarterwit is obviously a paid shill. This site seems to be full of them.
Sorry, Shanghai Ultra, the explaination might be good anough for you but it's not good enough for me. Give me a break.
Glenn M: intentions aren't good enough. The flac format has been popular for years but now, in 2012, it is the norm. Just pull your finger out and do something about it. If traktor can support flac so can serato. This should have been done a long time ago, not 2013 or 2014. I hope 3/4 of your clients move to other companies. This is an act of careless bastardry and a kick in the teeth to the people that have bought and supported your product over the years.
I agree with lx66, they couldn't care less. It's been over three months since the spin doctor said the ball was rolling and years since the flac threads have been popping up on this forum. Congratulations on selling us out. I hope you go bankrupt the same way you have bankrupted the vinyl market
fmolina 3:39 PM - 14 April, 2012
Gentlemen, tired of broken promises (flac support), I use Serato, but I got tired of waiting, so, traktor 2.5 is just around the corner ... it's a shame, serano not understand your customers.
blackavenger 6:19 PM - 15 April, 2012
Quote:
it's a shame, serano not understand your customers

Yeah, they have lost touch!

What we need is Traktor functionality w' Serato library organization.....that would be perfect software!
blackavenger 6:24 PM - 15 April, 2012
Quote:
I hope you go bankrupt the same way you have bankrupted the vinyl market

That's not fair.

Vinyl was on it's way out regardless. if anything, Serato have tried to keep love for vinyl alive with "Serato Pressings". I am just as disappointed/frustrated as you, but I don't hate Serato, and certainly don't wish them any harm. Their (in)actions will either help or hurt them.....time will tell.
fmolina 12:03 AM - 16 April, 2012
all i need is support to flac
noisemonkey 11:50 AM - 17 April, 2012
Flac support please I've got loads of downloads in this format
Dj Piatro 9:11 PM - 30 May, 2012
I've find somewhere a flac request from 2004 I think, so maybe flac support will never came. :(
DJMark 11:23 PM - 31 May, 2012
They're probably too busy implementing auto-sync.

/snark
blackavenger 5:29 AM - 1 June, 2012
So, Glenn, can you give us an update of your endeavor regarding FLAC??
ronibiggs 9:39 PM - 1 June, 2012
Yeah, What he said! ...
fmolina 12:36 AM - 2 July, 2012
because traktor, virtual dj and many can support flac and you do not, Serato lacking qualified engineers?
LosMintos 10:33 PM - 4 August, 2012
Quote:
Don't expect this to happen in SSL 2.4. Try not to get too excited just yet.

Well, I'm not excited any more .... However, we have now 2.4.2. Could you give an update? Are there any plans for 2.5? Is there some progress in supporting FLAC?
VJ Justin Allen 8:23 PM - 5 August, 2012
Still nothing announced.
caine b 12:38 AM - 9 August, 2012
Give us FLAC FFS...
Mr. Frost 9:16 PM - 13 August, 2012
When is 2.4.3 being released? I think we may be pleasantly surprised.
Serato
Glenn M 11:06 PM - 26 August, 2012
FLAC is now available in the latest public betas.

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.
blackavenger 12:28 AM - 27 August, 2012
THANK YOU!!
caine b 9:17 PM - 27 August, 2012
woooo hoooo get in. Will wait for the beta's to pass and hopefully it will be included in the coming releases.
Sukhoi 10:40 AM - 13 January, 2013
Serato DJ Supporting FLAC?
blackavenger 2:16 PM - 13 January, 2013
Most likely.....now what we need is Album Art support for FLAC.
LOL, I wonder how long it will take for them to implement that.
Serato, Forum Moderator
Logan D 8:51 AM - 17 January, 2013
Quote:
Serato DJ Supporting FLAC?

Yup Serato DJ supports FLAC too. However there is a bug that means you can't import FLAC files from Finder/Window you have to import it from the Serato DJ files panel. This is fixed in the next release :)
alec.tron 12:25 PM - 25 November, 2016
Is Glenn M still around at Serato HQ btw ?
I can't message him (i.e. his profile does jnot have a 'send message' button), so I assume not ?

Cheers.
c.
Serato, Forum Moderator
Michael R 9:59 PM - 27 November, 2016
No, he left about 3 or 4 years ago.
Name already taken 6:37 PM - 15 November, 2018
Hi, I started another thread related to issues with Flac files. Please check it out. Any constructive input you can give would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

(hopefully someday serato Flac will work properly, but until then maybe we can combine our knowledge to best work around these issues)

Link to thread - serato.com