FLAC to mp3

[chunky70]

I have 46628 FLAC files that i would like to compress to mp3.What is the most efficient and quickest way of doing this ie which software? Thanks in advance.

 

[The_Lhc]

What did you rip the FLAC files with in the first place?

 

[chunky70]

I used J River Media Center. I also have dBpoweramp which has a batch convert feature,but when i tried to convert the whole lot it was going to take 26 days to convert! Is there anything else available that will do the job quicker?

 

[The_Lhc]

That number of files is going to take a while (if it takes one minute per track it's 32 days...), where are you storing the files to, if they're currently on a network share and you're saving them back to a network share it's going to slow things down. If you can copy a batch at a time to a local disk and then convert them that will speed things up a bit.

I've just converted 10 files from FLAC to mp3 on this laptop (Core i3), on local disk but running on battery power, that took 91 seconds and that's doing 4 tracks in parallel (multi-core), at that rate it would take me about 5 days to do that lot, so you're not going to get it done in half an hour... Faster processor you could bring it down a bit but there are limits.

 

[chunky70]

Thanks lhc for your quick response. I'm saving to an external hd,i guess whatever i use it will take some time. I will just have to convert in smaller batches!

 

[davejberry]

Just for info, I have just done 8500 tracks in 5 hours 45 mins, on a dual core intel 2.1 Ghz. I used a purchased copy of dBpoweramp R14 and set it to high priority mode. The max transcode speed on that processor got to 100x, an average track of 4 minutes was done in 2.5 seconds on each processor core. I assume that a faster processor would take less time unless there is a limit set within the software.

 

[margetti]

Thanks lhc for your quick response. I'm saving to an external hd,i guess whatever i use it will take some time. I will just have to convert in smaller batches!

If your external hd is attached using USB (2.0) then that is probably your main limiting factor - the data transfer rate is much less than that of an internal hdd... USB 2.0 is feeling pretty slow these days with the amount of data we work with these days!

 

[chunky70]

Thanks for the clarification. It might be worth my while fitting a 2tb hd internally,do you think? Yes it is usb 2 and yes it does seem slow. I run a dual core 3.8 pc so it shoudn't be that slow. It is a lot of files i do admit, that amount in flac is 1.5tb!

 

[Fisherking 145]

I used dBpoweramp to batch convert about 170gb of FLAC to mp3. When it started converting it said it would take about 27 hours, but it had the job done in about 14 hours IIRC. That was via USB on a dual core processor. Just checked my FLAC folder, it's currently at 255gb, and says it has nearly 11,000 files. There's no way round this, it's gonna take a LOOOONG time I'm afraid.

 

[d4v3pum4]

I use Foobar2000 to convert to mp3 after ripping to FLAC using EAC. I don't know if it is fast in comparison to other software but it works well and is free. It will take you a long time! I would split it up over a few nights.

 

[margetti]

Thanks for the clarification. It might be worth my while fitting a 2tb hd internally,do you think? Yes it is usb 2 and yes it does seem slow. I run a dual core 3.8 pc so it shoudn't be that slow. It is a lot of files i do admit, that amount in flac is 1.5tb!

Technically speaking, yes. And moving forward, I would have thought it would be the way to go. But there are so many variables involved that it is not all as straight forward as that.

And I'm thinking that you'll be needing to move those files over to the new internal drive, which in itself is going to take some time. So by the time you've found a good 2Tb drive, installed it, got it up and running, and then copied that 1.5Tb of data over, and THEN started converting, I do wonder how much time will have been saved.

Best bet would be to do a bit of testing - pick an album or two, and time how long it takes to convert with your current setup (ie using the external drive). Then copy the same album(s) over to your current internal hdd - time this, repeat the conversion, and time that as well. That should give you some guidance on what you will achieve by moving everything over to a new internal hdd. (Note this will only be useful if the specs of the new internal drive meet that of your existing internal drive - particularly spindle speed and cache memory).

Hope that helps rather than confuse matters!

 

[chunky70]

Oh i can't be bothered with this conversion lark! Does anyone know a decent portable player that supports flac? You're detailed response was very helpful Margetti,it's just made me think why bother just get a new player!

 

[smuggs]

i may be wrong but i read someone saying that his htc phone can play flac back. but he only had4 gb and he picks a few albums every 3 days.

 

[The_Lhc]

i may be wrong but i read someone saying that his htc phone can play flac back. but he only had4 gb and he picks a few albums every 3 days.

HTC phones don't play flac natively but you can get media players that will play them on an HTC phone, such as Poweramp (no relation), which I use.

 

[Anonymous]

Dbpoweramp on my desktop (quad-core 4.3Ghz) says it will take 18hours to convert 43,000 flacs to mp3 from my NAS to internal HD.

Its all dependant on processor speed.

 

[chunky70]

Yes you are right techmad. A dual core processor is a bit weedy these days, that's why i am now looking at flac capable players.

 

[Anonymous]

Storing lossless music on a portable is a pain. I use my htc Desire with a 32GB microSD but even then u cant store that many tracks. Of course u could carry several memory cards and swap them over depending what u want to listen to - but thats a pain as well.

I use a program called AudioGalaxy (free) that enables me to stream my entire collection where-ever I go (wifi - or OTA (unlimited data allowance needed for OTA!! )).

If u want more storage maybe a cowan of some sort. The largest storage I've seen is an Archos 5 which can u get with up to 500GB storage.

 

[Anonymous]

Don't forget , playing FLAC on any device is a real battery killer, not to mention the storage issues. And it's unlikely you'll hear the difference on any portable device. I personally rip to 190 VBR for portable use, and have dbPoweramp setup to rip to both FLAC and MP3 when I get a new CD.

 

[chunky70]

When you say battery killer how long are we talking about with a full charge.