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Topic: Flac Decode CPU requriemets by preset ? (Read 820 times) previous topic - next topic
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Flac Decode CPU requriemets by preset ?

I'm just curious it so how much does the FLAC preset change the CPU decoding standard?

Right now im just doing -8 since I want smallish possible files and dont care about encoding requirments. but im wondering if the tine gains between the presets would cause big increase in decoding demands. i fond at list once i think but have not been able to re-find it

I'm also curious to the effect from Flacout which definitely uses a lot more CPU for encoding, but again wondering if the gains to decoding would be negligible.

I'm under the vague idea that generally lossless encoding  levels doesnt increase much on the decoding stage but I have no idea why I have that idea stuck in my head

Bonus curiosity.
I went with flac since it seem very supported and opensource so not to go away any time soon.
Monkey audio and optimfrog seems to be more dangerous to use from archiving, but I could be wrong.
Sven Bent - Denmark

Re: Flac Decode CPU requriemets by preset ?

Reply #1 –
Quote from: sven_Bent on
I'm just curious it so how much does the FLAC preset change the CPU decoding standard?
Some percents, but very little compared to switching to other codecs: http://audiograaf.nl/downloads.html .

Quote from: sven_Bent on
I'm also curious to the effect from Flacout which definitely uses a lot more CPU for encoding, but again wondering if the gains to decoding would be negligible.

FLAC will not exceed a certain decoding complexity. If you allow "non-subset" streams - and Flacout does by default - you can get to slower decode than you can see in that study, but it will still be very fast. Encoding time does not translate to decoding time for FLAC.


Quote from: sven_Bent on
I'm under the vague idea that generally lossless encoding  levels doesnt increase much on the decoding stage but I have no idea why I have that idea stuck in my head
It is by and large true with FLAC, but false with e.g. Monkey's.

FLAC can go up in complexity, but if you use the "normal" tweaks to get FLAC compressed better, it will just try more different models. E.g. with the reference flac.exe, then flac -8 and flac -8pe -A "subdivide_tukey(<big number>)" will just try a ton of different tweaks on predictors up to order 12, and then pick which one happens to be the best. It will not "pack heavier".

Monkey's on the other hand, will pull out a heavier algorithm and then it has to unpack it with the same complexity.
WavPack started out with that logic, but has for long also been able to do processing that only costs encoding time, not decoding time (the -x1 to -x6).


Quote from: sven_Bent on
Bonus curiosity.
I went with flac since it seem very supported and opensource so not to go away any time soon.
I'd say that is a good choice.

Quote from: sven_Bent on
Monkey audio and optimfrog seems to be more dangerous to use from archiving, but I could be wrong.

OptimFROG is closed source, and has changed algorithm every now and then to find better compression.
Monkey's is nowadays free and open source. Monkey's has also kept a stable bitstream for years and years, assuming you compress CDDA. But for multi-channel and float, you won't get ffmpeg to decode it, for example.
WavPack has been FOSS for a while as well.

Re: Flac Decode CPU requriemets by preset ?

Reply #2 –
Thank you so much for the info. I just peaked at wavepack and while it seems to do slightly better than flac in compressed size the decoding is much worse.
Not that it is important  in my current scenario  just trying to find an overall best way to do my archiving.

Flac for lossles backup and listen on computer.
and encode to mp3/aac when needed for portable use

The info was helpful . thank you
Sven Bent - Denmark

Re: Flac Decode CPU requriemets by preset ?

Reply #3 –
wavpack major benefit is bigger number of channels + hybrid + float encoding support.