FLAC support in iOS 11 - FINALLY

This will be a major improvement in convenience for those of us who own both Win and Mac machines.

 

Yeah, my goal would be to move off of LMS, completely. I'm getting closer... I'm running Plex in parallel to LMS, which seems more robust, and gives me streaming access to my local songs, when I'm away from home.

 

I ripped all of my music to ALAC because I was heavily imbedded in Apple-land at the time. Now this is no longer true, and nothing Apple is involved in anything I do with music anymore, but I don't see any reason to convert ALAC to FLAC because I've yet to encounter anything that treats them differently. Like FLAC its a free codec, so its no skin off anybody's back to implement them side by side.

 

There's something to be said about efficiency. Disk space is cheap, but flash based storage is at a premium and definitely something that needs to be taken into consideration if portable use is intended. I don't think the 100gb figure is at all unattainable. Probably more than that. Even 100gb of wasted disk space, cheap as it is, is nothing to sneeze at.


FLAC has the benefit of being better safeguarded against data corruption as well.

 

Could you please explain this comment and cite sources? This is the first I've heard of this, and I'm interested.

 

Sorry, I have no sources for this I can link to, just my own knowledge of this. A corrupt ALAC will decode anyway without telling you, a FLAC (which stores checksums based on the audio data) will fail to decide and throw an error message. It's not impossible to check an ALAC encoded file for corruption but it is much more difficult.

 

I agree. The cloud storage is wonderful to back up items, not main drive for larger files. I actually have my 30,000 + tracks backed up to the cloud 98% lossless. Plus all my non raw photo files ( I'm a pro photographer). Everything thru Crashplan. Took almost a year to get everything up. Backs up every night plus I use Time Machine.

 

I wonder if this portends the possibility of FLAC support in MacOs? I would love to use FLAC in iTunes...

 

According to this thread on Mac Rumors, High Sierra will have "Native FLAC format support in Quicklook and QuickTime".

Since, iTunes uses QuickTime, I wonder if that means iTunes will be able to play FLAC. Sure wish someone here had a developer copy of High Sierra..

macOS 10.13 All The Little Things!

 

I'm not an Apple or iTunes user, but this is an important first step. Perhaps Apple is starting to realize that FLAC is the worldwide standard for lossless music.

 

Hopefully Apple will eventually sell lossless music, too, and give users the choice of resolution, unlike they do now. The iTunes store, to my knowledge, doesn't even tell you what resolution your lossy content is before you pay for it.

 

Always 256 aac.

 

If iTunes started selling lossless, i'd be their biggest fan!

 

I thought you could already do this with the file transfer function and a flac player app like VLC or Onkyo. Maybe apple is acknowledging it finally.

 

That would be me. I'd use it.

 

You could always use a 3rd party app (and I do) but it's not quite the solution that we really needed. It's more a workaround and an inconvenience than anything.

The difference is that the files are sandboxed in that particular app. They're not a part of your music library, for all that entails. They aren't accessible by any other apps or services. And they're not played natively by the iOS media player but rather by the app that is programmed to do so.


So FLAC support imo is a pretty big deal.

Every WWDC when they show the slide that lists the changes too small to mention, I always zoom in and look it over hoping to see some small mention of FLAC support. Even this year I didn't see anything like that, but oftentimes those changes are more exciting than the ones they actually talk about onstage.

 

I'd love to see native support for playing higher res ALAC files. That would impact my life much more meaningfully.

 

Ok thanks, and I am not trying to quibble with you, but just reconcile this a bit, so I am reading that iOS Music Player will still not play the flac files, you would still need a third party app? I guess I am not seeing where the support is. Or is this just too early to define the support at this point and we are hoping it gets added to iOS Music Player, and that combined with desktop iTunes flac capability and syncing gets us the whole enchilada.

 

You can store the files directly in the new "Files" app, and play them back within said app. No more 3rd party apps required. Ideally, iTunes supporting coming in the Fall.

Everything in your Files app can also be stored via iCloud, and (presumably?) access via all your Apple devices. Which is much better than just dumping them in a proprietary app.

 

Ok thanks, I was not aware of this Files app.

 

That's right, I think you've got the big picture. A native decoder in the OS is the first step. Once there's a way to actually sync them to the music library and not just play them sandboxed in the "Files" app, then all will be good in the world

 

iOS 11 lets you play FLAC audio files straight from your iPad and iPhone

Yesterday, Apple announced the latest reiteration of its mobile operating system and while regular consumers will have to wait until autumn to try out the new iOS 11 on their iPhone and iPad devices, developers are already taking advantage of their early access to the beta version.

Redditors who have already installed the developer beta are reporting that Apple has purportedly included full playback support for FLAC audio files in iOS 11. This means users now have the option to blast high-quality music files straight from their iPads and iPhones.

The functionality was first spotted on an iPhone 6S Plus running iOS 11 Beta 1 and is reportedly available as part of the newly announced file-management app, Files.

Up until now, Apple had deliberately opted to ignore offering playback support for FLAC files in both iTunes and iOS – though there are numerous third-party apps to do the trick. But it appears things are finally about to change.

In addition to support for FLAC, Apple is introducing a ton of new features that could kickstart the transformation of iOS from simply a mobile operating system to a legitimate hybrid platform with desktop functionalities.

After all, one of the main reasons Apple is launching Files is to give iPad owners more flexibility to use their tablets as improvised laptop stand-ins.

Edit: I should have said iOS 11, not iTunes 11!! Sorry!

 

UNBELIEAVLE

 

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FLAC support in iOS 11 - FINALLY