I came across a problem where my Sansa Fuze would skip certain FLAC files, showing them on the screen only very briefly and then going straight to the next file. However, there were also other flac files which were played back normally. I searched the forums for information but didn’t find much; but at least I saw that there were other people who had the same or similar problem. Then I noticed what I now think is the culprit - all the skipped flacs had a sampling rate of 48000 Hz, whereas all the working ones were at 44100 Hz. Hence I concluded that Fuze probably doesn’t have support for 48000 Hz flacs. If this is the case, would it be possible to include it in one of the next firmware updates? I suspect that many of the flac related problems in other people’s posts I’ve read might have occured due to this…
Message Edited by TheYellowJester on 05-01-2009 03:37 PM
With that sample rate they are very likely also 24 bit. The Fuze can only play 16 bit Flac files. I believe the DAC in it is actually 18 bit, but I don’t know where one would get any music stored that way.
Since it’s a limitation of the DAC I doubt there is anything they can do with the firmware to work around it.
I just made a quick test with a single 16bit/48000Hz flac file. And it plays nicely on my Fuze!
Yep, those will work. It’s the 24 bit Flac files that the Fuze can not play (because the DAC in it does not support 24 bits).
I’m not an expert on audio processing but couldn’t it be easily done by software - I mean reducing the sample size (dynamic range) from 24 to 16 bit and sending the data to the DAC afterwards? Sorry, it is somewhat off topic …
That would depend how much decoding is being done with software and how much is done directly in the hardware. I don’t know just how the Fuze handles Flac, but it may not have enough processor horsepower to handle doing all of that along with other things.
I just made a quick test with a single 16bit/48000Hz flac file. And it plays nicely on my Fuze! Note that my file doesn’t have any tags.
Would be nice if you could strip the tags off one of your problematic flac files (16bit?) and try to play that.
Interesting…
Yes, my files are 16bit (unless VLC, MediaCoder and several other programs are wrong), and they shouldn’t have any tags either, as I have exported them from Audacity (1.3.6 beta, running on Windows Vista) without any tags set.
Message Edited by TheYellowJester on 04-30-2009 06:59 AM
I just made a quick test with a single 16bit/48000Hz flac file. And it plays nicely on my Fuze! Note that my file doesn’t have any tags.
Would be nice if you could strip the tags off one of your problematic flac files (16bit?) and try to play that.
Interesting…
Yes, my files are 16bit (unless VLC, MediaCoder and several other programs are wrong), and they shouldn’t have any tags either, as I have exported them from Audacity (1.3.6 beta, running on Windows Vista) without any tags set.
Message Edited by TheYellowJester on 04-30-2009 06:59 AM
That’s strange. I’ll try to do a similar test export from Audacity (mine is 1.3.5 on Debian Linux) soon to see what happens …
Well, I did it and the exported 16bit/48000Hz Flac file plays without problem. I don’t think there is an issue with Audacity here.
The only thing I could suggest is the usual procedure: Make sure you have the latest firmware, have the drive formatted (after backing up your files), put some of your Flac files back on the Fuze (do it in MSC connection mode) and cross your fingers …
I bought the Sansa about a week ago, and then downloaded the latest firmware, and I have put all the files on the Fuze in MSC mode, so this really shouldn’t be necessary, but it’s true there’s not much else to do… I’ll probably try to check the affected FLAC files even more thoroughly (somehow?) and experiment with exporting from Audacity. If I find anything, I’ll post it back here.
OK, I have just conducted a series of tests and I have come to a final conclusion, and it is indeed puzzling: it is mono flacs that Sansa cannot play. I have imported a mono file into Audacity and exported it once as a mono flac and once as a stereo flac (with the single track doubled), and only the stereo version worked. I did the same thing with a stereo file -> same result. I also checked that all of the flacs which were not working were in fact mono. It would be great if anyone else could confirm this, and then I think it’s definitely something worth submitting as a bug report (if there is such a function somewhere).
EDIT: Also do you think I should edit the topic title to reflect this?
Message Edited by TheYellowJester on 05-01-2009 03:15 PM
OK, I have just conducted a series of tests and I have come to a final conclusion, and it is indeed puzzling: it is mono flacs that Sansa cannot play. I have imported a mono file into Audacity and exported it once as a mono flac and once as a stereo flac (with the single track doubled), and only the stereo version worked. I did the same thing with a stereo file -> same result. I also checked that all of the flacs which were not working were in fact mono. It would be great if anyone else could confirm this, and then I think it’s definitely something worth submitting as a bug report (if there is such a function somewhere).
EDIT: Also do you think I should edit the topic title to reflect this?
Message Edited by TheYellowJester on 05-01-2009 03:15 PM
Yeah edit the title… I have never heard of this… It si strange… and the best place for a bug report id in the firmware theread.
OK, I have just conducted a series of tests and I have come to a final conclusion, and it is indeed puzzling: it is mono flacs that Sansa cannot play. I have imported a mono file into Audacity and exported it once as a mono flac and once as a stereo flac (with the single track doubled), and only the stereo version worked. I did the same thing with a stereo file -> same result. I also checked that all of the flacs which were not working were in fact mono. It would be great if anyone else could confirm this, and then I think it’s definitely something worth submitting as a bug report (if there is such a function somewhere).
EDIT: Also do you think I should edit the topic title to reflect this?
Message Edited by TheYellowJester on 05-01-2009 03:15 PM
Good catch! And I can confirm your findings. Even worse - but not surprising - neither 48000Hz nor 44100Hz mono Flac files won’t play. I checked both of them. Therefore the right topic should be something like: “Sansa Fuze skips mono flac files.”
Thanks for confirming the problem. Indeed, it seems that neither bit depth or any other parameter has anything to do with the problem, it’s just that the files are mono and flac. I only hope that someone from the Sansa team will notice it either here or in the firmware thread…
(By the way, I’ve already changed the topic name, it just doesn’t change automatically in the individual posts’ headings.)
