#210: bit depth loss with 'lossless' encoding! --------------------------+----------------------- Reporter: Atrocia | Type: defect Status: new | Priority: critical Component: undetermined | Version: git Keywords: | Blocked By: Blocking: | Reproduced: 0 Analyzed: 0 | --------------------------+----------------------- I have 48 KHz / 24 bit audio files created by the Zoom H1 audio recorder; e.g.: $ mediainfo sample.WAV General Complete name : sample.WAV Format : Wave File size : 2.75 MiB Duration : 10s 0ms Overall bit rate : 2 304 Kbps Audio ID : 0 Format : PCM Format settings, Endianness : Little Codec ID : 1 Codec ID/Hint : Microsoft Duration : 10s 0ms Bit rate : 2 304 Kbps Channel(s) : 2 channels Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz Bit depth : 24 bits Stream size : 2.75 MiB (100%) When I convert them to flac format, they become 16 bit: $ ffmpeg -i sample.WAV sample.flac ... $ mediainfo sample.flac General Complete name : sample.flac Format : FLAC Format/Info : Free Lossless Audio Codec File size : 695 KiB Duration : 10s 0ms Overall bit rate : 569 Kbps Writing application : Lavf53.0.3 Audio Format : FLAC Format/Info : Free Lossless Audio Codec Duration : 10s 0ms Bit rate mode : Variable Bit rate : 563 Kbps Channel(s) : 2 channels Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz Bit depth : 16 bits Stream size : 687 KiB (99%) Writing library : Lavf53.0.3 ffmpeg (git-N-29954-gfc19379) throws this warning - I don't know if it's relevant: Incompatible sample format 's32' for codec 'flac', auto-selecting format 's16' The 'flac' tool, from the flac project, handles these files correctly: $ flac sample.WAV ... $ mediainfo sample.flac General Complete name : sample.flac Format : FLAC Format/Info : Free Lossless Audio Codec File size : 1.59 MiB Duration : 10s 0ms Overall bit rate : 1 336 Kbps Audio Format : FLAC Format/Info : Free Lossless Audio Codec Duration : 10s 0ms Bit rate mode : Variable Bit rate : 1 329 Kbps Channel(s) : 2 channels Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz Bit depth : 24 bits Stream size : 1.58 MiB (100%) Writing library : libFLAC 1.2.1 (UTC 2007-09-17) flac gives this warning - no idea if this is related to the one ffmpeg gives: sample.WAV: WARNING: legacy WAVE file has format type 1 but bits-per- sample=24 -- Ticket URL: <https://ffmpeg.org/trac/ffmpeg/ticket/210> FFmpeg <http://ffmpeg.org> FFmpeg issue tracker