Windows 10: Windows 10: 9901 has native FLAC support

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WMP 12 in Windows 10 won't convert .flac when syncing to Windows Phone Lumia 1520

Thank you Marek. My point is that WMP has several formats it recognises and uses. With Windows 10, this now includes officially .flac so .flac is supported by WMP natively. Good step.

In the past, WMP converted all the formats it read for sync with Windows Phone. For example, lossless .wma is converted during the sync process to a lossy format which is usable on the Windows Phone connected to the PC. This is desired behaviour as it reduces
the size of the music file to fit on the limited space on the phone. It does the same if you use a USB stick as the sync device (and have set the WMP Device options accordingly).

However it does not convert the now officially supported .flac in the same way. Why not? it should.

I know that Windows Phone does not support .flac natively (unless you install .flac player). Which is why WMP should convert it.

Under Win 10, the natively supported format of lossless .wma gets converted by WMP while syncing to Windows Phone into a format usable by the native player on Windows Phone. This is good.

Under Win 10, the natively supported format of .flac does NOT get converted by WMP while syncing to Windows Phone into a format usable by the native player on Windows Phone. Why not? This is not good.

I don't want to have two windows music systems on my PC and on my phone - I just want Windows 10, Windows Media Player and Windows Phone to support the same file types in the same way. Why would Microsoft want me to install non-Microsoft apps?

 

FLAC & Media Player in Windows 10

Here is what I have learned so far. Windows 10 implementation of FLAC is flawed and needs to be fixed. Windows 10 does not support all of the FLAC format tags. Everyone who runs across this issue needs to report this to Microsoft through the feedback
tool. Then they may fix it.

When Windows failed to recognise the tags, I went the old way for getting FLAC to work in Windows. In Windows 7 I used a program called WMP Tag Plus. They know of the issue and give instructions on how to fix this problem listed below.... You have to actually
disable Native FLAC support and install the WMP Tag Plus to correct the problem. The instructions seem complicated but they worked fine for me.

You can download this add-in for Windows Media Player at this link. Any good codec pack will also work if it has FLAC support.

BM-productions

Is WMP Tag Plus compatible with my system?

WMP Tag Plus supports Windows Media Player 12 on Windows 7, Windows 8/8.1, and Windows 10.

The plug-in should also still work fine with Windows Media Player 11 on Windows Vista, but that combination isn't officially supported anymore.

Why am I experiencing issues with FLAC tags on Windows 10?
Microsoft has added native FLAC support in Windows 10. This means that, in a default Windows 10 installation, WMP Tag Plus isn't used anymore by Windows Media Player for FLAC tags.

Unfortunately, Microsoft's native FLAC support has been proven to still contain some issues. For example, it doesn't recognize certain tags that are recognized by WMP Tag Plus and most other FLAC implementations. The first thing you should do when you come
across such an issue, is report it via the Windows 10 feedback tool. That's the best way to urge Microsoft to fix their FLAC support.

Because of the issues with the native FLAC support, you can optionally force the use of WMP Tag Plus for FLAC on Windows 10, thereby giving you the same FLAC support as in earlier Windows versions. For this, you will need to disable the native FLAC support.
See the next question for instructions on how to do this.

How do I disable Microsoft's native FLAC tag support in Windows 10?
First of all, make sure that you have the latest available version of WMP Tag Plus. Only versions 2.6 and newer support Windows 10.

Removing existing FLAC songs from the library
Warning: if you skip this step, there's a high risk that you will lose some of the tags in your FLAC files!

• In Windows Media Player's library, select Music on the left, and type
  type:flac in the Search field.
• Select a single song, then press Ctrl+A to select all songs.
• Right-click the selection and select Delete. Choose Delete from library only, then click
  OK.
• Close Windows Media Player.

Disabling the native FLAC tag support
This will not only disable the native FLAC tag support in Windows Media Player, but also in Windows Explorer. It's not possible to disable the support for Windows Media Player and leave it enabled for Explorer at the same time. However, if you're experiencing
issues with FLAC tags in Windows Media Player, then you will very likely see the same issues in Explorer, so there's not much point in leaving it enabled in the latter anyway.

• Create a system restore point, just in case things get messed up.
• Launch the Registry Editor: press Win+R, type regedit, and press
  Enter.
• Navigate to the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\PropertySystem\PropertyHandlers\.flac.
  
• Select the (Default) value, press Del, and click
  Yes to confirm.
• 64-bit Windows only: repeat the previous step for the registry key
  KEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\PropertySystem\PropertyHandlers\.flac (note the
  Wow6432Node component).
• Navigate to the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\PropertySystem\SystemPropertyHandlers.
  
• Right-click the SystemPropertyHandlers key in the tree, select
  Permissions, and click Advanced.
• Click the Change link next to Owner, type Administrators as the object name, and click
  OK.
• In the existing Permission entries, select the Allow entry for
  Administrators and click Edit.
• Tick the Full Control box, then click OK three times so that you're back in the main Registry Editor window.
  
• Select the .flac value, press Del, and click
  Yes to confirm.
• 64-bit Windows only: repeat steps 7-11 for the registry key
  HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\PropertySystem\SystemPropertyHandlers (note the
  Wow6432Node component).
• Close the Registry Editor, and restart Windows for the changes to take effect.
  

Adding FLAC songs back to the library

• Launch Windows Media Player and make sure that WMP Tag Plus is ticked in the
  Tools – Plug-ins menu, meaning that the plug-in is active (press
  Ctrl+M if you don't see the Tools menu).
• Make sure that the native FLAC tag support was successfully disabled. To do this, go to WMP Tag Plus settings (Tools –
  Options – Plug-ins – select Background – select
  WMP Tag Plus – Properties). In the list of supported file extensions, the
  Native support column should show No for FLAC. Finally, close the WMP Tag Plus settings dialog again.
  
• To re-add the FLAC songs that were previously removed, go to Tools –
  Advanced, select Restore deleted library items, and click
  Yes.

Undoing your changes
If you want to enable the native FLAC tag support again, you can undo these changes by downloading and opening one of the following .zip files. Then unzip and open the included .reg file to import it into the registry:

• 32-bit Windows:
  native_flac_prophandler_x86.zip
• 64-bit Windows:
  native_flac_prophandler_x64.zip

After the .reg file has been successfully imported, remember to restart Windows for the changes to take effect.

 

Yes, working!





mkv and flac support, *Thumbs

 

I'm never really happy when something messes with files for no other reason than to save space when space is not an issue,
Cheers.

 

Hi there

Flac is fine -- it's LOSSLESS compression and a FREE non proprietary codec -- Space is often an issue say on things like USB drives and micro SDHC cards -- I'd prefer a high quality lossless codec any time over any sort of proprietary stuff.

WAV is fine too but even if you have a decent amount of space what's wrong with FLAC - you can get much more music.

MKV is just a container so I'm not sure why there ever was a problem with it - If VLC (which is FREE) can play it then windows should too.

However Windows Media is a bit late to the party now so I can't see that this announcement will make any significant difference - except possibly XBOX users who can play MKV files already by various means.

Cheers
jimbo

 

With most compression stuff there's always the possibility of corruption is the only issue I can see,
For myself space is not an issue I prefer to leave files in a original state on what ever device
Cheers.

 

Good taste in music sir!!

 

Well, thank you sir. I've got the DVD as well, which is awesome! Quality entertainment, a pleasure to watch.

 

Hi there

Lossless compression is exactly that LOSSLESS - and the FLAC algorithms have been around long enough now to know that there is utterly no problem with them.

Saying you *might* get corruption using the algorithm is like saying you would rather calculate a load of numbers manually rather than use a spreadsheet / calculator as you are less likely to get an error !!!. The only sort of data corruption you'd get with FLAC is if your HDD starts getting hardware errors --this could just as easily happen to things like WAV files too.

By all means choose formats you are happy with but the reasoning you present here is dubious to say the least.

In the event of truly unlimited storage then there isn't a problem using no compression at all - but if you want to carry high quality music between two places and you only have a mobile phone with a micro sdHC card then I'm quite happy to stick the files as FLAC on the device. Portable storage isn't usually unlimited and I HATE Cloud services.

Now for those who say you can't listen to very high quality audio on a mobile because the quality of the DAC's isn't that great -- true but what I do is then copy the music from the phone to a device at the remote location and THEN play it. I can convert to WAV if need be but decent pre-amps can handle FLAC anyway. So I'm basically just using the phones micro SDHC card as a storage device which can hold about DOUBLE the quantity of music than it would do if using WAV. I don't bother with compressed mp3 formats at all - those are both compressed and LOSSY.

Cheers
jimbo

 

mp3-mp4 is fine to me and sounds great where ever they are played *Smile
But then again I'm not listening to opera either *Wink
Cheers.

 

Agree.. and even if I did I doubt I could tell the difference in the sound reproduction.

 

Hi there

without turning this into a debate about Opera vs other music you need 4 components to get the best out of ANY music

1) DECENT SOURCE - if that's poor then everything else goes for nothing.

2) DECENT DAC(S) if your source is digital -- if the DAC (digital to analog converter_ is poor again your music will sound rubbish.
Most DAC's on cheap consumer grade equipment - including quite expensive mobile phones aren't very good. Computer sound cards are geared more to special effects for movies / DVD's rather than high / studio quality audio.

3) Decent speakers / headphones. Those cheap white bud phones (where most people can hear more music than the wearer usually) are excruciatingly horrible -- . Most computer speakers also are just boom boxes really just fit for the tip --they are optimised for game sounds and some movie effects -- certainly not high quality audio.

4) Of course you need to have a decent set of Ears too !!!!.

Mp3 at lowish compression just has too many artifacts that any sort of sound will produce. Even at extreme 320 kbs these are noticeable on a lot of music.

For movies you can get away with it but not for high quality music (of any type)..

Cheers
jimbo

 

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