Unwanted Auto-Conversion

[puddingtown]

I've been having a problem with Media Monkey 5 auto-converting some m4a files down to lower bitrate mp3s. It seemed to start when I wanted to remove a file from a playlist, but the client on my phone (Pixel 7) couldn't delete the file. So I went to the settings and granted access to some directories that it asked me to. Then it was able to delete, but since that time I've noticed it started converting files as well.

I've tried going into the server settings on desktop and disabling all auto-conversion options under the 'media sharing' tab, and it says m4a is a supported format, but it's still converting files. I don't think it's converting every m4a file, though, because when I synced metadata recently it converted more files even though I hadn't modified my playlists at all.

Any guidance would be appreciated.

[Lowlander]

Is this when playing via UPnP or when Syncing?

[puddingtown]

Is this when playing via UPnP or when Syncing?

When syncing. I saw on your link there are settings for individual device profiles which I overlooked, and after disabling auto-conversion there, it seems to be fixed. Thank you very much.

[philw]

I encountered the same issue playing FLAC to a 24 bit player... well I'm getting entries in the cache directory, and as I don't want MM to muck around with these files at all, that's worrying. Even if it's converting lossless good to lossless good, I don't need that.

1. I tried looking in the settings and I disabled (unchecked) all the "incompatible media" rules there, but this is 100% compatible, so those shouldn't be why it's caching. In any case that had zero effect
2. Then I deleted all the default conversions: if it has no rules, it can't possibly do anything, right? Except that had zero effect despite restarts etc.

I can't really tell if it's transcoding on me or not. I get one cached FLAC file (plus a "hsh" file) for each played track. They are always smaller than the source FLAC by similar amounts, for example 95G causes a cache entry of 85G. Can I disable that completely, or is it doing something useful?

[Lowlander]

Are you saying that the file on the device doesn't match the file on your PC?

[philw]

Are you saying that the file on the device doesn't match the file on your PC?

Not quite - the file in the cache is a different size.

The player is a Linn and is certainly happy with the biggest meanest bit-count ever invented - no one needs to transcode for it.

... so I'm wondering if anyone knows why these big files are being cached. They're stripped of meta data (album, artist etc), but the key thing is that the source is (say) 2800kbs and the transcoded cached file is 2546kbps, so assuming the cache is what's being sent to the player... someone's nicked some of my bits! So I'm kind of wondering where they went, what with no transcoding being done...?

(It's not yet been established if I can double-blind hear the difference: that's not the point, I'm curious as to what MM is doing eating my bits, when I asked it not to.)

[Lowlander]

The question was about the file on the device itself.

Do you have Sync do anything with Artwork? For example removing embedded Artwork and Syncing it as external Artwork would result in a smaller file being Synced.

[philw]

(Thanks for trying to help).
I can't access the file system inside the renderer. The Linn info window does say it's all 96khz 24-bot FLAC, but that's the sample frequency/ depth, not the actual bit rate, which is what the cache is damaging.

The Linn doesn't display/ render artwork, it's too posh to have an image display.

If a play a track with MM and then... delete the cache file whilst it's playing, MM re-transcodes the file and replaces the deleted cached item, and once that's done playing continues. Hence I can be fairly sure the cached file is the one which is being rendered.

I've not checked the FLAC spec, but the file has a single bit rate so I suppose it's either an average or it's all the same bit rate (not variable). There could be something in that, but I keep coming back to: why is MM transcoding it at all?

[Peke]

(It's not yet been established if I can double-blind hear the difference: that's not the point, I'm curious as to what MM is doing eating my bits, when I asked it not to.)

Can you please open support ticket and supply us with DL links to original and cache file (Link share Google drive, Dropbox, One drive, ...) I would like to take a look and compare with my devices and see if in future MM versions some default conversion settings needs to be adjusted, while existing can be corrected.\

EDIT: FLAC Rates are never rounded so 2546kbps is more likely than 2800kbps and that more looks like 24/192 than 24/96 or maybe 24/88.2 with compatibility header.

[philw]

Done - thanks. I'll post a concluding update here when we get to that.

According to MM5 FLAC is VBR, so any single figure quoted is presumably subject to the algorithm used, which could be different without there actually being a difference. That doesn't explain the file sizes though, which we're dealing with in the ticket.

[philw]

Ok, we got to the bottom of this via that ticket.

There are two places you can set "auto conversion" for a DNLA renderer:

1. Tools -> Options -> Media Sharing -> Server OPTIONS -> Auto-conversion.
2. Play -> Play To -> [cog]

I had disabled / removed all the settings from the first, but the second was still there. My stuff was being converted because in that second place (but not the first), auto-level of volume was set. I zeroed that second setting, and the unwanted caching stopped... now it sends the actual unadulterated FLAC to the renderer, which is what I want. Sorted!