[flac-dev] Flac multi channel

[Martin Leese]

Federico Miyara wrote:
...
> The file format allows some unused fields for future use, such as the
> padding block. It could include a flag to indicate a change in the
> format adding one more streaminfo byte which would allow up to 256
> channels (actually, 256 + 8), or it could trigger a new byte when 11111111.
>
> There is also an invalid block identifier (127) which could be used with
> the same purpose.

The problem isn't *just* the 3-bit field used for
the number of channels.  As Brian Willoughby
explained:
...
>> As you cram more channels into a block, you get fewer samples per block for
>> each individual channel. There simply isn't any advantage to having lots of
>> channels in a single stream.
>>
>> I believe that Ogg allows you to create a file that interleaves multiple
>> FLAC files.

Perhaps comparing FLAC with the Ogg
container and Vorbis codec will aid
understanding.

With Ogg, different streams can be either
chained (sequential) or grouped
(parallel/interleaved).  Typically, metadata
streams would be chained (so they appear
before any audio data) and audio streams
would be grouped.

Within a single FLAC stream the audio is
split into blocks which are grouped.  But within
each block the eight channels are chained.
This makes sense with a maximum of only
eight channels.  Within a Vorbis stream the
audio is split into frames which are grouped.
Because a Vorbis stream can contain up to
256 channels, within each frame the channels
are also grouped.

So the maximum of eight channels is really
embedded into the FLAC standard.  To change
this would require a whole new standard (or
the use of multiple grouped FLAC streams in
an Ogg container).

Regards,
Martin
-- 
Martin J Leese
E-mail: martin.leese  stanfordalumni.org
Web: http://members.tripod.com/martin_leese/