Audio Format Recognition without file extension

[majorlance]

I'm prepping my music library in anticipation of a December delivery of my Model S... In the past, I've always placed an iPod Classic in the glove box of my car, hooked it up and not thought twice about it.

Given that Tesla currently only supports direct connection of USB thumb drives (and I've heard that the FLAC files sound great compared to a lossy format like MP3 or AAC), I'm re-ripping my CD collection. My plan is to mix and max FLAC with MP3 and AAC on a thumb drive. I'll use "A Better Finder Renamer" to randomize my favorite 5 star songs...

But to do so, I'll need to remove the file extensions from song files. Arcane question but...

Will the Model S play back a music file without a file extension as long as it's a valid music file?

I'm trying to combine two different libraries (compressed and uncompressed) into one playlist and I don't want duplicate files. If I remove the extensions and then copy to the folder the higher quality files they will replace the compressed files. Unfortunately, for many songs I purchased them online vs. a CD. But I'd still like to have them in the playlist...

Thoughts?

 

[jerry33]

Sorry, I've always just accepted the defaults from the ripping app which adds the extension. Try it with a few and if that doesn't work, try linking the files to a name that has the extension. Examples for hard and soft links: (ln song1 song1.flac) or (ln -s song1 song1.flac).

 

[majorlance]

Sorry, I've always just accepted the defaults from the ripping app which adds the extension. Try it with a few and if that doesn't work, try linking the files to a name that has the extension. Examples for hard and soft links: (ln song1 song1.flac) or (ln -s song1 song1.flac).

Thanks. I don't have the car yet but I may go over to the Tesla dealer and test.

If the files play without an extension, I can easily combine my lossless flac with my lossy files and not have duplicates. Otherwise, I have more work to do!

 

[majorlance]

I did visit the Tesla dealer today and tested various file formats on a flash drive. Bottom line- all files need to have a proper music format extension (.mp3, etc.) to be recognized by the car as a music file. As expected, Apple Lossless does not play but flac plays fine, along with mp3 and the other lossy apple format (i.e. iTunes store purchase).

I've read in this forum that the flac files sound great (and better than a high quality lossy format) with the high end audio system but I didn't dare turn up the stereo on the car at the mall to find out!

 

[jerry33]

've read in this forum that the flac files sound great (and better than a high quality lossy format) with the high end audio system but I didn't dare turn up the stereo on the car at the mall to find out!

FWIW, there is no distortion at the highest volume on my car (has the sound studio package) with properly recorded and mastered CDs ripped to FLAC. However, there is a lot of music that isn't properly recorded and mastered, and no amount of lossless can save it. With audio, it's garbage in/garbage out.

 

[bollar]

FWIW, the car does support lossless AIFF files (which is what iTunes currently creates if you rip in a lossless format).

 

[Olen]

My guess is that files without an extension will not be recognised by the player app, HOWEVER, I don't think it uses the extension to identify the file types. So my guess is that a flac file with a .mp3 extension will play just fine. The player probably opens the file and determines the file type from the "magic number".

I have not tested this in the car, but it works fine with most other Linux based audio players.

 

[majorlance]

FWIW, the car does support lossless AIFF files (which is what iTunes currently creates if you rip in a lossless format).

Agreed that it can or it can rip to Apple Lossless. But the AIFF files are much (I think twice) as large as Apple Lossless or flac. All formats can be converted to the other without degradation (well maybe just a hassle).

I use iTunes on a Mac and have a variety of formats- Apple lossless from my CD rips, compressed 256kb/sec AAC files from iTunes purchases and even some 320kb/sec mp3 files. I star rate and add a genre for everything.

My plan is to use a flash drive and copy over my some of my general playlists (5 star rock, 4 star all genres, etc.) to the flash drive. I can use XLD to batch convert the Apple lossless to flac. I will then use "A Better Finder Renamer" to randomize the file names of the tracks. I *think* that this will effectively shuffle the playback of the songs in the big general playlists (I thought I read somewhere that playback was in filename order, I hope!).

I do wish that Tesla would add shuffle as an option... can't be that hard.

Best and thanks to all!