The Memory Player is brought to you by the designers of Pipedreams and Scaena loudspeakers, and Melos Audio. We've been designing award-winning High End Audio products since 1979.
The Memory Player was just awarded 2011 Publisher's Choice and Most Wanted Component from The Stereo Times !
In 2012, The Memory Player 64 features:
64 Bit Audio playback, reducing jitter on 16 bit and 24 bit recordings to vanishing levels
Click-and-Play Music Library, making usage simple, fast and intuitive (No more moving music!)
RUR Level 3 with unlimited re-reading, virtually eliminating the jitter caused by ECC
IDEAS jitter reduction method, now running automatically in the background, creating a near-replica of a master recording, and
Direct to DAC (D2D), achieving the shortest, purest signal path of any DAC made
and Click-and-Play Library with unlimited storage!
With 64 Bit Playback . . .
Once you hear The Memory Player,
you'll never forget the music.
About The Memory Player
Since the birth of digitally recorded music and the Reed-Solomon codes of 1982, listeners have had to either get used to, or overcome, a unique problem affecting the sound of music playback. Although there have been many methods to alleviate the sonic problems faced by the modern digital audio listener, their primary cause is simple. Known universally as "jitter", it is the experience of hearing a recorded bit arrive or play back late.
When comparing the sound of digital music to analog (LP) or live music, many audiophile listeners complain of harsh treble and upper midrange, artificiality in tone and a loss of "air". The Memory Player offers a complete, unprecedented solution to the jitter problem. Through The Memory Player, jitter is lowered to levels rarely, if ever, experienced in a digital audio device.
The Memory Player is no ordinary digital audio player. The Memory Player is an intricate and powerful music server that accomplishes its goal through a comprehensive jitter erasure system, which:
1 - Copies music through re-reading from a CD, DVD or music file to a block of memory,
2 - Eliminates digital volume control losses and other system losses by upsampling to 32 bit audio,
3 - Eliminates jitter-creating signal splitting by playing from a 64 bit sample,
4 - Removes jitter from the music data before you play it (something not possible when playing a moving disc or a file directly),
5 - Using the shortest signal path possible in a DAC, achieves a huge, deep image with air throughout the stage and around each instrument, seemingly unlimited dynamics and a sweet 'analog' tone, never before heard in digital playback.
The Memory Player's refined DAC design is a welcome departure from the high tech, circuitry-burdened devices now in use. D2D creates the clearest, cleanest, least colored and simplest path from the DAC's first moment of analog to the outputs of The Memory Player.
The Memory Player received over 20 rave reviews between 2006 and 2010, and was awarded "Most Wanted Component" by The Stereo Times for five years.
RUR, IDEAS, and D2D have brought The Memory Player to the very summit of where digital audio is now, and where it's headed. They have opened doors to explore how to reduce jitter, and revealed how jitter measurement is often fooled by jitter created very early in the chain. Someday, we may be able to reduce jitter to genuinely inaudible levels, and narrow the gap between digital and analog to the vanishing point.
You'll find more on how The Memory Player uses its technologies to achieve its transformative sound right here on our website.
Read detailed information on its innovative techniques (RUR, 64 Bit Audio Playback, IDEAS, and D2D) and powerful tools, which make The Memory Player the only product of its kind in the world. The Memory Player is available through Laufer Teknik.
About The Company
Sam Laufer
President, Laufer Teknik
Sam Laufer, partner and principal investor, purchased The Memory Player and its associated technology from Nova Physics Group in 2007, and has since been working with Mark Porzilli to enhance its performance and manufacturability.
A long-time music lover and audiophile, Sam started his career as an attorney with the law firm of Mudge Rose Guthrie Alexander & Ferdon, specializing in Intellectual Property, Contracts, and general corporate litigation. After practicing for five years, he joined the family business as President of NABS, a global supply chain logistics company specializing in component parts distribution for the high-tech industry. After 14 years, he sold the company in 2006 to a publicly traded company in the supply chain area called Supply Technologies. After the sale, Sam focused his attention on introducing a number of new products to market.
In 2006, Sam established his company, Laufer Teknik (www.lauferteknik.com), specializing in the distribution of audio products that implement cutting-edge new technologies, in furtherance of the reproduction of music. During that time, Sam co-invented a new mechanical device for preserving wine and other liquids, for which he was awarded a patent, and has additional patents pending. In 2009, Sam partnered with the leading composer of music for animals to establish Pet Acoustics (www.petacoustics.com), a company specializing in therapeutic music for dogs, cats, and horses.
When Sam first heard The Memory Player in 2006, he was amazed by its sound, but dubious about its technological foundation. After disassembling a unit, he was convinced that it was nothing more than a computer. In fact, he was largely correct. But it was a special type of computer optimized for music playback in a way that had never been done before. After learning more about the product and the challenges that had existed, Sam teamed up with Mark Porzilli to revisit and enhance The Memory Player.
Little did Mark or Sam realize that they would discover a new way of minimizing jitter to levels never before imagined, all through software. Patents are pending on this new jitter reduction technology, and expected to be implemented not only in high-end audio, but also in the areas of high definition video, medical imaging, and VOIP systems, among many other areas of potential.
When not working, Sam spends time with his family at their home in Connecticut.
Mark Porzilli
Designer
Mark Porzilli is the designer of The Memory Player. His newest creative venture follows a distinguished 20 year long career in high-end audio as a founding partner of Melos Audio and the designer of the Pipedreams and Scaena loudspeakers.
Mark was a child prodigy whose father, Anthony, was the head electronics technician under Lucio Vallese at ITT, during the development of the world's first working laser (ruby). At the incredible age of 5, Mark was wiring small circuits and drawing simple electronic schematics. At age 11 and 12 he entered two state and national science competitions, and won First Prize in both. One award was for a home-made X-ray machine, cobbled together from parts of discarded TV sets. He also designed a series of cutting-edge multiple channel biofeedback and alpha-wave monitors, sold to hospital systems around his home state of New Jersey, by the time he was 16 years old.
He began his studies in physics and chemistry at Rutgers University while still a high school student.
In 1979, Mark met George Bischoff, then an owner of a local high end audio salon. Bischoff introduced him to the art, and they partnered along with Charlie Gavaris, U.S. importer of Strathern Ribbon speakers used in the Infiniti QRS, to form the now iconic Melos Audio.
Melos became the third largest vacuum tube audio component manufacturer in the world. Over the span of two decades, Melos had 10 products listed in Stereophile's Class A and B "Recommended Components" for 10 consecutive years, received 17 Editor's Choice awards from The Absolute Sound, and enjoyed over 400 positive reviews from every U.S. audio magazine, as well as magazines in many countries. Melos was featured on covers of audio magazines in England, Greece, Italy, Taiwan, Thailand, Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Hong Kong, Korea, Germany and South Africa.
In the United States, among the dozens of Best of Show awards from TAS and Stereophile, in 1992, the Melos SHA won Stereophile's Product of the Year, following two rave reviews by Cory Greenberg and John Atkinson. The SHA was originally designed for Joe Grado of Grado Labs, but its popularity as a pre-amp and a headphone amp made it a reference for many brands of headphones. Even Keith Jarrett gave the SHA a glowing endorsement.
During this time, Melos sold over 14,000 products in six continents.
In 1998, Mark designed an ultrasonic noding line array loudspeaker, now known as the Pipedreams. By moving the nodes into ultrasonic regions, a contiguous line array with multiple drivers was finally possible.
The Pipedreams were acclaimed as "the finest speaker in the world" by Harry Pearson of The Absolute Sound, and again, by Jonathan Valin of The Absolute Sound. In 2000, Pipedreams was awarded The Golden Ear and was the first product to be featured on the cover of TAS. The Pipedreams were also praised as the world's best loudspeaker by Ross Wagner in The Audiophile Voice. In 2003, Pipedreams was awarded U.S. Patent Number 6628793.
In 2003, Mark designed the now famous Scaena line array ceramic loudspeakers. The Scaena loudspeakers won Best of Show six years in a row at CES, T.H.E. Show and the RMAF. They were given three rave reviews in The Absolute Sound by Harry Pearson, and also won The Golden Ear.
In 2005, Rod Handley, George Bischoff and Mark Porzilli formed Nova Physics Group LLC, in order to develop and market The Memory Player.
In 2006, Mark met Sam Laufer, who later purchased The Memory Player and its associated technology, and launched their partnership.
Mark and his wife Carolyn live in Los Angeles, California.
The first step in The Memory Player's reading and playback system is RUR. RUR, or Read Until Right, is a CD reading technology that uses the most intelligent re-reading available for audio.
A bit represents a moment of music. When it fails to be read, seen or played, it is considered to have been 'dropped'. Normally in digital copiers, codes known as ECC (or Error Concealment Codes) are introduced to the recorded material in order to compensate for any dropped bits.
Although ECC does re-create dropped bits quantitatively, it increases jitter dramatically, and in a manner that escapes most measurement methods. This is known as "Read Jitter". Jitter created at this stage may become an inextricable part of the newly read music data, evading jitter reduction at the DAC.
To avoid this most sonically destructive jitter (that is, jitter created early in the chain), RUR re-reads a CD, and NEVER uses ECC (Error Concealment Codes or Error Correction Codes).
Since bits will 'drop', The Memory Player's intelligent re-reading algorithm, known as RUR, instead re-reads the CD an unlimited number of times for up to 80 minutes.
Re-reading comes in two classes, "smart and dumb". These are not disparaging or complimentary terms, but rather describe the sophistication of the re-reader and its limitations. RUR does not just re-read the data repeatedly (like EAC, CDEX or the legendary Paranoia).
Instead, RUR
Users simply insert a CD into The Memory Player, click, and RUR takes over.
When done re-reading, (100% of bits are read) RUR places a brand new copy of the music, as an undissected whole, on the IDEAS Memory (Library).
Even though the music is re-read at an unprecedented level of accuracy, if not placed in a useful musical structure, music bits can look like random noise. Therefore, the next step The Memory Player uses is the conversion of raw data, explained in 64 Bit Playback.
* RUR was designed for the CD, so is not part of the process of copying DVDs or music files. All music media can be upsampled, and all can experience the revitalizing power of IDEAS, our patent applied for technology, the first of its kind.
RUR
Crosses into data areas to
locate boundaries
Changes speed
(Read Until Right)
Music is read by copier
Re-reads
forward and reverse
Changes laser intensity
CD is inserted to drive
64 BIT PLAYBACK
VOLUME CONTROL
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In digital audio, volume is lowered by removing bits.
When volume is lowered from the 32 bit position
(- 1 dB), even at a low volume (- 90 dB), all bits in a 16/44 CD are still captured.
How 64 Bit Audio Playback Works
The Memory Player is the first digital audio player to exploit 64 bit audio playback. (It should be noted that the term "64 bit audio" is not related to a 64 bit computer operating system.)
By using extremely high bit depths to play lower resolution audio files (16 bit and 24 bit), The Memory Player can yield many of the benefits of extreme bit depth resolution on CDs and 24 bit files.
Music file types have a maximum storage size. Music content often is larger than 16 and 24 bit samples can hold. Since there is more information to be played than can be contained in 16/24 (or even 24/192), the signal must be split. Whenever there is a split, jitter results.
The Memory Player allows you to play any audio file as uncompressed 64 bit audio, enabling you to enjoy unprecedented purity, harmonics, low distortion and vanishing jitter levels.
STEP ONE: Remove Digital Volume Control Losses Through 32 Bit Upsampling
In addition to bit drop/ECC related loss, explained under the RUR section, losses can also occur through digital volume, balance, DSPs (used in room correction) and equalization controls.
As a volume control is lowered, bits are dropped, and the audio is re-sampled.. Normally, you won't hear the full 16 bits of data, but will hear a lower bit depth, as well as error correction and its accompanying jitter, as a result of being lowered.
The Memory Player's volume control uses a technique called "floating", which allows full resolution, and no loss, at any volume setting or balance. Also, for the first time, it allows notorious jitter generators such as equalization, shaping and room correction devices to play music with jitter-free purity, never before experienced.
SEE DIAGRAM ON THE LEFT.
The Memory Player takes a 16/44 recording and increases the signal from 16/44 to 32/44 (and a 24 bit, high resolution audio file from 24/192 to 32/192). This is known as a "float".
The 32 bit signal now has 16 bits of music 'on top' of 16 zeros. The signal then appears as 16 music bits, from bit 32 to bit 17, and the zeroes at bit 16 to bit 1.
The use of a digital volume control reduces the bits from bit 32 to bit 17 before ANY loss in bit depths occur. In fact, the volume is at zero at the 16th bit.
Upsampling to 32 bit defeats losses from volume controls and imperfect system processes. But we're not done yet!
When played back from a 64 bit sample, there is no size limitation for files, indexes, or registries. Due to its powerful capacity, none of them are ever dissected, and always remain contiguous.
The 64 bit sample enables spectacular accuracy with extremely high resolution readings, and the powerful jitter reduction of 64 bit audio, when playing CDs (16 bit) or high resolution audio (24 bit).
STEP TWO: Play Back Through 64 Bit Audio Sample
The newly upsampled 32/44 signal now gets placed in the 64 bit sample, from which it is played.
Audio bit depths (16, 24, 32 or 64) determine the maximum size an audio file can be. It is always desirable to maintain a contiguous file.
64 bit audio has a capacity equal to 144,000 terabytes! This is important, for the reasons explained below.
If the music is too long (and too large) to fit within 16 or 24 bit sample parameters, the file will be split and continued in another section (the next sample). This is similar to what happens when you use caching, which fragments the signal and re-assembles it when played.
Within the signal alongside the music is its index, also a source of jitter. The index gives the player the information needed to play the bits in the proper order and speed. Once the music is played, the information on the index pertaining to that music bit is no longer needed, but is moved. If an error occurred in a previous index, this "moving index" can inherit jitter from the previous byte, and pass that jitter along to the next byte of music.
In 64 bit audio playback, dissection of the large music files and the huge indexes for such large files is eliminated. The files are left contiguous, and the jitter that could have resulted from traditional playback methods is completely avoided!
Aside from its ability to leave the music signal contiguous due to its size, 64 bit audio offers another advantage.
In 16 bit audio during the sample period (1/44000 of a second) the player has one choice to pick a bit to read. That bit should be the closest to the actual music moment. If the bit is late (jittered) it will be read anyway, and considered "bit perfect" because the number of bits read is 100%.
When a jittered bit is read, it proceeds to the subsequent sample to be read again ("inherited").
In 64 bit audio, the player has four choices to read a bit in any sample period, instead of just one. This increases the odds of a correct bit to be read, by four times. Or said another way, if it sees a bit that is closer to perfect time, it does not have to use the only bit available, it can look four times for a better match.
SEE DIAGRAM BELOW.
This allows The Memory Player to analyze and choose the most accurately timed of the four nearest bits, avoiding the jitter that could have been inherited.
Encoding enables the CD's contents to 'float' at the 32 to 17 bit positions.
Even when volume is lowered, all bits in a 16/44 CD are still captured.
16/44 CD
64 Bit Reader
16 Bit Reader
Music data played in 64 bit samples results in seeking the bit in smaller periods, in 1/4 the time, and with 4X the accuracy.
If at any time during the period the bit is read, the next period will begin.
32 Bit Sample
1/44,000 of a second
1/176,400 of a second X 4 = 1/44,000
This represents a typical music byte with eight bits. Scattered, non-music bits interrupt what would have been a continguous row of only music bits.
New byte begins
IDEAS discharges non-music bits leaving behind gaps between music bits, creating delays as bits are read.
IDEAS then discharges the gaps and places scattered music bits back in their natural order.
Once complete, a healthy music byte has eight contiguous music bits.
non-music bit
music bit
The next step in the process of creating analog quality from digital audio is known as IDEAS. Impulse Discharge of Events in Atemporal Space is explained under How The Memory Player Uses IDEAS.
More Ways Music Can Acquire Jitter
Musical information being played is always transferred or copied to a form of memory, from which it is played. Therefore, it could be said that all digital audio players are "memory players".
They vary according to how much music they hold on the memory, how much dissection that music is subjected to, and what, if anything, is done to clear the data of unwanted jitter. No matter what type of player, CD, file, download, stream/internet radio, music server or computer, data is played from some form of memory inside the player.
All digital audio players use small caches, or small pieces of memory, that dissect the incoming signal, and place portions of the music on the cache. They play it and hold it, as the cache awaits the next inflow of music data. By holding more and more music data, the cache compensates for any small delay or interruption of signal, because the cache may hold several seconds of music, giving the data time to arrive, so no silence occurs.
Memory experiences a great deal of corruption if left unattended. Electronic and physical obstructions (physical in the case of optical media) ultimately end up interrupting perfectly timed, pure music bit flow. All these obstructions cause jitter.
Obstructions can include local RF fields or radio itself, stray flux fields (magnetism and power supplies), dirt, scratches, noise, old data from other CDs played recently, internal operations of the unit itself, such as pre-fetching, DLLs, or ECC bits created to conceal dropped music bits.
All these must be cleaned off the cache memory, or the music data will experience time delays, known as jitter.
With nearly all those obstacles gone, the memory serves as an ideal palette for music bits alone.
The Memory Player, eliminating jitter through the IDEAS process, creates an almost perfect replica of the master on the Memory from which you'll play your music.
How The Memory Player Uses IDEAS
IDEAS is a complex process that attempts to replicate the master itself, through reading its index to determine the file type, and eliminating non-music data from the memory.
First, IDEAS prepares the space by cleaning it of any legacy (old) music data or any non-music data, as described above. Every bit on the Memory that is not music data is discharged. This is the Impulse Discharge.
The spaces where the data was in the past are called Events in Atemporal Space. If these spaces had bits in them, they would interrupt fresh data, forcing it to jump to the next available space. Even left empty, the bits will be scattered around these spaces.
The chart on the right may resemble a defragmentation screen. In truth, there is no relationship between IDEAS and defragmentation. Defragmentation compresses all the data together to increase the speed of a computer. IDEAS arranges the data for the lowest jitter, regardless of speed.
Determining that the space is empty, and then skipping it, takes more time than it would if the next bit been inside that space. When the bit is read late, that time delay results in jitter. Therefore, both the problematic bits and the empty spaces are discharged through the IDEAS process.
Once the IDEAS process is complete, music data can populate the Memory in a more natural configuration.
Now, music bits are in their original order, and since they are uninterrupted by vacant space, non-music bits, or old music bits, recorded music can mirror the master itself. Mirroring the master consists of not just capturing the quantity of bits, as is done in the nulling process used in studios, but capturing them in their original time.
The Memory Player can lower jitter to the femtosecond level, easily rivaling costly atomic clocking players, and 10 to 100 times lower than achieved by the finest conventional CD or high resolution file players.
Now that the recorded music has been cleared of unwanted jitter, the next stage in our challenge is reducing or eliminating further losses in playback, through D2D.
Once a music disc is read using RUR, the data placed inside a 64 bit sample and read as 64 bit audio, and jitter erased through IDEAS, D2D (Direct to DAC) completes the final stage of refinement in digital audio playback, taking it to a level of fidelity never before achieved.
All DACs are located in chips with internal circuitry on the output of the DAC. Usually, this takes the form of some amplification, some buffering and some filtration. It is not uncommon to have as many as 200 parts consisting of, capacitors, resistors and transistors in the chip and in the signal path, inside the DAC chip itself. These cannot normally be circumvented.
D2D technology consists of an extremely high quality DAC, not unlike many top-tier DACs in use in the best of High End Audio players today (see Specifications).
However, a DAC chip treated for access to the internal devices, could enable up to 100% of the output circuitry and on-chip components to be bypassed.
D2D enables The Memory Player to completely bypass all buffers, all amplification, all equalization, and all filtration.
The circuitry in the D2D is unique, in that the very first moment of analog is present, it is induced, accessed and passed through a single polypropylene* film and foil capacitor to the output supplied.
Although just one capacitor, this is our favorite High End Audio capacitor other than Teflon. It uses the finest grade of polypropylene film and heavy metal foil. Almost without color, exquisitely detailed and never harsh, it is one of the highest quality capacitors made for high end audio designs.
This creates the shortest signal path possible, from the very first point where analog is created, to the output of the player.
D2D bypasses literally hundreds of parts. These losses are from solid state amplification, active equalization, caching and unnecessary filtration.
As many of these internal components are transistors, they add coloration from power supplies as well. D2D dramatically reduces detail loss and coloration of the music signal because no capacitors, resistors, transistors, power supplies, buffers, amplifiers, equalizers and filters, are present.
Chances are, you've never heard a digital audio device this uncolored. With 100% of the circuitry bypassed, digital coloration is almost gone. Deep inner detail, volumes of air and the sweetest tone all help to defy and redefine digital audio.
* Teflon capacitors are available at a higher cost. However, if Teflon capacitors are prohibitively priced, we also offer Teflon bypasses across the superb polypropylene caps normally used, to gain a great deal of the quality of an all-Teflon DAC.
DAC
Buffering
Filtering
Amplifying
Analog Out
High Resolution Audio Can be Better than Ever
The internet has opened vast resources for music. High Resolution Downloads can be spectacular. Even some Streaming Audio/Internet Radio sites are now being broadcast in 16/44 (CD quality).
As with the CD, High Resolution Audio is jittered by the media that carries it.
Even downloading splits data and reassembles it, and that, too, results in jitter.
Downloaded audio is placed into packets that are sent to you according to the speed of the connection. As with optical discs, the data arrives at different speeds and it is deposited again, onto cache memory.
Once it is deposited to the cache, legacy data will force the music data to populate the memory around it. Legacy data can be portions of previously used features (DLLs), noise, RF and other digital bits that guide the processes in use.
The Memory Player eliminates the "random quality" often experienced in playback as a result of downloading. The jittering from this data can be mildly to significantly destructive to the sound, depending on the environment and what you've done previously!
In downloaded music, as with CD or DVD files, IDEAS first removes non-music data, then moves system files away from the area on the Memory where it is placed, from which it will be played.
It cannot be overstated how important it is that data be kept optimized on the memory. IDEAS keeps its Memory optimized continuously, by cleaning the Memory and moving system files. This state of quality, cleared of jittering bits, cannot be accomplished when playing a download directly off of the Internet nor off of files on a DVD, as playback in real time allows no time to de-jitter the music information.
High resolution audio files from ANY digital source have never been heard at jitter levels this low, before.
IDEAS can almost eliminate jitter from all high resolution files that suffered as a result of download damage, and restore them to nearly the fidelity of the original master.
Be Prepared for Viruses and Maintenance
Ever mindful that all CD players are computers and all play music off of memory, downloading is on the Internet, and because of that, music needs to be protected from spyware and viruses.
The Memory Player contains a permanent, automatically updated anti-virus, and an anti-spyware suite that updates itself every 30 minutes. Virus writers like to disguise their downloads as music or videos. Not that there's much a virus can do, as The Memory Player removes most computer processes, the processes that most virus writers target, so long as they are not for the playback of music files. A virus in any music server can slow its responsiveness and even raise jitter in some cases.
As long as The Memory Player has an Internet connection, this protection will always be active and up to date. It will even look up drivers to help install any third party hardware you may add.
This anti-virus and anti-spyware protective suite, along with our online Remote Repair system, ensures that in almost all cases your Memory Player will be updateable and repairable, without the need to send it back to the factory.
Without being removed from your shelf, it will stay up to the current edge of the art of digital audio.
Is Your Music File Just Another Pretty Face?
The Memory Player was the first High Resolution Music File player on the HEA market. In 2005, The Memory Player already had support to play music files up to 24/192, and that was six years ago!
Now, as The Memory Player operates entirely in a 64 bit configuration, it supports and plays files from 16/44 (CD) to as high a resolution as 64/192, and any combination of sample rates and bit depths in between, from any file type:
We support virtually every audio file, compressed, losslessly compressed or with no compression at all.
In many respects you could say that The Memory Player was designed for High Resolution Audio. In fact, in 2003, The Memory Player was originally a DVD Audio player. High resolution downloads have no greater vehicle than The Memory Player.
Since many high resolution file types are inherently higher in jitter than other types, The Memory Player can Upsample to convert any of these files to fully uncompressed WAVs (64 bit) in order to avoid any such depth losses. It is a fact that lossless compression has higher jitter than true, uncompressed audio. Why? It's the same problem, and it has the same solution.
The Upsampler Takes on Lossless Compression
Is it really lossless? It depends on what you consider 'lossless'. The Memory Player's Upsampler is powerful and precise. It can convert almost any audio file type to almost any other audio file type, but The Memory Player's Upsampler can also upsample almost any file to an uncompressed WAV or AIFF.
So-called lossless compression, such as APE, MP4 (Apple), WavPack, Shorten and FLAC must compress and decompress during playback, so there is no time or opportunity available to clean and de-jitter the signal. Although a file such as FLAC will give you 100% of the bits, they are highly jittered. The bit count is correct, but nothing else is assured.
This is why FLAC and many others have poor ambient retrieval, loss in perceived dynamics, harsh highs, hard midrange and a very 'digital' and unnatural tone. This is not exclusively a FLAC problem; it is a problem inherent to all lossless compression.
Although The Memory Player normally plays uncompressed WAVs or AIFFs*, if you have music stored in APE, ALAC, M4a, WavPack, Shorten, or FLAC, The Memory Player's Upsampler will release fidelity trapped inside these file types.
Even if those file types are masked by the jitter inherent to them, caused by compressing and decompressing, The Memory Player's Upsampler can enable that music to be heard at a higher fidelity than ever before.
*Yet, there is a "best" sounding file type - the 64 Bit WAV.