HLS streaming - what does it mean in the new update?

Wondering how HLS streaming, just added to the network board firmware and Mosaic Control can be used. Thx.

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HLS streaming is one of the technical platforms that are used for e.g. internet radio. Various stations use this method and will now be available for dCS users via airable and therefore Mosaic.

Incidentally airable has always been able to provide stations using HLS but their menu is trimmed to fit their client’s technical capability so the addition of HLS by dCS should now add these stations. It is very important for UK users as our national broadcaster , BBC, is to move to HLS streams later this year.

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Ok so if I browse radio stations, do I get options with HLS? Or will choosing a station have the radio station see HLS is a possible protocol and use that?

Looks like our postings crossed in the server. As airable know what Mosaic offers to date the HLS streamed stations have been missing from the offer that we see. In the future they should add HLS streamed stations to their display for dCS Mosaic but generally the technical description will really be invisible to you. You just click the station you find and want to hear. It is like stations that provide flac streams and are currently omitted from the Mosaic radio listing.

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Any recommendations?

Was just listening to Mother Earth Klassic in FLAC 24/96. Amazing.

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How are you listening to a flac broadcast ? AFAIK Mosaic does not process flac broadcasts. Are you using a separate computer to link to Mother Earth Klassic’s internet stream?

I used to do this when a station I listen to had an experimental flac steam and this certainly could sound amazing. However as the station has a good percentage of live relays where the broadcast engineers had to do on the fly balance mixing it had clear downsides as you could hear too much, faders being adjusted, microphone groups changing etc. All stuff that could be got away with using less revealing platforms. The experiment has never been repeated.

I literally just picked it from the list of Mosaic stations. I can’t recall how I determined it was FLAC, but the 24/96 quality is shown in Mosaic as it plays.

This interesting. I found the station which Mosaic displays not as flac but PCM 24/96. More reliable is to look at the actual readout on the DAC of the data format being processed. Yes it’s 24/96.

A couple of years ago we had a number of complaints that flac streams on radio could not be listened to e.g. Radio Paradise other than by its MP3 streams. Requests were made that dCS should catch up with Naim . I have checked the Release Notes of Mosaic since 2020 and cannot find the addition of flac. So what is going on?

I would expect that a 24/96 PCM stream is actually sent over FLAC - in this way it is losslessly compressed and the protocol is open source and well supported.

dCS can certainly decode FLAC in the DAC as you can insert a USB stick with FLAC files and play them in Mosaic.

I wonder if HLS enabled this for http streaming.


This seems to be FLAC …

@Phil - can you clarify what is happening and whether the HLS release allowed for FLAC streaming? Thx.

BTW… According to the below, this stream is indeed FLAC:

It’s sound well 24/96

Hi Miguel,

The HLS functionality added in the latest firmware updates does not have any functionality relating to FLAC Internet Radio stations - it currently only relates to the UK BBC services which are moving to HLS / DASH format audio.

BR

Phil

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Hi Phil,

Can you confirm when Airable will switch to the HLS BBC streams?

BR,

David

Real 24/96 radio

Hi David,

I’m afraid I can’t - originally they were supposed to switch to HLS/DASH formatted streams back in 2015 if I remember correctly.

Currently the “date” that is being given by the BBC is summer 2023 but nothing more precise than that and dates have been moved many times previously however they have recently been announcing that the switch off of the existing Shoutcast service is imminent which hasn’t been the case previously.

BR

Phil

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Same I see. Also seems that this bitrate is encoded in FLAC according to the link I put above.

What I don’t understand is why this would NOT work? It should given that the DAC(s) CAN decode FLAC.

Airable in dCS don’t work as in Auralic for example where you can copy / paste urls tunes FLAC or whatever. Here you can only search by the name of the tunes and not play from the url

Ok but that’s an entirely different issue.

My question is why do people say that FLAC streams are not playable.