dschuetz wrote:

> the same problems that came with Ogg come with FLAC or
> anything else -- the Rio only does integer math. So you
> need a good, fast, integer-only decoder.

Covered. From the flac feature page:

"FLAC is asymmetric in favor of decode speed. Decoding
requires only integer arithmetic, and is much less compute-intensive than for most perceptual codecs. Real-time decode performance is easily achievable on even modest hardare."

The other lossless codecs may be similar but I haven't checked.

Your mention of downgrading gets me to thinking. The Jrec server supports transcoding between formats. It could also transparently support downgrades -- allowing the bulk download of playlists of highly-compressed mp3 from your pristine flac source for burning on CD or storing on a portable mp3 player where space is at a premium. Ideally, it'll cache the compressed tracks on an LRU basis to avoid re-compression of the most frequently 'downgraded' tracks.

--Reed http://jreceiver.sourceforge.net