FLAC & Media Player in Windows 10

Here is what I have learned so far.  Windows 10 implementation of FLAC is flawed and needs to be fixed.  Windows 10 does not support all of the FLAC format tags.  Everyone who runs across this issue needs to report this to Microsoft through the feedback tool.  Then they may fix it. 

When Windows failed to recognise the tags, I went the old way for getting FLAC to work in Windows.  In Windows 7 I used a program called WMP Tag Plus.  They know of the issue and give instructions on how to fix this problem listed below.... You have to actually disable Native FLAC support and install the WMP Tag Plus to correct the problem.  The instructions seem complicated but they worked fine for me. 

You can download this add-in for Windows Media Player at this link.  Any good codec pack will also work if it has FLAC support.

http://bmproductions.fixnum.org/index.htm?http://bmproductions.fixnum.org/wmptagplus/

Is WMP Tag Plus compatible with my system?

WMP Tag Plus supports Windows Media Player 12 on Windows 7, Windows 8/8.1, and Windows 10.

The plug-in should also still work fine with Windows Media Player 11 on Windows Vista, but that combination isn't officially supported anymore.

Microsoft has added native FLAC support in Windows 10. This means that, in a default Windows 10 installation, WMP Tag Plus isn't used anymore by Windows Media Player for FLAC tags.

Unfortunately, Microsoft's native FLAC support has been proven to still contain some issues. For example, it doesn't recognize certain tags that are recognized by WMP Tag Plus and most other FLAC implementations. The first thing you should do when you come across such an issue, is report it via the Windows 10 feedback tool. That's the best way to urge Microsoft to fix their FLAC support.

Because of the issues with the native FLAC support, you can optionally force the use of WMP Tag Plus for FLAC on Windows 10, thereby giving you the same FLAC support as in earlier Windows versions. For this, you will need to disable the native FLAC support. See the next question for instructions on how to do this.

First of all, make sure that you have the latest available version of WMP Tag Plus. Only versions 2.6 and newer support Windows 10.

Warning: if you skip this step, there's a high risk that you will lose some of the tags in your FLAC files!

1. In Windows Media Player's library, select Music on the left, and type type:flac in the Search field.
2. Select a single song, then press Ctrl+A to select all songs.
3. Right-click the selection and select Delete. Choose Delete from library only, then click OK.
4. Close Windows Media Player.

This will not only disable the native FLAC tag support in Windows Media Player, but also in Windows Explorer. It's not possible to disable the support for Windows Media Player and leave it enabled for Explorer at the same time. However, if you're experiencing issues with FLAC tags in Windows Media Player, then you will very likely see the same issues in Explorer, so there's not much point in leaving it enabled in the latter anyway.

1. Create a system restore point, just in case things get messed up.
2. Launch the Registry Editor: press Win+R, type regedit, and press Enter.
3. Navigate to the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\PropertySystem\PropertyHandlers\.flac.
4. Select the (Default) value, press Del, and click Yes to confirm.
5. 64-bit Windows only: repeat the previous step for the registry key KEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\PropertySystem\PropertyHandlers\.flac (note the Wow6432Node component).
6. Navigate to the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\PropertySystem\SystemPropertyHandlers.
7. Right-click the SystemPropertyHandlers key in the tree, select Permissions, and click Advanced.
8. Click the Change link next to Owner, type Administrators as the object name, and click OK.
9. In the existing Permission entries, select the Allow entry for Administrators and click Edit.
10. Tick the Full Control box, then click OK three times so that you're back in the main Registry Editor window.
11. Select the .flac value, press Del, and click Yes to confirm.
12. 64-bit Windows only: repeat steps 7-11 for the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\PropertySystem\SystemPropertyHandlers (note the Wow6432Node component).
13. Close the Registry Editor, and restart Windows for the changes to take effect.

1. Launch Windows Media Player and make sure that WMP Tag Plus is ticked in the Tools – Plug-ins menu, meaning that the plug-in is active (press Ctrl+M if you don't see the Tools menu).
2. Make sure that the native FLAC tag support was successfully disabled. To do this, go to WMP Tag Plus settings (Tools – Options – Plug-ins – select Background – select WMP Tag Plus – Properties). In the list of supported file extensions, the Native support column should show No for FLAC. Finally, close the WMP Tag Plus settings dialog again.
3. To re-add the FLAC songs that were previously removed, go to Tools – Advanced, select Restore deleted library items, and click Yes.

If you want to enable the native FLAC tag support again, you can undo these changes by downloading and opening one of the following .zip files. Then unzip and open the included .reg file to import it into the registry:

• 32-bit Windows: native_flac_prophandler_x86.zip
• 64-bit Windows: native_flac_prophandler_x64.zip

After the .reg file has been successfully imported, remember to restart Windows for the changes to take effect.

Thanks so much for this information.

I'm using K-lite codec pack and wmp tag plus 2.6. I only did use the WMP for sorting the files in the library.

As default player I use Foobar2000. 

After updating to Win 10  and trying to refresh some flac tags with the WMP, lots of the flac files got damaged/corrupted. The header is destroyed, the files appear as "raw flac".

I questioned that in the german section of the Microsoft Community and nobody answered.

Now that I know this happens not only on my system, I'll stop using the WMP for tagging.

I'm sure your solution with the changes in the library would work good, but as I use Foobar2000 as default player where the tags are ok, I'll wait for a fix by Microsoft.

I hope they have recognized this issue now and will react soon! :-)

regards

Jochen

Apparently, WMP in Win 10 was responsible of the destruction of 360+ FLAC files in my collection, replacing the headers with the hex sequence "494433030000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000".......

Of course, I had backed up the library without noting the issue, replacing previous back ups, so... :-(

Also apparently, eliminating that corrupted files "cured" the very frequent crashes of WMP.

So much work lost....!

I have spent months ripping my dad's entire CD collection on Windows Media Player 12 on Windows 10 only to find that the library regularly becomes corrupt and other strange behaviour from my FLAC files.

FLAC files ripped using WMP12 do not play on Groove Music! 

I will be very very annoyed if all my hard work has to be started again. If you can, avoid any native Windows media players for handling your music.

Once upon a time.....I converted my entire CD collection (about 11,000 songs) to WMA lossless format using WMP. I had many issues with file corruption and strange metadata and eventually abandoned WMP.

After looking around, I discovered Sony Media Go. This is a great media player and it performs exceptionally well. It will rip to FLAC format, which I have now done with my CD's (again) and never had any issues with corruption.

For audiophiles like myself, you can also add FLAC files from bands that provide them in HD format (96 KHz, 24bit) and it will play them back in the same resolution (depending somewhat on your audio card).

I can also plug in a USB flash drive and when I copy across music for listening in the car, Sony Media Go automatically converts the files (if I choose) to a compressed format. I usually use 320kb/s MP3.

Editing metadata is a breeze, as is adding album artwork if it is missing from the built in Gracenote lookup.

Recently, I added Google's Play Music uploader to the PC and after file matching, my entire collection is now available in the cloud from any device.

So whether I home listening on my HIFI in hi-res format, in the car, office or going for a walk, I can access my entire music collection and I only have to rip it to the PC one time. Oh yes....and all of the above is free.

Rob 

Simple! Download http://downloads.xiph.org/releases/oggdsf/opencodecs_0.85.17777.exe