WaveLab FLAC compression ratios vs. other encoders

WaveLab
1

After reading a couple notes on other forums, I was curious to test…

I just used the batch converter in WaveLab to convert an .mp3 to FLAC (compression level 8). Original file was 4,960kb and the resulting file was 37,130kb.

Then I encoded the same .mp3 file with other tools, with the following results:
XRECODE 3: 21,747kb
dBpoweramp: 21,835kb
MusicBee: 21,790kb

So obviously the general-market tools are achieving a ~40% FLAC compression advantage over WaveLab’s FLAC compressor, using the exact same setting of FLAC level 8. Any ideas why?

2

Wavelab is using an old version of the FLAC encoder, but the difference in file size shouldn’t be this huge. Try forcing Wavelab to output a 16 bit file and see what happens.