Google Chrome no longer plays certain audio files

Question

Since the update to v45, Chrome seems to no longer play select MP3 files. This is not across the board, and some other MP3 files still play. Chrome v44 displayed no issues and played all the files.

This issue is common across many computers running various editions of Windows (in both 32 and 64 bit), and rolling back will allow the files to play. This however is not a viable solution for the client PCs, nor suitable going forwards.

Upon inspecting the files themselves, I am unable to note any distinguishable differences between playable and unplayable files (aside from duration, size, and name; duration and size are fairly spread in both, so it's not like files over a set size don't work; some do, others do not.)

Saving the files and checking with MediaInfo reveals the following information

General
Complete name                            : D:\Desktop\L03-02n.mp3
Format                                   : MPEG Audio
File size                                : 3.41 MiB
Duration                                 : 1mn 29s
Overall bit rate mode                    : Constant
Overall bit rate                         : 320 Kbps
Genre                                    : Abstract
Writing library                          : LAME3.82

Audio
Format                                   : MPEG Audio
Format version                           : Version 1
Format profile                           : Layer 3
Duration                                 : 1mn 29s
Bit rate mode                            : Constant
Bit rate                                 : 320 Kbps
Channel(s)                               : 1 channel
Sampling rate                            : 44.1 KHz
Compression mode                         : Lossy
Stream size                              : 3.41 MiB (100%)
Writing library                          : LAME3.82

all information, aside from that noted earlier, remains the same over affected and unaffected files.

I am unaware as to other file checks I can perform, and whether Chrome has discontinued support for some variations.

So
Is there a suitable format to re-encode the files to? (and should this continue to use LameMP3? Or a different codec?)

Or

Is there an alternative solution that may be viable without either waiting for Google to correct this (the issue also appears in Chrome Canary, so I've low hopes for a quick turnaround from them), or forcing clients to rollback and stop updating?

For reference, all other browsers play the audio correctly, requiring non-Chrome use is also not a viable option.

Answer 1

I'm not 100% on the specifics of this, however, it looks like some MP3s using older versions of Lame, or longer than a couple of minutes, or at high (300 <) or low (128 >=) bitrates seem to be affected. It appears to be webkit-related, as it also affects Safari users.

HOWEVER!

As a solution, re-encoding the MP3 files using 160Kbps bitrate, and the latest version of LAME (3.99.5) seems to have fixed this, and they now play normally across all major browsers again.