Transcoding: stdout error / Writing to temporary file

[kehan]

I'm running version 4.6 on debian.
I'm having trouble getting flac -> mp3 transcoding to work, which I believe is due to something going wrong with stdout. Normal decodes work, but sending the output file to stdout with either flac or ffmpeg causes the terminal to endlessly fill with random characters.

Alternatively, as a work around, would it be possible to have the mid-point file -- in this case, the .wav created after decoding the .flac -- be written to a temporary directory where lame or ffmpeg could finish the transcode.

Thanks to anyone that can comment.