Going over to the Dark Side?


Oh no! So, I finally succumbed to temptation yesterday and got the new 30GB iPod. When I got it, I figured I would store all my songs in .WAV or Apple lossless. Yesterday I spent 6 hours choosing songs from a variety of disks and loading them into iTunes via Apple lossless. Sounded great. But now I'm getting greedy. I think about all the CDs I have (over 1000 easily), and the fact that the iPod would be used for listening while skiing, flying, or in the car, none of which is an excellent listening environment. I already have a reference music system, and at home I'll be listening mainly to vinyl, with the occasional foray into CDs. Now I'm thinking that I could easily triple or quadruple my storage by using the highest AAC setting (320kBS) instead of Apple lossless for my iPod and store a lot more songs.

tonight I ripped a version of a song in Apple lossless and in AAC. I keep listening back and forth through my powered studio monitors. There is a difference, but it seems slight. Then I think of the tiny earbuds, the listening environment, and I hear the siren song of the dark side of lossy compression calling. Oh no!! Run away!!!

Has anyone else faced this dilema, and what was your solution?
arafel

Showing 1 response by arafel

I decided to go with AAC at 320. I plan to keep my CDs, so I don't see the point in ripping in lossless. Although, I guess it could be nice from the point of view of storage. All the racks for my CDs and vinyl and DVDs take up a LOT of space. Of course, before going to that system I'd have to get a nice AD converter. And, having done some work with engineers in pro audio environments, I'm a little skeptical of a computer for playback, as it is such a noisy piece of gear.

Anyway, I'm in the middle of a week long project ripping all the songs I want into the computer. Even at 320 kbps, I'm at almost 20 gigs and still have about 100 more CDs to load. Damn!