Importing files to iMac

I've been confusing kHz with kbps.   iTunes offers 48 kHz at 16 bits for AIFF.  Thanks.

Following advice of Abe Collins at an Asylum thread I reset iTunes AIFF encoding to automatic and 16 bits.  I've now become pretty proficient at resetting the Sony HAP, clearing the iTunes library, resetting encoding, and clearing the memory of the HAP transfer app.  The actual process of ripping to the Sony HAP-Z1ES requires of me only inserting a CD or SACD into the reader I use with my iMac.  The resulting sound is excellent, indistinguishable from that with the disc played on the Sony SCD XA5400ES.

I'm not sure what the HAP-Z1ES does.  I think it may upscale uncompressed encoding to DSD during playback, and attempt to address the loss from compressed encoding.

I should have written that I don't know if it writes a hirez file or converts it during playback.  I do know an SACD source sounds like an SACD.

Spencer,

The statement I can make without fear of dispute is that I don't know what the Sony HAP-Z1ES does, but whatever it does, the sound satisfies me.

My principal SACD player is an Ayre C-5xeMP in another setup.  Neither the HAP-Z1ES nor the XA5400ES quite matches it, but the HAP does sound very similar to the Sony disc player.

db  

I've managed to rip an SACD using FLAC with XLD and the tracks show up in an XLD window on my iMac, but I don't know how to make the HAP transfer app find the file.  It seems to look for files in iTunes.

db

I have XLD, JRiver, and Audirvana running on my iMac.  Yet iTunes seems to be the default app for music files.  Should I quit out of iTunes if I want to try ripping with FLAC?