Can Anyone Please Walk Me Through This?

I second the VBR mp3 file suggestion using EAC. In addition, as I've mentioned elsewhere, with the ipod, storage isn't your main concern, battery life is. The ipod has only a 16 or 32mb buffer (I think it's 16 though). With uncompressed wav files this keeps the hd spinning nearly constantly and battery life will plummet from an already sub-par battery life of 7-8 hours. Using my ipod, with several amps and with several headphones (the best being shure e5's) I was unable to distinguish between wavs and vbr mp3s.

The VBR mp3's are so good, that I picked up an m audio firewire audiophile external soundcard and run a digital out with coax Signal Cable from my computer into my stereo. The sound is excellent. The only reason I can occasionally tell a difference is because the mp3s sound a bit quiter for a given volume setting--I have no idea why this is though.

Avoid the standard 128kbps mp3s like the plague (I'm sure you know this already).

Edesilva, the reason why I'm advocating mp3s over wavs is because of the buffer size and battery life of the ipod. I have one, I've tried it and, unless you want to use it for more than one trip around the block, it will not work. For better or worse, the ipod is a player created for small files of compressed music. This is also why I'm advocating VBR over CBR. I'm furthermore advocating -alt preset standard over extreme or insane because, even the creator of the -alt preset settings admits that there is no audible sound difference between the three--simply file bloat. He admits to creating it for people who must feel like they have the best regardless of logic of reason (oddly enough, I believe that applies to 99% of the people on A'gon). Check out hydrogenaudio for more infomation.

The -alt preset standard generally produces file sizes that are roughly double that of 128 kbps CBR, but are still small enough to make the ipod's pathetic buffer size happy.

I'm not advocating mp3s as God's gift to music. I'm hoping (and I think) that this is a sad little chapter in music history. I think it's only a matter of a couple of years before we have our 1.8" 100GB Toshiba drives with 1GB of buffer and we can all happily use wav files (of course, you still can't tag and organize them...)

The point I am making though, is that most people's experience with 128kbps CBR mp3's shouldn't turn them off to enjoying good portable sound right now. Arm yourself with EAC, choose an -alt preset of somekind (ABX them first to make sure you're really happy) and enjoy the music.

I disagree on a few points. First, read this article here:

http://www.geocities.com/altbinariessoundsmusicclassical/mp3test.html

Realize that 1.) To claim that your hearing is superior to some of these folks, while certainly possible, is unlikely. And if you're going to be straining like they were in a critical listening session, the ipod is not for you. 2.) The -alt preset mp3 encoding suggested in this thread is far superior to the mp3s used as test samples in this article.

Also, Apple's lossless compression is...lossless. I'm not really sure what you're going to add to lossless in any setting to make it sound better.

And, forgive me, but aren't you looking for a format for an ipod? You're not sitting in an anechoic chamber. You're going to be listening to headphones (and if it's the Apple earbuds this whole thread was for naught). You're probably not even going to be using a portable amp and I can guarantee you this, without an amp, any headphone straight out of the ipod jack is utterly incapable of resolving any difference in what may, or may not, exist between -alt present mp3s, Apple lossless and wavs. Even with an amp, my Shure e5's (while they might not be the ultimate headphone, they're pretty close) and Senn 600's made my VBR mp3s sound pretty fantastic--every bit as good as the original wavs.

What this all boils down to (and correct me if I'm wrong) is that you haven't even tried these formats yet. As always, trust your own ears. And while I am very thankful for a great deal of advice gotten from A'gon, I have come to the point where I realize, based solely on my hearing (which as a musician isn't shabby) that a lot of it is crap posted by people that must feel that they own the best. If possible, do some ABX testing so you can be honest with yourself. I think you'll be shocked. But regardless, I'm interested in hearing the results

I'm sure there are situations where there is an audible difference between mp3s and wavs. After all, mp3s are a lossy compression format. However, the ipod is not one of those situations. But for this reason, if your sole interest in this project is to make digital backups of your music, then obviously do not use the mp3 format. Personally, I have backups in FLAC (a lossless compression format) and those same cds in -alt preset standard mp3s for use on my ipod. Even if you have a thousand cd's, this solution isn't going to cost you more than about $100 in hard drive space. You'll have the peace of mind knowing that your music is backed up in a perfect format and you'll have the added benefit of enjoying a boatload of great sounding music and battery life (as good as the ipod gets at least).

Edesilva, you might be interested in the last post on this thread on hydrogenaudio regarding the -alt presets. By the way, Dibrom is the author of those presets.

http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?showtopic=3155&st=0&&

Haha, love the comment about brass cones and mahogany cones:) When stated that way, yes, I am in complete agreement with you.

Also, in your defense, I have not been able to compare APS and APX as extensively as you on multiple systems so I'm quite happy to take your word for it. What is the typical difference in file size between those two?