Hi ATRL! I decided to make this tutorial because I've noticed that this forum is still kinda obsessed with 320kbps mp3 files and other things from the last century so I thought:
"maybe someone should explain an alternative? Maybe they don't know what a lossless rip is? I think this could interest them".
First of all what is 'lossless quality'? Lossless quality means to rip a CD with the maximum quality that that CD can offer. It's like you are listening the album from the CD all the time but you actually have the tracks on your computer as any other regular rip. There is a variety of lossless formats such as FLAC or WAV but in this tutorial we're going to use Apple's because it's really easy to encode with it via iTunes and the resultant tracks will have the common and friendly .M4A extension.
CAUTION:
Lossless rips are NOT recommended if what you want is to copy or share an album to your iPhone or any other device because of the size of the encoded tracks which is really big (about 30 mb per track). In addition, some players could not recognize this format. The aim is to have a playable copy of the CD in all its glory on the PC.
QUESTIONS:
1. Is this quality better than the tracks I buy on iTunes? Yes.
2. Even if it shows 'mastered for iTunes'? Yes, CD quality is still better than the one that any digital format can offer.
3. Will I notice the difference? I don't know, it depends on you.
Quote:
-- STEP 1: GETTING YOUR CD READY --
Well so let's start. For this tutorial we're going to choose a random album... ARTPOP for example!
(You can acquire it physically on your local Amazon )
Okay so open your PC's CD/DVD drive, put your CD on it and close it.
-- STEP 2: WORKING WITH iTUNES --
Open your iTunes by clicking on its icon ( ) and the follow window will appear:
You just have to select the appropriate option so iTunes can download the album's information (track names, year of release, and other metadata). In this case we can choose either of the shown options.
Now we'll have to set up the importing options:
1. Click on ' Import CD'
2. Select ' Apple Lossless Encoder'
3. Mark that option (highly recommended)
4. Clickon 'OK' to start the ripping process
-- STEP 3: THE RESULTS --
Wait until iTunes finishes importing the tracks and then go to the library to find the album. If you select any of the tracks and check its info you'll confirm that:
1. It's been encoded using Apple's losless format.
2. Its size is kinda big as I said.
So that's all. You can now start listening to it or whatever you want. Don't forget to retire and save the CD in its case.
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I hope this will be useful to you and if you have any questions please don't hesitate to ask