Lossless Collection.

Hey, everybody.

I don't really know if anybody here is an audiophile like I am, but hopefully you can help me.

SO!

Recently I've upgraded my personal listening setup for my iPod. I have a brand new set of cans that I'm burning in now, Grado SR325is, and I picked up this cool little portable headphone amp called the FiiO E7. So I kind of want to upgrade my sound a bit.

In this way, I've been toying with the idea of making a new iTunes library specifically for lossless quality music. (I always use lossless audio on my Cowon, but iPod is way more convenient, even though it doesn't sound as good.)For anybody who doesn't know what lossless audio is, basically it's music, or digital audio that sounds a lot richer and fuller, but takes a TON of space on your computer. (To put this in perspective, normal songs bought from the iTunes market take around 256 KB of space per song, while a lossless file, ONE SONG, takes 60-80 MB.)

Anyhow, I was wondering if this second library is a good idea, and how would I create and maintain 2 separate libraries. Has anybody else done this? (FYI: I was planning on buying a new iPod Classic as well.)

Just some corrections, MP3 compressed is 256KBit per second which results in about 5MB per song, compared to your 60-80MB.

And for me, lossless does not sound "a lot richer and fuller". I am not able to tell the difference between an MP3 of at least 192Kbit and the lossless WAV file, at least not with a decent MP3 compressor like lame.

I am not sure if the Ipod can handle lossless files at all, but even if it did, my 2 cents, MP3 alone is enough.
I even keep the masters of my own songs "just" as 320KBit MP3s...

And, IF I would keep something lossless I would not use WAV. I know you did not mention the format, but with FLAC for example the filesize won't stay at 60-80 but at 40-60MB per song.

I'll respectfully disagree. Even high bit-rate MP3 is not the same as lossless. How noticeable the difference is depends a lot on your gear and the music you're listening to. I have a number of Rolling Stones SACDs. On my gear, there's very little difference between SACD and normal CD--at least as far as the Stones are concerned.

Jascha Heifetz, on the other hand, was a revelation. Even my wife (at the time, who had been hassling me about buying the SACD player) walked into the room a few days later and asked, "Is this that new thing you bought? WOW!"

So I can relate to Little Plink's desire to go lossless. I rip my CDs to my iPod Classic at 320, but I only use the iPod in the car or when I'm out and about, and in those cases the smaller file size outweighs the need for the highest fidelity.

Unfortunately, I can't help you on the issue of maintaining separate libraries because I've never done that. I suspect a Google search on the topic will get you all the info you need. Good luck!

Pete

What OS? And what lossless format are you planning to use?

Nice Grados! I'm a fan myself, with two pair of SR-80s. I've been slowly converting my music to lossless, but getting rid of the lower quality files in the process.

If you have a mac, you can create a second profile and use that for the second library (since there's no easy way to share a library across two profiles on one mac).

I'm with Pete. The lossless can and does make a difference with well recorded material on a high quality playback system. What I do is burn my library to FLAC (or Apple Lossless if that makes you Appleheads feel better ). Then I downconvert to whatever MP3 resolution is required for the ipod. I create the MP3 lib from the FLAC Lib.

I still use dbpoweramp. There may be better things out there nowdays. dbpoweramp offers a connection to the accurate rip database which can tell you if your rip is reliable, (there are caviats, like CDs from alternate pressings etc.) It also offers secure rip (multiple rips and comparison of the resulant CRCs). Lastly it offers batch modes where you can point it at an entire library and tell it to convert from one encoding scheme to another and put the result in a new lib. Start er up and the next morning you have a second lib. WIth the cost of external USB storage so low, it is a pretty economical way to go.

Reviving the thread...

It's nice to know there are other audiophiles out there who also play the uke. I just started getting into the audiophile scene myself and I am actually trying to do the same thing, maintain 2 libraries (1. Apple Lossless and 2. FLAC). Once I play around a little more I will let you know what I come up with.

The stock iPod itself does not play FLAC but Apple Lossless is the closest you can get. If you do what other audiophiles od and Rockbox your iPod you can actually play FLAC files but I am not sure if the iPod hardware itself can handle the file, it might actually have to downsample (if that's the correct terminology) the file before it goes through headphones.

===Inventory===
Source: iPod 6G 80GB, iPhone 4 64GB, Studio V (coming soon)
Earphones: FitEar To Go! 334, Shure 535 (Null Audio upgrade cable), V-Moda M80
Amp: Cypher Labs Algorhtym Solo -> iBasso D12