Mac Laptop & Sound Cards

Any idea how much more space a Lossless file takes up compared to an AAC? I have a 320gb external hard drive and will be loading about 5,000 songs and 2,000 photos.

Dbphd - it's universal. The sound card functionality is built-in to each and every Mac regardless of form factor except the servers.

Lossless takes up considerably more space then AAC, but nowhere near as much as WAV or AIFF.

I have about 15,000 songs Apple Lossless songs which is about 1,500 CDs (including extended classical and jazz pieces) on a 400Gb hard drive. It takes up about 335Gb, and I maintain a complete back up on a separate drive. Keep in mind that you never get the full amount of the drive.

Hard to say on pictures since I don't know what size images you shoot, whether you have RAW files, or they are all 800dpi JPGs or what. (It's that whole compression thing again.)

Sounds as though a 350Gb drive will do for a good long while. If you haven't bought one yet, get a 400. Storage is unbelievably inexpensive. A good source is newegg.

Ckorody - Thanks for the helpful info. I'm looking at my notes from an Apple training session about a month ago. I wrote (and remember being told) that the highest resolution is Lossless. I'd thought that was WAV file. However, I asked which setting would potentially give me the best sound (resolution) quality. I was told the following:

MP3 - lowest
AIFF - next lowest
WAV - middle
AAC - 2nd highest
Lossless - highest

If I want the best audiophile quality downloads and burning, what would be my choice? The 'expert' at the Apple Store said AAC is the best compromise between high quality resolution and storage space.

I think I'll check out newegg and look for a 500 gb for backup.

If you are using a Mac (which you are) the best quality and the most flexible format is Apple Lossless. Apple Lossless offers an additional advantage, it deals with metadata very well - the various bits of information about each song.

I think your notes must be a bit scrambled because WAV and AIFF are uncompressed audio - they are as good as Lossless but take more space and do not handle metadata as well. AIFF is the file type you pull off a CD...

Here is the way that most people here do the math. Depending exactly on what you get, a very large drive is under $150. A backup is another $150. Here is an example

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136025

Now let's calculate the value of a 1,000 CDs and add to that the time it is going to take you to rip them. Suddenly the cost of the hard drive is not a significant part of the equation - which makes the difference between Apple Lossless and AAC moot.

Dbphd, in my dedicated audio room, i use all Classe gear with totem mani 2 speakers. i have my den setup using totem speakers, dk design amp, sony dvp9000es cd/sacd player, and the airport express hooked up thru my wireless network. a mac mini is my music server using itunes. i also have another system in my living room that has a multi source multi output receiver with an airport express that allows me to get my itunes music to my living room and to the outside speakers. my macbook can control the itunes on my mac mini from any location in the house.
future plans are purchasing an external dac for my den that the sony cd player and the airport express will plug into.
IMO, if you are looking at purchasing external hard drives for your pc, you need to get a couple or buy a RAID setup so you will have no single point of failure. i have a friend that lost his disk drive and his purchased itunes (worth $3600) was wiped out. if you need 500gb now, buy a terabyte drive, you will use it faster than you think. right now, i have multiple 500gb drives and each 500gb drive is backed up to another 500gb drive daily. leopard comes with time machine that automatically backs up your data. i'm in the process of purchasing a multi-terabyte RAID disk subsystem that will allow me to get rid of a few 500gb drives and have 1 disk subsystem that is fault tolerant using RAID 5 technology.