Does Apple Lossless + iTunes + Windows = Perfect

Additonally, (4) is iTunes the only way to get music on an iPod that will retain song informatin (ie. cover art, titlte, etc)? (5) This one is non-audio but video related. I have Mpegs/Divx videos that I have downloaded from the internet over the years (old saturday night live skits, funny commercials, etc.). Would I be able to watch those on the latest iPod video? Would there be some conversion that is required?

Thanks again!

Why not just play the lossless songs from the iPod directly into your stereo? No Kmixer!

A helpful tutorial can be found here: http://www.music-reviewed.com/guides.php

Here's my understanding to help get you started:

If you're going to burn CDs onto your hard drive and you're using a PC the best software is EAC (exact audio copy) and it's free. The Kmixer in windows has nothing to do with burning your CD, only with playing it back. So if you burn your cds uncompressed with EAC (and you burn using 'test and copy') you're fine...you will have secured the music on your computer in the best way possible and don't have to worry about needing to redo it. the files on your hard drive will be exact copies of the tracks on the cd. A tutorial can be found here: http://www.music-reviewed.com/guides.php?page=audio_cdr&PHPSESSID=9efa04612a928b00985b57186e1df2f8

Playing the CDs with a PC: Apparently the way to get around listening through the Kmixer is to download an ASIO driver. It's free. Go to Empirical Audio for info on how to install this and info on all aspects of hard drive audio here: http://www.empiricalaudio.com/ (find the link for computer audio)

Playing the CDs using itunes and or foobar (among others.) Steve at empirical audio (see above link) explains his preferences using these programs. Apparently if you're using a PC, foobar is the way to go for the best sound but i think the difference might be very slight so if using foobar (free on the internet) is a problem for you, just go with itunes. You can always change later and music on your hard drive is never affected.

Ipod. Once you have your music uncompressed on your hard drive you'll probably want to convert it to to lossless for your ipod to save space. in itunes you just drag the music files into the open itunes window and it will do this automatically i think. you might need to alter your settings in the program. the music on your hard drive is uneffected. from itunes you then just drag the music you want onto your ipod.

Im not an expert so use the links above to make sure i'm not giving you incorrect info. the bottom line is that you just want to make sure to burn your music properly the first time and fortunately that's the easiest part. playing back can get more difficult if you're concerned about getting the best performance with a PC but even if you miss a step, it's only a matter of changing settings later when you become more familiar with the process.