Ripping to Mac OSX

I have a MAC Book Pro (4 MB RAM) and use iTunes with AIFF with error correction to transfer my CD's to a Seagate Free Agent Go Pro 500 GB external hard drive connected to the MAC via Firewire. It takes around 4-5+ minutes per CD. AIFF takes more disk space and produces the best sound quality. My MAC is connected to an Ayre USB DAC connected (balanced cables) to my Ayre AX-7e Integrated amplifier.

So I'm guessing that some folks would say - if you've already ripped your library to Apple Lossless and are looking to improve the sound, it's better to re-rip everything to AIFF than to simply convert the existing Apple Lossless files to AIFF by pushing a button? Or does it not make a difference?

Now that I have my audio collection ripped to a hard drive connected to mac mini for streaming via usb dac, how do I create a file with mp3 files of my AIFF files for ipod use?

Ricky, as long as you are using WAV as a file format, I don't think the ripping part will make a huge diff.

Audio card will def. make a dif.

Other comments:

1. as your music collection grows, you may quickly get beyond the typical artist, album type file structure. With a few cds this is ok, but quickly becomes unmanagable with more

2. I have a server running with 6 TB of HD space, and 6000+ CDs ripped all as WAV. As other posters have noted, storing the files as WAV, you loose the ability to track the file Meta data. The way I structured my file tree, its not too important.

since the folks who wrote the playback software were not typically into classical music, there is no search function for composer, so I structured my classical WAV files by composer first, then type, then artist, makes for much quicker searches.

For Jazz, rock and Pop, they each ahve their own main folder, with artist broken down under that.

HD space is pretty cheap these days, so why squish the file size down just to save on HD space?

3. Make sure you make a back up copy of your music files since the question to ask is not IF an HD crashes but WHEN.

best.

My system is similar to hgeitsman's - I always use AIFF with good results. The external HD is a 2 TB mirror by Cavlary connected to the Mac Pro with firewire. The iTunes music leaves the computer via a 1 foot long Toslink to a signal converter that, in turn sends the signal to the pre/pro via SPDIF digital cable. I tried USB out of the Mac but if you go to Utilities (Midi set-up) you will find that the USB "out" gives far worse specs than the "built-in Output" of the Toslink connection. The USB option gives you only one default setting of 44,100 hz 2 Ch 16 bit whereas the "built-in Output" (using the headphone jack with a Toslink adapter) gives you at least three options to choose from up to 96,000 hz 2 Ch 24 bit. For me the best sound results are at the 48,000 hz 2 Ch 24 bit choice.

iTunes and their AIFF format has been remarkably good both for importing and playback.