Music File Formats - AIFF vs ALC

[BTs_GhostSniper]

i think it was a typo and he meant 8.4 GB.

Ah, makes a little more sense now.  But even 8.4GB is a far cry from 100GB.  But too late for me to change my evil ways now!  250GB 2nd Hard Drive here I come!!!

[:MoD:Shade]

TY Civic 

[crypt]

GS, just try 320 kbps AAC, no sense in having that much space for music, I doubt you will hear any difference. (I can't hear any with 128 kbps AAC from the iTMS from AIFF CD quality)

[BTs_GhostSniper]

GS, just try 320 kbps AAC, no sense in having that much space for music, I doubt you will hear any difference. (I can't hear any with 128 kbps AAC from the iTMS from AIFF CD quality)

But what I'm doing is compiling my own CDs.  I have to keep them in AIFF format so that I can listen to them in my car (most factory car stereos don't read anything other than AIFF).[/size]

[Civrock]

you can burn MP3 formate (and any other that iTunes reads) to AIFF with iTunes (it converts it while burning). you simply choose audio-cd in the iTunes burning preferences. no noticeable quality loss.

[BTs_GhostSniper]

you can burn MP3 formate (and any other that iTunes reads) to AIFF with iTunes (it converts it while burning). you simply choose audio-cd in the iTunes burning preferences. no noticeable quality loss.

That's not true.  Try playing them on the Ford Mustang's 1,140-watt factory stereo system cranked up to the max and there is a BIG difference.[/size]

[*DAMN Elandrion]

I would use the Apple Lossless Codec, which uses less space than AIFF and should encode the files without quality losses...

[BTs_Mysterio]

Indeed, ALC is much better than AIFF.

[BTs_GhostSniper]

Indeed, ALC is much better than AIFF.

But will ALC play on a standard factory car stereo cd player?

[Civrock]

as i said... you can set it to "Audio-CD" in the iTunes burn settings (preferences/options) and whenever you burn a CD it converts all songs you burn to AIFF automatically.

[BTs_Mysterio]

....with higher quality.

[BTs_GhostSniper]

....with higher quality.

But will it lose any sound quality on a 1,140-Watt sound system cranked up to the max?  I'm telling you, every time I've tried to convert back to AIFF it just doesn't have the same deep bass on the Mustang's sound system.[/size]

[Civrock]

AIFF is an old codec. ALC on the other side is quite new and uses therefore a much better technology. it has better sound-quality while using less (not much) space. audio-CDs simply still use AIFF because it's the industry standard... there are several better codecs already.

[BTs_Mysterio]

Then I'd blame the sound system for having a bad choice of compatibility.

[BTs_GhostSniper]

AIFF is an old codec. ALC on the other side is quite new and uses therefore a much better technology. it has better sound-quality while using less (not much) space. audio-CDs simply still use AIFF because it's the industry standard... there are several better codecs already.

But just because it's using better technology and has better sound quality doesn't get rid of the fact that I'm going from AIFF format to AIFF format.  Therefore, no matter how good ALC is, it isn't going to improve on something that was originally recorded in AIFF format.[/size]

[Civrock]

of course, the quality won't improve by converting to a different codec. the only possibility to get a better original quality would be to have a better codec than AIFF on the audio-CD itself already.
the point here is, though, which codec wouldn't lower the quality by converting but have the important advantage of less space usage.

[BTs_GhostSniper]

the point here is, though, which codec wouldn't lower the quality by converting but have the important advantage of less space usage.

How much smaller would say a 5 minute long song be in ALC format versus AIFF format?[/size]

[Civrock]

lemme check it out... i'll edit this post with the answer asap.


okay... a 5:10 minutes song is 53.5MB big in AIFF formate here. the same song converted to ALC is only 35.2MB small. that's about a third less in size, without losing any quality.

[BTs_GhostSniper]

Well, the true test will be converting a song from AIFF format, to ALC format, then back to AIFF format and playing it on the Mustang's sound system.  I think I'll use my Violent Femms cd to try this out with.  I'll let you guys know tomorrow if the conversion stands up to 1,140-Watts of pure musical bliss.[/size]

[Civrock]

very interesting, waiting eagerly for the result...

don't use some shitty CD-R, though, that can lower the quality noticeably... especially in this quality range.