I am getting an iPod in a few days and I want to start archiving MP3's .
I just was wondering which is giving the best results:

Fraunhoffer or Lame
CBR or VBR
should I rip 256kb CBR or 192VBR ?

And another question when i rip VBR i hae peaks higher than 320kb but my iPod only plays up to 320, will he be able to play songs like this wothout problems ?

It's important for me because i wan't to start archiving and i don't want to do it all over because my seting where not good enough

I've had no problems using any of the alt presents in Lame which - in my opinion - is the only way to go if you are using Windows. If you are using Mac, I say that the standard combination of iTunes 3 and iPod is very handy and nice. And the vbr from iTunes are of course also working perfectly.

You're a lucky man. I just had an iPod for a review, but I'd like to lay my hands the 20gb myself.

Emanuel

just go "LAME --alt-preset standard" - or do some ABX testing of various modes, e.g.:
1.--alt-preset standard
2.--alt-preset standard -Y
3.--alt-preset extreme
4.--alt-preset insane
5.--alt-preset ... (put a bitrate instead of "...")

against original and against each other. But AFAIK - --alt-preset standard quality-wise will suffice.

EDIT:
with LAME VBR frames cannot exceed 320kbps - so don't worry about iPod and VBR (its not a crappo sony )

can you please tell me the difference between:

--alt-preset standard
--alt-preset standard -Y

which of the two is (supposed to be) the best quality

"--alt-preset standard".

-Y turns off noise shaping in ScaleFactorBand 21 (>16 KHz), which often results in a lowpass-like situation at 16 KHz.

-Y will give you 10-40% smaller file size than alt preset standard without the Y switch. That means 10-40% more songs on your ipod.

Of course, test to hear the difference. I cannot hear one at all - but I do not claim to have perfect hearing!

When you have several gigabytes of space available, I don't think space is that much of an issue. I surely wouldn't go to great lengths to save space, and potentially harm sound quality.

Although I will not argue with your sound quality comment, I agree - do not sacrifice quality for space unless you absolutely HAVE to -

I will say that music libraries in excess of 1500 songs are not uncommon. You will be hard pressed to get over 1500 songs on an ipod 10gb with aps.

"Well, just limit your library then" - is the response. One of the GREAT things about the ipod is that it synchronizes with itunes or mmjb. Unless you constantly want to add and delete from your library, you have to keep the total library size under the ipods hard drive size to take advantage of this awesome feature.

Therefore, on an IPOD (a quality player but not a high end stereo component that plays all of the frequencies), the -Y switch does not change the sound quality for me.