well, after a lot of worry about sound quality etc. i stumbled upon EAC. thought it was good, until it started leaving me distorted tracks or not ripping them at all! so i would just go back to ripping to wave using itunes or just ripping to itunes AAC 320kbs. any thoughts? i think 320 AAC is excellent quality eh? i can't understand the tests here that focus on these low bit rates. why not just go higher?

so, is itunes a good wave ripper?
is aac 320 any good?

thanks so much, you guys are rockstars!
craig

I think it is adequate but I am pretty sure that it does not clear the cache on drives thus negating the whole point of the secure mode. Plus it doesn't have AccurateRip.

But hey, if you're satisfied, that's all that matters

How did you discover this?

distorted tracks?was the cd scratched up pretty bad? did you try the last version of EAC or try dbpoweramp?

Weird! I've never had any trouble with EAC. If there are no errors (if the disc is in good condition) you should get a perfect copy of the audio data, re-packaged in WAV format (assuming you are ripping to WAV). At least it reports the errors... Some ripping programs don't. (I've never ripped with iTunes.)

Most people won't be able to hear the difference between the CD and a 320 kbps file in any format! If you've got plenty of disc space, go-ahead and use a high bitrate.

The whole point of compression is smaller files. Lower bitrates give you smaller files. People are looking for, "How low can I go, and still get CD quality?" Or, "Which format is better?" At higher bitrates, less data is being thrown-away. So, the compression doesn't have to be as "smart" about which data gets thrown-away, and all of the formats/aglorithms will sound like the original.

There is not much interest in testing at higher bitrates, since all of the files sound exactly like the uncompressed originals... So, all of the testing is done at lower bitrates.

If you are not concerned with file size at all, you can just use (uncompressed) WAV files. Or, you can use lossless compression, if your player can play it. ...If the bitrate is high enough, the lossy files will be no-smaller than a lossless FLAC or Wavpack file. (Lossless compression is going to be in the ballpark of 700 kbps. An uncompressed 16-bit, 44.1kHz WAV file is about 1,400 kbps.)

thanks so much for the info and responses. i was going for lossless, but it was draining my ipod battery as it had to decompress to play. 320 just works for me sound wise and psychologically. good point about the low bitrates. those tests are necessary if space is an issue. for me space isnt an issue.
now, what is this about cache not being cleared out with itunes? don't really understand what that is.
c

I'd take that specific concern with a serious grain of salt. There is very little (if any) reliable information about exactly how iTunes extracts audio data. It is known that it will present erroneous data without informing you, however.