Before I rip my entire collection, and I have opted to use wavpack and dBpoweramp to rip. First thing obviously with the cost of HDD space these days, is there anything I need to know when selecting FAST mode vs HIGH QUALITY MODE, in lossless format, except file size. The difference in file size from fast to HQ is only 10 megs. Even though I am ripping 100's if CDs, I will just buy another HDD.

I am just ripping, archiving, and encoding what I need to MP3 to put on my ipod when I need it.

Am I good to go?

Welcome to the exciting world of WavPack!

Since both settings are lossless, the only differences I can think of are file size and encoding/decoding time. Some prefer to use longer encoding times to get a quicker decode time (lots of transcoding planned or portable player usage, for instance). Some only care about size and will encode several times longer to save an extra percent of space. There are extremes to fit all needs.

In my experience, the high setting (-h) is still pretty darn fast on encode and decode, while giving a fair bit of savings on filesize over the fast mode. If you are set on encoding once to WavPack and then once to MP3, then maybe you already have your answer. It sounds like the lossless files will be saved as an archive, so you have to ask yourself if you value time or space more.

Hope that helps. Have fun.

As sidewalking says, all settings (excluding hybrid mode!) will get you the same lossless audio - it all comes down to file size, encoding speed and decoding speed.

For some, file size is paramount; for others, it's decoding and/or encoding speed.

My comparison may help you to find the sweet spot that you are after. You can sort by compression, encoding/decoding speed, or even export to CSV to play around in Excel. I find this a useful way of looking for the setting with the best balance (which is always up to the individual).

Edit: FYI: I use WavPack -hm. I picked this way back as compression was paramount to me, although I wanted reasonable speed. As time goes on I wonder how important those few GB in my collection are. That said, I have no issue with the encoding speed (~43x) on my PC, so have no inclination to change.