I have some CDs ripped with EAC, which I didn't encode with my favorite MusePack... these are very valuable for me... And I don't know what to choose: to encode them to APE or FLAC or just stay with wav.

1. If I'll encode to some lossless:
+ they'll take ~60% of the original without any quality loss (sounds interesting, because I listen to music only on my computer now and going to use quite expensive CD-R media (TDK Reflex or something like that) for back-ups)

- APE archives are unstable, little scratch on a CD-R - and everything is lost! (of course, I don't have the original CDs)
- Maybe some of them I'll encode to MPC. For that decoding to wav will be needed (?).

2. If I'll stay with wav:
+ I'll be able to encode them to some good lossy format in the future or just burn some Audio CD of CD-R (maybe some day I'll listen music outside the computer)

- They are taking a lot of space on my HDD and will take a lot on the expensive CD-Rs...

hm. the problem of burning the wav files to cd is that filenames will be cut and you also have no tagging with wav files so you could use a tag program and rename the file by the tag.

lossless backup is good but you need a mpc encoder like oggdrop that can read out the tags and an on the fly decoder. with vorbis that would be perfect but with mpc not as there is no oggdropxpd for it. ;-)

i personnaly would buy a hd and backup the wav files there

If they are so valuable to you, just have backups of the backups. BTW CD-Rs are not expensive... Anyway, burn the WAVs to one CD. The compress (with FLAC or SHN) the WAVs and also use whatever lossy system you like. You should be able to store both in the same CD. That way, using 2 CDs, you have 3 different versions of the same music.

FLAC does not have this problem because it's streamable.

Personally, I use FLAC to backup my superprecious CDs. It's robust and I can usually get 2CDs onto each CDR. 50% cost cut isn't anything to scoff at.

ape archives burnt to mode 1 cds aren't any more unstable than other normal data cds. If some data cd you backup gets 'one little scratch' is it wrecked? No, not unless you burnt on very, very cheap cds. Data cds have built in error-correction, and if you keep them in a safe environment and on good quality media they can last a very long time, irregardless of the type of data stored on them.

I personally store two cds worth of ape files on each cd-r, rar'd, with .par archives filling the remaining space on the disk. Storing the lossy version is a waste of space for me; I have a fast computer, and if I need to I'll just reencode the ape files.

I think he means that a Monkey's Audio file can't be decoded partially (only upto the first error).

Hmm, well thats different. In any case, if any of my backups get errors somehow, I'd rather toss them and find the music again than have a song with glitches in it. Though I suppose if the music were extremely rare, you might have to live with the glitchy songs .

Also the fact that even though there is an error, it will not always be an audible one, and if it is, decode, edit it out and re-encode to lossless.

Not a bit for bit copy anymore but still much better than up to the error and no further!

Kristian

As far as errors on CD's are concerned, Standard UDF is a better file system than the default Joliet (if you don't specify than that is usually what you'll get). UDF also supports 128 char long file names. But much better than Joliet and UDF is the so-called "Mt Ranier" formatting (kind of a hyper UDF) which supposedly is MUCH more fault tolerant. But of course, the RW drive has to support it (and most drives older than 1 year won't). My Yamaha F1 does...but of course, the Ranier option isn't there in Stomp's RNM (may be in DLA???). It is available in Ahead (Nero) InCD & Roxio DCD.

xen-uno

so does Mt. Ranier decrease total available space on a cd-r? or how else could they add more error correction?

And how can one find out if a burner is compatible with the format?

I do not like CD-Rs at all. It takes forever to create them and you need to pay a lot for high quality medias.

If you are willing to pay that, conside this instead:

* Lossless files on your primary computer
* External harddrive for backup

If one of the disks crashes or you accidentially delete some files, then you have everything on a backup drive.

Whether you do with MAC or FLAC or something else is a question of taste.

Floyd > so does Mt. Ranier decrease total available space on a cd-r

Yes...DCD puts the reader software (enables OS to read) on every disk (they call it EasyWriter), plus as you mentioned "how else could they add more error correction". It seems to take longer to burn...but if the data is more reliably read in the future then it's worth the xtra time. Look at the manual or the mfr's web site (there may a firmware update). Downside? My iRiver 350 won't read Ranier disks.

xen-uno