65. Import a CD in CD-Quality (Lossless) Format BEFORE YOU BEGIN 9 Import a Music CD into iTunes 64 Customize Importing Options SEE ALSO 66 Convert Audio Files to Other Formats 80 Use Your iPod as an External Hard Drive People use iTunes and the iPod for the most amazing things these days. The makers of the Lord of the Rings movies, for example, used iPods to transfer in-progress audio and video clips to each other for editing and approval. (You'll see how to make use of your iPod's external hard drive function in 80 Use Your iPod as an External Hard Drive .) 65. Import a CD in CD-Quality (Lossless) Format It's easy to imagine that, in this capacity, it was important for the filmmakers to keep their audio clips in as pristine a format as possible to ensure that the clips could be edited and sent from studio to studio without any degradation in audio quality. This is the purpose for which lossless audio formats exist: AIFF , WAV , and the most recently developed one, Apple Lossless. These formats create audio files that are much larger than compressed MP3 or AAC files, but these pristine, CD-quality audio streams don't suffer from any quality loss as they're imported and exported from one format to another. If your needs are such that you have to have a particular CD added to your iTunes Library in pristine CD-quality format rather than the space-saving compressed formats customarily used by iTunes, you can choose one of these lossless formats for your importing duties . Your iPod won't be able to hold as much music in these formats, but it'll sound a lot better. NOTE Apple Lossless and AIFF formats are not supported on the iPod shuffle. 1. | Configure iTunes to Import in a Lossless Format Open the iTunes Preferences window (choose Edit, Preferences in Windows or iTunes, Preferences on the Mac). Click the Importing tab. Choose a lossless format from the Import Using drop-down menu. Choose AIFF Encoder or WAV Encoder for cross-platform, uncompressed files that are no smaller than the raw CDDA files on the music CD itself. (AIFF is more Mac-oriented, WAV is more of a Windows standard.) Alternatively, choose Apple Lossless Encoder for lossless music files that are about 50% reduced in size from the raw CDDA datathese results are still about six times as large as compressed MP3 or AAC files, but this format definitely helps save space. Click OK to use these new settings for future CD imports. | 2. | Insert the Audio CD Insert the CD you want to import into the CD drive. Wait for the track names to download from the Gracenote database. | 3. | Make Necessary Edits to Track Names Double-check the track name information downloaded from the Gracenote database against the track listing on the insert in your CD's jewel case; make any corrections to the track names that are necessary. | 4. | Import the CD Tracks Click Import . iTunes imports the CD tracks and saves them to files in the chosen lossless format. These files are represented in iTunes in the same way as any other song files; the only way to tell the difference is the contents of the Kind field. (See 71 Customize Which Information Columns Are Displayed if the Kind column is not visible.) | 5. | Locate the Uncompressed Audio Tracks You might want to use the imported AIFF or WAV files in an external audio-editing program. To do this, you must locate the original files on your hard disk. Select one of the imported song files and choose File, Show Song File to open a Finder or Windows Explorer window showing the original file in its location on the disk. You can then open the audio file in your favorite sound-editing software. | |