Moving from PC to Mac - .Flac to apple lossless

[KublaKhan]

I ripped my entire cd collection using dbpower amp (and sometimes EAC) to my Sony PC.

I'm getting rid of my PC and moving everything over to my new Macbook.

1. Should I use the power amp converter that's on my PC to convert my flac files to apple lossless and then bring them over to my Mac OR should I bring the flac files over to my Mac and THEN convert them to apple lossless? I think I had read somewhere that doing the latter will save the meta data. HOWEVER...

2. Can I buy dbpower amp and converter for my Mac? If not, what program can you suggest for converting on my Mac (if converting the flac files only after they're on the Mac is indeed the best idea) AND

3. In the future, once all my files are apple lossless and on my Mac, what program should I rip new cds with on my Mac?

BTW, I only want lossless files and I'm neurotic about having bit perfect music files since I've given up my expensive cd player and am using my computer hard drive as a source for my audiophile home rig.

Thanks in advance!

[LtData]

Re: Moving from PC to Mac - .Flac to apple lossless

1. If you convert your files to ALAC (Apple Lossles), make sure you also run the M4A Optimize codec on them also. Make sure you check the "Generate RTP Hint Track". The Optimize codec is in the m4a/mp4 beta codec thread in the "M4A Utility Codecs" download.

2. dMC is Windows-only, sorry. As for a program to recommend, I have no experience in this matter.

3. Again, no experience in this matter

[starry43]

Re: Moving from PC to Mac - .Flac to apple lossless

1. I would suggest converting them before moving. The only meta-data that matters is the tags and those're preserved during the conversion with dBpowerAMP. I hope they finally work out the last few bugs with Apple Lossless soon, but it seems to work fine for now.

2. On Windows you have the tools to convert the files so rather than trying to fiddle with dBpowerAMP in WINE I'd suggest just doing it all on Windows. Can't think of a reason why converting on the Mac would be better.

3. Simply set iTunes to encode to Apple Lossless. Can't do much better than the offical encoder. (Too bad support in iTunes for multiple formats is severely lacking.)