Assistance required to start converting CD collection to FLAC

[Robert Morris]

Can anyone at Illustrate let me know if I have purchased the correct package and where I can find a user manual. I purchased dBpoweramp Music Converte I am new to this package and to FLAC format. I have tried for over a month to access the dashboard to show my downloads and to find a way to download complete alums like you can on itunes. I want to get this right as I hope to do my entire collection. Thanks

[Spoon]

Re: Assistance required to start converting CD collection to FLAC

Sorry which Dashboard?

dBpoweramp Music Converter will allow you to rip CDs to FLAC, after you install the program a manual is presented, otherwise look in Start >> Programs >> dBpoweramp Music Converter >> Help

for the manual.

[srenovo]

Re: Assistance required to start converting CD collection to FLAC

To the best of my knowledge "itunes" does not allow the download of CD quality albums.
The stuff from iTunes or Amazon can not be converted to TRUE flac format - the stuff one gets from iTunes or any of the others is in one form of "lossy format such as MP3 or another.

It can not be reconverted to lossless format. One can make flac files (or ape,or shn, etc) from MP3s etc. but they are not accurate.

The purpose of ripping from CDs to .flac or any other lossless format (but compressed) is that when decompressed all the 1s and 0s from the original digital information of the original CD will all be in the correct form/order.

There are some websites that do have high quality digital music downloads but Apple isn't one of them. I do not know if any of them are good or not but perhaps someone could chime in.

I hope this helps

[garym]

Re: Assistance required to start converting CD collection to FLAC

To the best of my knowledge "itunes" does not allow the download of CD quality albums.
The stuff from iTunes or Amazon can not be converted to TRUE flac format - the stuff one gets from iTunes or any of the others is in one form of "lossy format such as MP3 or another.

It can not be reconverted to lossless format. One can make flac files (or ape,or shn, etc) from MP3s etc. but they are not accurate.

The purpose of ripping from CDs to .flac or any other lossless format (but compressed) is that when decompressed all the 1s and 0s from the original digital information of the original CD will all be in the correct form/order.

There are some websites that do have high quality digital music downloads but Apple isn't one of them. I do not know if any of them are good or not but perhaps someone could chime in.

I hope this helps

correct. Apple does not provide LOSSLESS downloads. There are a few places on the net that do. And once you have only a LOSSY file (m4a, mp3, aac, etc.) you can convert it to a FLAC file or WAV file but IMPORTANTLY it does not do anything other than make the file larger. Converting to FLAC does not turn a lossy file into a lossless file. There is no magic way to add back what was taken away with the lossy conversion. NOTE HOWEVER, that for most music, it is very unlikely that you could tell a high bit rate m4a or mp3 file from the LOSSLESS version. Lossy codecs have gotten very good at creating transparent files that can only rarely be picked out from a comparision with the LOSSLESS CD version in a double blind (ABX) test.

[sdcoomber]

Re: Assistance required to start converting CD collection to FLAC

NOTE HOWEVER, that for most music, it is very unlikely that you could tell a high bit rate m4a or mp3 file from the LOSSLESS version. Lossy codecs have gotten very good at creating transparent files that can only rarely be picked out from a comparision with the LOSSLESS CD version in a double blind (ABX) test.[/QUOTE]

That advice is probably correct for most applications. But in a high end system, and all other things being equal, it instantly noticeable when going from 24bit, Red Book and lossy. (I cannot consistently pick up benefits from increased sampling over 48Khz, although some people can) I accept a file one fifith of the size is, I concede, only slightly degraded to the ear - buy why do it? Storage space is so cheap these days why would anyone want to sacrifice what we are given of the music on CD (or rarely on high res downloads, DVD-A and SACD)?