Apple lossless.

Wav's are not great for tagging (Song name, Artist info)

Mp3's are antiquated, and suck to use in production

Def Apple Lossless for ultimate quality while saving some space and having good tag support.

256k or higher AAC if for some reason drive space is an issue (for example, video DJ's).

MP3 as an absolute last resort (for example, advance promos that are available no other way).

Possibly AIFF if you got space. Apple lossless does not work with some Windows based DAW systems if you want to work on edits of a song. You can convert it but it adds an extra step.

AIFF is the most versatile uncompressed format for use with serato.
If hard drive space is an issue, buy a bigger hard drive.

I use AIFF format for the majority of my tracks. The way I see it is I will invest in the best quality/most versatile format I can and not worry about hard drive space. Hard drive space is expanding so rapidly that soon I will not have to care at all about filling my drives.

Can I just be loud & angry for one second.....

LOSSLESS FILES ARE BASICALLY CD FILES. CD TECHNOLOGY IS 30 YEARS OLD NOT 'THE FUTURE'

thanks...

Not necessarily.

Lossless-encoding (and even lossy-encoded) formats can support higher-resolution/higher sample-rate formats than 16-bit/44.1kHz.

For every DJ that realises that there are 10,000 that don't.
When it comes to getting people to switch to AN OLDER BUT BETTER FORMAT it's better if we stick to the basics.
I'd bet you've confused more people than you've helped with that statement.

Your statement is incorrect and confused me more then DJMark's comment.

Maybe but I'm not really trying to help the hopeless here...

I'm not having this argument for the 19th time on this site.
Stick to your 256kbps. You're welcome to it.
People are under the impression that blog music is 'better' than CD quality.
Of course I realise a CD is just a playing medium.
I'm talking about file size & quality & how audio is going backwards.
There you go, pick that sentence apart on a technicality. Its the Serato forums way...

Well, it certainly seems I've picked a tricky subject for my first discussion!
Thanks for all the comments guys, So I'm getting the impression that AIFF is the prime candidate for all my music, But is AIFF the same as Apple lossless? And being a vinyl junkie I have a lot of records to convert, any preferences on whats the best recording software to purchase, I' currently using Wavepad Masters but not overly impressed...
Look forward to your responce.

Any recording software should do, go with what you know. I use Ableton. Apple lossless is the same quality and tagability as AIFF, but uses less space. As mentioned before Apple lossless might not work with certain Windows DAW's

Apple lossless is a compressed format for storage. It decompresses the song when you load it.
So the storage size is smaller but the quality is the same as true lossless.
We've done A-B comparisons at my work (television audio) and the file size is bit accurate.

Substance is right. Do your own research. There are allot of misconceptions. MP3 is the current main format. MP3 music originaly recorded at 320kbps from the master IS LOSSLESS. In fact even at 192kbps your ear would not have been able to listen to any frequencies that may have been cut off by using that compression rate anyway. I am not an expert but it took me a while to find the truth about AIFF vs MP3. But dont listen to me or other novices, read what the REAL experts say. Google search.

One more thing:
The quality of MP3 files re-recorded at a higher rate from an original file at a lower rate, are no better than the original lower rate. You must find files that were originaly recorded at the 320kbps rate if you want MP3 lossless quality.

um - mp3 is by definition lossy.

there's no such thing as "mp3 lossless quality"

I use MIK Platinum Notes to convert everything to 320 mp3 and I've actually gotten compliments on my sound quality. But you have to take into consideration I'm in Cincinnati for now and the people here aren't exactly cutting edge : )

ugh - don't get me started on platinum notes.

Just keep in mind, converting a lossy file to 320 does not give you back any fidelity and in fact, removes even more frequencies that were already removed from the first encoding process...

By definition you are right at 320 mp3, but for all practical intended purposes any sound that gets lost by the initial encoding of 192 is so minimal that its insignificant and at 320 kbps its even that much less. At 320 kbps vs aiff your splitting hairs.

Now on MP3HD you are wrong, this is true mp3 lossless.

So on paper technicaly you are right but I guarantee your ear could not differentiate between an original apple lossless and an original mp3 coded at 192 let alone 320kbps.

Why take the risk with something that MIGHT sound like shit versus how it came out of the recording studio?

320 to aiff is not splitting hairs. not even close.

i had so many problems with ssl and traktor and wavs and aiffs that i quit using them. i could never get my itunes or logic to get my aiffs to not switch to aiff-c files which didn't work well with either.

You have a point but true losless is useful for preserving the original recording. I could see where every microscopic piece of information would want to archived.


Its a proven fact that the great MAJORITY of people can not hear the difference on anything above 160kbps. There are audio engineers that will agree. There are sound tests you can take that will confirm that. Just take an unbiased honest test and judge for yourself.


So what is working best for you?

And I'll continue to throw myself under the bus by saying that AFTER using MIK PN and processing ALL of my files to 320 I have had ABSOLUTELY ZERO issues with SSL. NO CRASHES, NOTHING, ABSOLUTELY ZERO. I'm not an MIK rep. I don't care if anyone uses it or not. I just spend a LOT of time and effort trying to figure out WHY my system kept crashing and how to make it STOP crashing. Formatting ALL of my files to the same format was the end all save all fix : )

there can be a difference between sound tests and real world sound, though.
for example, if you have a track with low bass, the track might sound identical in both formats with the eq flat, but when you turn up the bass eq on a club system the bass can sound hollower on the mp3.

all these tests are always done on either headphones and/or home sound systems and never take into account the "feel" of sub-bass frequencies below 90hz.

Yes, the human ear can technically hear to 20 Hz, but at the same time the richness of that low end that gets lost even at the initial encoding process let alone transcoding.

These low-end frequencies are often what a lot of club sound systems are designed to emphasize.

Soo is spot on. Although I'd say you're generally fine playing 192+ quality at ANY venue, just short of mega-clubs , theaters and stadiums. It's when you get to producing/remixing that.mp3s really start degrading your sound

I could see where in music production you would want to use losless files. That would make sense.


Thats a good point. I would have to research into actual live tests like that, but I believe real life conditions have been tested. As for me mp3's at 160 kbps sound great with low end Hip Hop beats on my system, 320 sounds even crispier.

If you can take the FLAC (lossless) Vs 320kbps MP3, with or without amplified low end music and get better than 90% correct, I give you mad props, but I seriously doubt this can be done in a blind test.

Also just to be fair, the MP3 being compared in that test should be encoded with LAME encoding.

Correction: If you can take the FLAC Vs 320kbps MP3 TEST.

Also I dont think you can better than 80% correct taking the test 20 times per track on 3 to 5 tracks. Try it.

i can hear the diff between aiff and mp3 on my home monitors quite easy. anything with heavy bass is fairly obvious, especially, as Soo said, on big systems.

hey, i just posted this in another thread regarding ttm57 vs sl3, but it applies to this discussion, too.

But you still degraded the sound quality of every file that you re-encoded. It's part of the mp3 encoding process, whichever software you may use, whichever bitrate (up or down) you encode to.

Sounds like you had a couple bad encodes in your library that were giving you problems (crashes). Re-encoding is one way to fix this, but the fact that you chose 320 as a bitrate does not prove anything being discussed here.

When I had corrupt mp3s, I would just cut the last 1 second off the track, save, fixed. The problem was usually within the header of the mp3 file, not the actual music encoding. Changing the length of the track forced a new header to written, one that was not corrupt.

If you can't hear the difference between aiff and mp3, then you havent played on a clean soundsystem and are definitely missing out....

i forget half of you guys play terribly made mashups and 16 bar intro tracks that have been made from mp3s. in that case it wouldnt matter.

i hope that that is a terrible exaggeration

Have you taken the FLAC vs 320 kbps test? I know you say you can hear a difference on your system, but that's not what Im asking. Your comparison wont work if your using two different songs. You cant make a MP3 recording off of a different format and recode it to MP3. It has to be two formats both recorded from the original audio source.

Google the test and take it at least 20 times per track. You never know, you might be able to do get good results.