opinion sound quality ipod/cd's

Hi again. I have a Pioneer DUH-P5000UB deck that comes with built in ipod control. If i went with a 160 gb ipod with all of my music on it, would it sound better than using cd's or would i get cd "like" sound from the ipod? cd's are getting to be pain in the butt. The ipod is so simple and could handle litteraly all of my music. I'm just not sure of the sound quality compared to cd's. Thanks in advance for your opinions."To defy the laws of tradition, is a crusade only of the brave" Primus

no the quality will not be as good as a CD...BUT you can raise the quality to the highest setting before transferring the files to the Ipod

The key is how you encode the music files off your CD.  If you use any of the lossy compression schemes like MP3, your quality suffers.  If you use a lossless compression scheme like Apple Lossless or FLAC, it is very close to original CD quality.  If you use an uncompressed method like WAV or aiff, it will be exactly the same as the CD.  The iPod itself - at least the latest generation ones - reproduce surprisingly high quality sound when they have high quality files to play.Support the12volt.com

DYohn is right, completely, except that iPods do not recognize .FLAC at all. They will ONLY recognize Apple Lossless (AAC lossless or .m4a) files. If you use iTunes, you will ONLY get "near CD sound" (and BARELY that). The reason for this is because iTunes will only rip in compressed formats, and I believe that it will only rip .mp3 as high as 192K... GAH!!!! iTunes is also a bloated, resource-hogging, default-overtaking, security-hole-riddled POS. I highly recommend AGAINST it. And that is a recommendation from the IT guy in me, forget how I feel about it personally! Additionally, you MUST CHOOSE BETWEEN ONE MANAGER OR THE OTHER! iTunes will become the default on any computer you install it on, and will delete any files you have already transferred to your device.. iTunes SUCKS! If getting the Classic 160, (and ripping lossless) as I did, you'll be able to still get THOUSANDS of songs on it. I use all lossless ripping, (the largest footprint) and I have over 2500 songs right now, and I have used just over 32G. If you want true CD quality, you will have to use lossless formats, but this will relegate you to using YOUR deck, and no others (unless they also support lossless playback, like the Alpine W205). How do I get my music, then? I use dBPoweramp with the .m4a lossless CODEC for ripping, and I use MediaMonkey for controlling the device. Both free, and FANTASTIC pieces of software, I highly recommend using them! (And donating, as I did, to help these guys and thank them for their work.) iTunes will only allow you to copy music TO your iPod, once there, you cannot remove it, you cannot connect your iPod to another computer, copy it, burn it to CD... Nothing. iTunes will also only rip to lower bit-rates. If you BUY your music from iTunes (God forbid you BUY inferior format music!! And I assure you AAC is inferior - it is a compressed format, and the DEFAULT format from iTunes!) you will get a one way transfer, and once in place on your device, I hope you REALLY like it there, because you can do two things with it from there... Listen to it, and delete it. If you want true CD quality, you need to rip "lossless". MediaMonkey allows two way data transfer, on-the-fly bulk file tagging, a really nice player interface, small (resource-wise), and I have found it to be quite stable.It all reminds me of something that Molière once said to Guy de Maupassant at a café in Vienna: "That's nice. You should write it down."

haemphyst wrote: DYohn is right, completely, except that iPods do not recognize .FLAC at all. They will ONLY recognize Apple Lossless (AAC lossless or .m4a) files. If you use iTunes, you will ONLY get "near CD sound" (and BARELY that). The reason for this is because iTunes will only rip in compressed formats, and I believe that it will only rip .mp3 as high as 192K... GAH!!!! iTunes is also a bloated, resource-hogging, default-overtaking, security-hole-riddled POS. I highly recommend AGAINST it. And that is a recommendation from the IT guy in me, forget how I feel about it personally! Additionally, you MUST CHOOSE BETWEEN ONE MANAGER OR THE OTHER! iTunes will become the default on any computer you install it on, and will delete any files you have already transferred to your device.. iTunes SUCKS! If getting the Classic 160, (and ripping lossless) as I did, you'll be able to still get THOUSANDS of songs on it. I use all lossless ripping, (the largest footprint) and I have over 2500 songs right now, and I have used just over 32G. If you want true CD quality, you will have to use lossless formats, but this will relegate you to using YOUR deck, and no others (unless they also support lossless playback, like the Alpine W205). How do I get my music, then? I use dBPoweramp with the .m4a lossless CODEC for ripping, and I use MediaMonkey for controlling the device. Both free, and FANTASTIC pieces of software, I highly recommend using them! (And donating, as I did, to help these guys and thank them for their work.) iTunes will only allow you to copy music TO your iPod, once there, you cannot remove it, you cannot connect your iPod to another computer, copy it, burn it to CD... Nothing. iTunes will also only rip to lower bit-rates. If you BUY your music from iTunes (God forbid you BUY inferior format music!! And I assure you AAC is inferior - it is a compressed format, and the DEFAULT format from iTunes!) you will get a one way transfer, and once in place on your device, I hope you REALLY like it there, because you can do two things with it from there... Listen to it, and delete it. If you want true CD quality, you need to rip "lossless". MediaMonkey allows two way data transfer, on-the-fly bulk file tagging, a really nice player interface, small (resource-wise), and I have found it to be quite stable.

  Excellent, freaking, reply !! I can't thank you enough for your candid talk. It just so happenes that i downloaded MediaMonkey this morning. I will definitely use it and conribute."To defy the laws of tradition, is a crusade only of the brave" Primus

iTunes is a lot better than Zune...Microsoft sucks at making software.

aznboi3644 wrote: Microsoft sucks at making software.

One of the world's richest men shrugs that off and goes on his merry way to the BANK.   DOH!

Just a story:  when Bill Gates was just a pauper putting all the pieces together long before the debut of the first Windows, he bought a software program from a little company that my brother was involved with.  It was Paintbrush.  Yep, my bro was a member of the group that developed (what is now known as) Paint...(and my bro is still a pauper).

http://www.answers.com/topic/pc-paintbrush-1?cat=technology

Build the box so that it performs well in the worst case scenario and, in return, it will reward you at all times.

I STRONGLY beg to differ. At listening levels required to overcome road noise, with the windows down, the high frequency artifacting is SO fatiguing... It eventually becomes painful. (Not to mention what compression artifacts do to bass frequencies.) You need to sit in a car with significantly higher resolution some day. Sonically indistinguishable, huh? I can guarantee you that even at 320k, I can hear the difference in my house. They are ABSOLUTELY NOT indistinguishable. MP3 just plain sucks. It does. Period.It all reminds me of something that Molière once said to Guy de Maupassant at a café in Vienna: "That's nice. You should write it down."