The Big Rip

In the wake of the realization that my music collection has gone the wrong direction, quality-wise, I have decided to re-rip my entire CD library in Apple Lossless. I expect this to keep me busy for the foreseeable future.

Why apple format instead of flac? Because iTunes supports it natively (and it is a nice ripping environment) and the format is playable in Linux and convertible to other formats. The thing that sucks about any format is that there is no one perfect choice. MP3 is the only real generic choice for lossy, but there is no similarly universal format for lossless. So I will need a minimum of two copies of my entire library to support my existing audio needs. Possibly three. Sigh.

I don't actually expect the ripping to be the really painful part of the process. I expect incorporating the lossless items into iTunes without losing anything or duplicating anything and without hopelessly wrecking my playlists to be the hard part.

The way my luck is going lately, my hard drive will probably crash halfway through the process. I should get a Drobo, but I want a Mac to attach it to. Or I could take a chance and attach it to linux (formatted hfs+), I suppose...

48 disks down, lots and lots to go.

David