High quality music setup

[Bossman150]

Now that I have spent way more than I intended on my setup, I want to get the most out of it. I currently use the default Apple files from iTunes and rips from my old CD collection that I have not had in years. The difference in recordings drive me insane. One song will be really loud and the next very quiet. The quality between tracks is mind boggling. I hate constantly having to change the volume between tracks and lots of songs I can't even listen to because they sound so bad.

What I am planning on doing is buying an SSD HD and putting the best quality music I can on it. I will have a second USB cord run so I can still use Appleplay, mostly for navigation and voice texting.

What is the best way to go about this? I noticed a lot of the songs I purchased from iTunes are 126k, none are 320k. I have purchased about 500 songs from itunes over the years, most of them years ago. Has anybody tried HDtracks? Looks like the tracks there are either 44.1khz/16bit or 96khz 24 bit, with some even higher. A lot of their music is Album only and that could get very pricy.

Any other suggestions?

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[bradl79 10+ year member]

Torrents and download flac files

 

[WhiteYota]

I looked at many different ways of fixing the same issue with my tunes. I ended up signing up for itunes match, it was 25$ for the year. It matches all your files with what is in the itunes store then after it matched them all I deleted my entire library on my computer and re-downloaded it all from the itunes match. All the same 256 kbps AAC from all the same place.

edit - Here is a link to how to do it

 

[Bossman150]

I looked at many different ways of fixing the same issue with my tunes. I ended up signing up for itunes match, it was 25$ for the year. It matches all your files with what is in the itunes store then after it matched them all I deleted my entire library on my computer and re-downloaded it all from the itunes match. All the same 256 kbps AAC from all the same place.
edit - Here is a link to how to do it

How long ago did you do this? I just want to make sure it can still be done. Also I have a lot of songs that I ripped from CDs in my library, will it work for those too or just the ones purchased from iTunes?

 

[Jeffdachef 5,000+ posts]

Torrent man, 320kbps for days.

 

[WhiteYota]

How long ago did you do this? I just want to make sure it can still be done. Also I have a lot of songs that I ripped from CDs in my library, will it work for those too or just the ones purchased from iTunes?

It works with any music added to iTunes even the ones you purchased long time ago. I did it about a month ago and from what I read it has been the same since they introduced iTunes match several years ago. There is a 15,000 song limit but the ones you purchased from Apple do not count towards that limit.

I will mention that if it does not match the song - like if it has been modified, ie decaf music - it will upload those and you will not get the better quality version.

What I did was let iTunes match run (well first I had to shrink my library cuz it was over the 15,000)

I then created a smart playlist that used iCloud Status is Uploaded - this is the list of songs it does not match

This smart playlist I sorted through and seen what song I needed to either find a newer version or decide I didnt want it.

I will mention that my music collection I have had since the late 90's when mp3 came out so a lot of them were not matched.

 

[Bossman150]

Torrent man, 320kbps for days.

I have not used torrent for anything in many years. My cable company busted me for downloading and sharing movies and I get banned if I get caught again, I could not handle losing my fast internet lol.

 

[Bossman150]

It works with any music added to iTunes even the ones you purchased long time ago. I did it about a month ago and from what I read it has been the same since they introduced iTunes match several years ago. There is a 15,000 song limit but the ones you purchased from Apple do not count towards that limit.I will mention that if it does not match the song - like if it has been modified, ie decaf music - it will upload those and you will not get the better quality version.

What I did was let iTunes match run (well first I had to shrink my library cuz it was over the 15,000)

I then created a smart playlist that used iCloud Status is Uploaded - this is the list of songs it does not match

This smart playlist I sorted through and seen what song I needed to either find a newer version or decide I didnt want it.

I will mention that my music collection I have had since the late 90's when mp3 came out so a lot of them were not matched.

Thanks man, I will start there and see if that makes a difference.

 

[Jeffdachef 5,000+ posts]

wow wtf is your cable company smoking lol. Never had a problem with either att or time warner.

 

[Bossman150]

wow wtf is your cable company smoking lol. Never had a problem with either att or time warner.

I know it *****, the really bad part was before they gave me my first warning, they caught me a 2nd time. So I used strike one and two before I knew I had strike one....

 

[brafferty]

pay for music, show support //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/wink.gif.608e3ea05f1a9f98611af0861652f8fb.gif as a Dj, i can say that often times it seems to sound better, maybe cause you pay?(sarcasm)

 

[fly_marlin]

Torrent man, 320kbps for days.

Yeah, that's the highest quality mp3. Anything more compressed and it starts to sound terrible. I deleted all my songs that were below 320. You can still notice the difference between that and CDs.

 

[WhiteYota]

Yeah, that's the highest quality mp3. Anything more compressed and it starts to sound terrible. I deleted all my songs that were below 320. You can still notice the difference between that and CDs.

This is why mp3 is a lossy format. The best way is to rip your CD's into a lossless codec then create lossy files for portability.

edit - If you want a good read about the formats, here ---> http://www.stereophile.com/features/308mp3cd/index.html

 

[fly_marlin]

Storage is cheap enough now. You can get a 4TB portable HD, connect to USB and rip all CDs into WAV files onto the HD.

 

[Bossman150]

Storage is cheap enough now. You can get a 4TB portable HD, connect to USB and rip all CDs into WAV files onto the HD.

Yeah, buying CDs and ripping them into FLAC or ALAC files might be what I end up doing. I wonder if there are still used CD stores around lol. I don't want to use WAV because it does not contain the song data. I think I still have 100 or so CDs somewhere, I have not used them in probably 10 years.