[PhilNYC]

Here's a question.  Let's say I rip my CD collection into Apple Lossless or .wav files via iTunes (stored on a hard drive on my Mac).  I'm using this with my Squeezebox2 connected to my audio system (into a DAC).  Then let's say I buy an iPod Shuffle (1GB).

Is there any easy/seamless way for me to load tunes onto the iPod Shuffle in some compressed format (to fit more songs on it) while maintaining the uncompressed/lossless iTunes library to use with my main rig *without* duplicating the songs in iTunes?

[fiveoclockfriday]

Unfortunately I'm at work on a PC right now with no iTunes so I can't give you exact specifics, but there is an option in iTunes under the iPod settings (I believe) to do exactly this. Whenever you are sending songs over to your shuffle, it will downsample them to 128 AAC, leaving the original file intact. It works like a charm and I use it almost daily with a 1 gb shuffle. Working out, I don't really care about sound quality so it's wonderful.

[PhilNYC]

Thanks, that's what I wanted to hear.  Does it always send them at 128 AAC?  or can you specify what you want it to send them as?

[fiveoclockfriday]

The only option they have now is 128k AAC. This may be modified with a hack, plugin, something like that; I'm not sure. In my experience, this is roughly the same as 160k MP3 (not much dynamic range, decent overall sound, heavy compression on cymbals if you listen carefully).

[thayerg]

You should look into anapod explorer as an addition to iTunes. I believe it lets you downsample on the fly when transferring files. Plus a bunch of other stuff

[jhenderson010759]

An alternate approach is to rip your CDs to lossless, then batch transcode them into an iPod-compatible format using a free tool such as dBPowerAmp Music Converter http://www.dbpoweramp.com/dmc.htm.  

Since transcoding is a comparatively slow operation, it is most expedient to perform this operation during a more appropriate, such as overnight, rather than when updating the iPod.  For example, to transcode a CD from FLAC to MP3 using LAME takes approximately five to ten minutes.  No reason to serialize this operation in front of each iPod update.  

I rip all CDs to FLAC (using EAC).  All new files are automatically bulk-transcoded to MP3 each night at 1:00 am.

[Brad]

For portable use (working out, etc), the automatic 128k AAC files sound pretty good.

You should at least try it that way first - hopefully it will meet your needs/ears.
Also will help maximize the storage on the Shuffle.

[thayerg]

Looks like the iPod nano kind of reduces the need to compress files outrageously...

[John Ashman]

Phil, what I do is I have a big external for Apple Lossless (6000+ tunes).  Then I put my favorites, stored as AAC songs, in a file on my internal HD (~1600 tunes).  Then I put those all indifferent folders.  If I am (rarely) in my main library folder and don't want to see the AAC songs, I simply type the word "lossless" and the AAC songs "disappear".  

But then I duplicated those AAC songs on my laptop and then deleted them later, but both worked well for me.