floosh

Don't believe the hype. God created loudness buttons, tone controls and equalizers for a reason.

Got any secondary components you can swap in/out to try to isolate the distortion to a certain component? IOW, if swapping a component out for another eliminates the distortion you know in which component it lies. For simplicity sake, might as well start with software. Does the distortion remain using itunes alone, or something like VLC? Is there EQ/tone controls anywhere in the chain?

Good advices above. Whatever bitrate you ultimately choose, I just don't see any reason to overwrite the originals. I bet they all fit on a single reasonably small external (2T ?) drive. Do whatever conversions you chose and call them "Working Masters", but archive the originals on said external drive labeled "Original Masters" and you're covered for any which way in the future.

Thanks. Didn't think to google "Archimago", instead thought it ought be mentioned in his profile, where it belongs. ;-)

Sorry, can you point us to the blog?

I don't often get to sit symmetrically between my speakers, necessitating the use of Balance control. The only music player I know that includes a balance adjustment is Vox. Are there other players that offer the function, or is it possible to do it at the OS level (Mountain Lion) that I'm unaware of? Integration with iTunes 11 would be ideal.

In this case I can confirm that the Schiit Bifrost is NOT compatible via Toslink.

Excellent! I'm not familiar with your upgrade policy, what will it cost from 1.4.2?

I'm on trial period. I really like it but no eq might be a deal breaker for me. Please add eq and balance control in a future release.

Thanks Paul. I'll give it a try.

Gizmo = wow. Hope they port this thing to the mac.

Actually, despite upgrading my mini, I might still be interested in creating the brunt of my library from another machine (cough - work is slow- cough). So if both machines are running the same version of iTunes it would work? I'm setting things up to have the library database in itunes default user/music folder, with the music files "managed" by itunes on an external drive. So the plan would be to take the external drives to work, one with original music files, the other where I will have itunes manage/copy them into. And then I can just take the itunes database folder from the work machine and use it to replace the similar folder on the mini? Any caveats or pitfalls to be aware of? I'd create the library on the work machine and then ju

Sorry for such a n00b question, but A+ does not support equalization, or am I missing something?

Good stuff so far. I'm still researching, but at the moment I'm leaning toward a 2-pronged approach while I experiment with iTunes, 3rd party players and such: 1. A managed iTunes library with FLACs converted to ALACs. The media will reside on the external, the database internal. 2. The original files on a separate but connected external drive for use in standalone players. The two drives will essentially provide redundancy/backup for each other. Not saying I'll never back them both up, but you know what I mean. This way I'm going all-in with iTunes while simultaneously maintaining other options. We'll see where it ends up down the road. PS, yes using a DAC. Shitt Bifrost via Toslink. Tekton Lore speakers.

Oops, I don't know how to edit a post. I just want to be clear above, when I speak about the library files I mean the database. Any reason not to keep the database and the music files together on the external drive?