I'm a little troubled... I want to convert my CD collection in digital format.

But I'm having a mixed Win/Apple setup. So.. what would be the best solution? ... Keeping in mind that I might go to the BeoSound 5 in the end...

WMA Lossless is no option as iTunes on my MacBook can't handle it. Rip everything to MP3 @ 320k? 

Karel.

I have used MP3 at 320kbps but have started using 320 kbps AAC instead.

If you already have to rip your CDs I suggest you do it on the Windows system with WMA-losless as this is the best audio quality you can get (beside WAV whicht does NOT support any ID tags).

If you have your CDs ripped in WMA losless you can easily convert them to MP3 320kbit/s for all other systems!

That's the way I would do it.

And an important tip: Every mixed Album (one album, different artists) should be checked and marked as a compilation CD!

This will save you sorting trouble on the Beosound 5!
 

i had a similar problem.

i only have a mac and haven't used a windows pc in years. i bought vista and partitioned my hard-drive on my mac (using bootcamp function on my mac). this means i can use it both as mac using leopard and then reboot it into windows vista on the same machine.

in vista on my mac, i downloaded windows media palyer and used it to rip all my CDs into lossless - much better than mp3! you can always convert wma-lossless into mp3 later if you wish but you can't do it the other way round. wma-lossless is mathematically a clone of yoru CD but mp3 is lossy.

i then transferred my wma-lossless files by picking and dropping them into my beomedia 5 harddrive - easy.

i think the main problem is that there is no ripper for wma-lossless for a mac at the moment...

Ripping CDs with Beoplayer is for me the easiest way. Start windows on the mac - I have a macbook and a mac mini both with parallels always active - 

Insert the CD - Beoplayer will be activated and connected to the BS5 automatically, even when it is in standby mode  - wait for the CD data - press COPY and drag the CD icon to the BS5 folder. That`s it. Beoplayer is set to "lossless" and "copy to Beosound 5", so no settings are needed. There is also Beoconnect installed on the mac side of my computers, so it`s possible to use itunes too. For AAC 320k, which I think is the best sounding compressed audioformat.

Stefan

Stefan,

does Beoplayer automaticaly use the "WMA losless" with its best settings?
How do I edit information on the CD (like the cover, if it's a compilation album etc.)?
 

"...does Beoplayer automaticaly use the "WMA losless" with its best settings?"

Yes, it does -  if you have chosen "lossless" in the configurations menu.

"How do I edit information on the CD (like the cover, if it's a compilation album etc.)?"

If BP doesn`t find any information about your CD, a window opens, and you can add title, composer....Adding/changing coverart is just drag and drop.

Stefan

stefan:

"How do I edit information on the CD (like the cover, if it's a compilation album etc.)?"

If BP doesn`t find any information about your CD, a window opens, and you can add title, composer....Adding/changing coverart is just drag and drop.

You can - also manually - edit the information any time later (Title, Album, Artist, Genre, Year and, as Stefan says, cover art) directly on the "INFO" screen in Beoplayer (enclosed) by simply overwriting the existing information, as well as ask the Beoplayer to update the information over BeoPlayer’s internet connection any time you wish, which in combination with possible additional fiddling with your music files in Windows (and your own internet search) allows for reasonable possibilities to sort your music (sometimes the info from internet based database is really not accurate!).

In the case of compilation albums BeoPlayer usually finds the cover for, well, that particular compilation album cover art – but not always as the music publishing industry, as we know, sometimes looks like a sort of jungle…

ok, thank  you for your help!