jc:

Why ripping in a compression Codec? Why not just in WAV?

...........because it uses up to twice the disc space of Lossless codecs (flac, wma, Alac etc) and it doesn't handle tag information as well as wma & Alac (flac too suffers in not having the tagging area properly defined for specific tag data).

Ok, I've researched and think I found a good solution:

1) Rip CDs in "WMA Lossless" through Windows Media Player. Furthermore, if you want to download music, do this using one of the download services available through Windows Media Player to download music you don't have on CD (these are generally less lossy than iTunes' downloads). Make Beomaster 5 access this library only.

2) For those of us who like to use an iPod, import the rips/downloads into iTunes - this website will tell you how to do that http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1347

Thereby, the Windows Media Players acts as the source for both Beomaster5 and iTunes, enabling transfer of lossless CD rips and less lossy downloads.

Thanks for this useful information... unfortunately, the WMA conversion only works on Windows.  I think many of the complainers have Macs.

Stan

jc:

Why ripping in a compression Codec? Why not just in WAV?

Because it takes up obscene amounts of space.

ALAC or FLAC are much better options - they produce exactly the same audio, but take up less space...

Just a quick addition to my comments. If you run an itunes library (for facilitate use of an iPod) in addition to your "master " library in Windows Media Player, make sure the iTunes library is NOT in a sub folder to your Windows Media Player library (which Windows 7 will probably suggest by default!)- otherwise, as Beomaster 5 accesses your Windows Media Player library, it may actually copy the iTunes library as well, thereby creating duplicates (at least with respect to tracks lagging metadata so that it cannot identify it as a duplicate).