For all you audiophiles out there...
 

I'm wondering about the quality of songs ripped from iTunes.
I mean they sound good on my sound system in general, but with my BOSE headphones that I use for my iPod (which are amazing), you can definitely hear the quality in the songs.

Anyway...I know for mp3s then best quality is 320kbps, right?
But...is it "better" to have a .m4a file?

In what quality do you rip your songs?
What sounds the best?

Thanks ^^

Hrm. I would also like to know the answer. I usually rip mp3s at 192kbps but I worry I might be losing quality.

In general, iPods have horrible audio output no matter what quality file you put on it, that might be where the problem is.

I usually rip mine at 192, I always play on some good speakers I have but never extremely loud, so I can't hear the difference anyway.

I greatly dislike iTunes but I can tell you from the experience of a friend who used to use it; he hated the sound quality of iTunes-ripped music. It sounded almost...metalic. So in the end, he used to use another CD ripper, and used to pick a format of .mp3. Either 192kbps or 320kbps was depending on the type of CD, but most ripping programs will check the content and pick the one that's most appropriate.

.mp3 in 320 in particular comes out wonderfully on the iPod.

320kbps > 192 kbps > 128 kbps > .M4A