Staying away from MP3 files or any other highly compressed file is the easiest way to get better sound. If you just have to have compressed files use FLAC.

cross posting---not cool

Digital inputs on speakers are extremely rare. The only company that immediately springs to mind is Meridian and those are extremely expensive. Since the analog outputs of the Wadia is better than almost any iPod dock it's still a good investment to pair with the Audioengine speakers.

Have you changed the default settings in iTunes? Out of the box the setting in iTunes optimized to maximize storage space, effectively minimizing sound quality. Changing these settings is fairly straight forward. Go to the

The "problem" with WAV besides the size is if you move the files from one drive to the another or even from one folder to another iTunes looses track of them. When you ask iTunes to find all music files and organize them all of the data (artist name, album, etc, etc) is gone, everything except the song name. That's because the meta data capabilities of the WAV format are really, really weak. AIFF and Apple loss less both support stronger meta data. As do MP3 and AAC but those formats are unacceptable for high end usage because of their greatly reduced sound quality.

FLAC supports tags and in some ways is better than Apple Lossless and AIFF, but it will NOT work on your iPod unless you install Rockbox on your iPod. If you run linux on your computer or are otherwise a computer geek, I'd recommend Rockbox - otherwise, you'll take one look at the directions and run away.

So you'll probably want Apple Lossless - but I wanted to make sure there was complete information out there.

Yes, it would be really nice if iTunes and iPods natively worked with FLAC as that is the lossless format embraced by most of the rest of the industry.

My friend Roger installed some sort of a plug-in, which allows the ipod to play FLAC files.

Yes, I know that the plug ins are out there but it should be a native function of the iPod. A third-party plug-in with with unknown bugs should not be necessary.

iPods don't have a plug-in function (except the iPod Touch and iPhone perhaps). I'm pretty certain Rockbox is the only way to play FLAC files on an iPod, but it is an OS/Firmware replacement. I've used this a bunch in the past and it is very stable, pretty, and easy to use. In some ways, it lacks the fluidity and ease of the iPod's stock firmware, though. It also doesn't give quite as good battery performance (last I checked anyway, although it was improving). On the positive side, it doesn't erase the iPods firmware, and you can choose to boot up to either way, or delete Rockbox if you get tired of it. It also allows you to play a bunch of different games (at one point I got DOOM to work!), and has a crossfeed function that can be fun to play with.

On the "native" issue - the FLAC codec is open, so it doesn't involve any reverse-engineering for playback (the iPod hardware does, though). In my experience, the iPod plays OGG and FLAC like a pro with Rockbox installed.

Apple should just support FLAC playback.

Quote:
A third-party plug-in with with unknown bugs should not be necessary.

This plug in comes with all the known bugs, so there are no surprises.