[IceFire]

Thinking about making my first purchase from the iTunes store. I've read that it's DRM free... but is it REALLY drm free or something else goes on instead? Also does anyone know if it's 128kpbs or 168kbps?

[blowfish]

Yes.  They managed to get it all DRM free recently.  And it's 256kbps AAC.

[Mustang19]

DRM was the greatest thing to happen to the software industry since sliced wafers.  It stirred publishers from their sclerotic slumber into an effort to advance the science of cryptography, as incompetent as their efforts were. I'll be sad to see it go.

[Unknown Target]

I prefer Amazon, since you're not tied to that awful program, but yes, both are DRM free thankfully.

[Nuke]

if they let me pick the format, and my bitrate, and offer tracks from obscure bands you've never heard of, that might be enough to make me stop pirating.

[BloodEagle]

I'd recommend against paying for anything with an audio quality of less than 320kbps at 44.1kHz per dual channel, which I consider to be the lowest acceptable quality level.

[Enigmatic Entity]

Artists like Lady GG and Rhianna don't really lose much from pirating (i.e. they have $$ no matter what), but lesser known artists, maybe. Then there are those so unknown that they aren't even pirated...

[Nuke]

most of the bands i like require ordering a vinyl lp from a foreign country. if they take paypal, yay! but other than that, **** it im torrenting.

[Dark Hunter]

I only buy from iTunes if I have no other choice.

The less "no copying, only iTunes/iPod can play" bull**** I have to put up with, the better.

Then again, iTunes usually doesn't have what I'm looking for anyway, so...

[Pred the Penguin]

I like having CDs...

[Klaustrophobia]

i don't buy digital downloads ever.  physical CD only, lossless rip.  if i'm only going to get 1/10th the quality from a download, i expect to only pay 1/10th the price.  and that just doesn't happen.

[jr2]

So, when will M$ 'steal' the idea from Apple and go DRM-free with Zune Marketplace? 

[MP-Ryan]

I'd recommend against paying for anything with an audio quality of less than 320kbps at 44.1kHz per dual channel, which I consider to be the lowest acceptable quality level.

 

[IceFire]

I'd buy from Amazon but I'm Canadian and Amazon.ca is poor and inadquate compared to the cool stuff you get in the US. I love ordering from Amazon.ca but they don't have all the stuff you guys have. No online music sales at all I believe. I do order physical CD's but sometimes they just aren't available anywhere... like a couple of Finnish rock bands I like to listen to.

[Nuke]

I'd recommend against paying for anything with an audio quality of less than 320kbps at 44.1kHz per dual channel, which I consider to be the lowest acceptable quality level.

 

yea, im not really getting what audiophiles go on and on about. i already ****ed up my hearing with 2 decades of metal, so i dont think im capable of discerning every little nuance of the music. also i never did enjoy over-engineered music either. so these days i just go with a pair of large stereo speakers for my computer speakers, im using some unidentified stereo from the 80s (with a turn table) with a fried opamp that makes one of the speakers go out if i try to put the volume over 1/3 the max. thats ok because at 1/3 volume the whole house rattles. then i just run a minijack to rca adapter cable between the sound card and the aux ports. it has the added bonus of letting me tape anything i like on youtube without having to fire up audacity, **** with audio settings, sacrifice a small animal and hope the windows gods let me record the stereo mix. even if all the tapes im taping to are tapes i found on the ground with tape over the tapes no tape over hole. analog <3.

i did hook the turn table's phono plugs into my soundcard instead of to the stereo, so that i can rip ancient hank williams records to mp3, works quite well.

[IceFire]

For the sound system that I have nothing over 256kbps will make any difference. They are good speakers but unless I spend a thousand dollars a speaker like my dad did for his home theater system (and I may one day) it isn't going to matter much. I am a bit of an audiophile and I do appreciate high quality music where I can hear everything clearly and all of the frequencies are well balanced... but there is a point of diminishing returns and it starts around 196kbps for compressed audio. I can sometimes (albeit rarely) tell the difference up to 256kbps but I honestly don't think most people can tell the difference above that.

I've seen studies done with test subjects that didn't know which audio file was which played on a top end system. The error rate was essentially them flipping a coin on what the levels were.

[Nuke]

for me it has to be below 128kbps before i notice any difference. i usually rip tracks at 192kbps or higher though. of course i seldom rip tracks. i usually acquire tracks in any bit rate i can get, considering their rarity.

[Mongoose]

I can still hear some compression at 192 kbps, but once you go above 256, it becomes far less noticeable.  That being said, I have a crap-load of music in FLAC, just for the e-peen.

[IceFire]

Well my purchase was successful and I was able to copy my music to my backup hard drive and everything still works so no DRM to speak of. Good! Process was pretty painless anyways as I already had an account setup for my iPod to sync some album information. I'm not a huge fan of iTunes... I curse it's name often... but this was encouragingly easy.

[Thaeris]

I like having CDs...

I fully concur, and all the music I really care about ends up in a physical format on my shelf.

I don't mind iTunes, and in fact I kind of like the software. The software to truly be loathed and despised is Windows Media Center.