Hi -
I'm new to Media center, and currently debating on how to start ripping my collection. I'd really like to rip to a lossless format (like APE), the idea being that I'll never have to re-rip. However, I need MP3 versions of my audio files to transfer to my PDA and to burn onto CD-R/W for my car stereo. I'm wondering about how (if at all) I can do this:
1. Ideally, it'd be great to be able to store multiple versions of an audio file as part of a single library entry, so that I could have an APE and an MP3 file for a particular song. When I play the file on the comp, it will play the APE file, but when I want to burn a CD-R of MP3s or transfer it to my PDA (or any other MP3 player) or do anything where file space is a premium, then it will use the smaller MP3 file. It doesn't seem like there is a way to do this right now, but it'd be a great feature to add in the future.
2. If this isn't possible, is there a way to convert APEs to MP3s on the fly when I transfer to my PDA or when I want to burn a CD-R. I haven't seen a way to do this, but perhaps I'm missing something. Of course, the obvious drawback of this option, is that it requires re-encoding files every time I want to transfer them, but there may not be a way around this.
Thoughts or suggestions?
--Tim