My guess is this: If you rip a file from CD to wav, you start with the full version (all the little sound bits in place) and end with the full version, but then many of the little sound bits are lost in encoding the wav to Mp3. When you convert that mp3 back to wav, you don't have the quality of the original wav--the original sound is lost, because all the little unnecessary sound bits were lost during the first encoding. But the wav file is still going to be much larger than the mp3. Now when you encode from wav back to mp3 again, sound bits will once again have to be removed at the discretion of the encoder. The question really is--would those bits that are removed be identical to those put in when decoding the mp3 to wav? If not, the sound quality of the second encoded mp3 would be worse than the original encoded mp3. Severian, you said "uncompressing and recompressing" and that's important. Mp3 doesn't compress the bits, it tosses them completely away. They're gone for good. Can't get 'em back without re-ripping the CD. That's why Doof wants to wind up going from wav to ape--ape compresses, rather than eliminating bits as mp3 does.