Hi,

Just stoking this fire again. I remember a year ago iTunes did a press release saying they may be headed to lossless 24 bit downloads. Does anyone have new information?

Cheers,

Matt

I honestly have no idea but if they can make money with it, they will do it. If they cant, it will never happen.

Apple Lossless has been available as part of iTunes since Late 2011. They open sourced and made royalty-free the Apple Lossless codec.
Supports 24 bit, multi channel & high frequency audio. Many songs from iTunes store are available in Apple Lossless format.

http://www.applelossless.com/

No 24 bit though.

I heard a rumour they will be making 24/96 recordings available. That would be awesome!

Serious music listeners/audiophiles don't use iTunes crap, do they? Isn't it for the ear bud crowd? This is a real question, not just an insult.

As things currently stand I agree - but if they start to offer 24/96 lossless that could change...

Why wait for Apple to catch up, when mature high resolution solutions are out there? It is like Microsoft 20 years ago, or IBM 30 years ago. They think that they own everyone and make all the rules (they may be right for now).

When they finally do catch up, Apple will pretend that they invented it.

Depends. If you're looking for music server streaming and you have the disk space, simply rip your CDs as WAV or AIFF. Use iTunes and a device such as Apple TV connected to preamp/amp using toslink.

Us serious music listeners who use iTunes don't use crap.

We use software that bypasses the OS processing, and external DACs that let us hear files in high resolution, up to 24/192. iTunes will play these. If you don't have external gear that can handle them, though, iTunes will downsample.

For people who have earbuds, iTunes and an iPod will serve and play files at resolutions up to 24/48. Play those on a good pair of IEMs and you can have a lot of fun.



Oh, if you're talking about the files for sale in the iTunes store... well no, I don't think too many serious listeners use those.

Ouch! A little Apple hate here. Would love to see examples of Apple pretending they invented something that they obviously did not...

What they do based on the Apple products I own and their market share in tablet and mobile is improve existing products that are often foisted onto the market half-baked in order to rush to market. Apple waits until things are ready for prime-time before introducing to consumers. Maybe that's why they've led in customer satisfaction for 8 years in a row:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13506_3-20108336-17/apple-tops-in-customer-satisfaction-for-8th-year/

We're not.


I'd be surprised if they ever claim they invented high resolution, or even CD quality downloads. They're just a smart company that makes smart products people want. Jealousy and resentment abound...

MP3 players were around long before iPads. They were repackaged, repriced and polished up. Brilliant marketing, not engineering. Macs use Intel chips. Their proprietary CPU's were just too slow and expensive from an R&D perspective.

If Apple had crushed Microsoft in the old Windows 3.1 court case, we would all have them today. They were ripped off and Steve Jobs learned another important lesson for use later on. I could never understand how Apple could lose that one. I guess it was in the hands of the lawyers.

I don't see where Apple claimed to have invented the MP3 player. They introduced the iPod 11 years ago and consumers bought them in droves.
Which some say saved the recorded music industry by enabling a whole new distribution model.

Apple never used any prioritary CPUs. They used Motorola 68k chips back in the 90s, then moved to IBM PPC CPUs before moving to Intel. What's your point?

But they do make their CPUs now. The A5X family. These quad core CPUs can be found the new iPhones and the new iPad. Same chips used in Sony playstations. Cool eh!

I assume you mean "iPods".

And Americans built cars before the Japanese took it to the next level and beat them at their own game.

What's your point?



Again...what's your point? Trying hard to understand what this has to do with high res digital audio - other than your obvious dislike (and perhaps jealousy) of Apple.

My point is simply that Apple controls their customers the way Microsoft did in the 90's and IBM did in the 80's.

Try playing Flac files in iTunes. They won't let you. They make the rules, not their customers.