How to Set Sample Rates for Ripping CDs in iTunes

Setting the right sampling rate is the difference between a mediocre and a great listening experience. Importing your music with the highest possible sampling rate, you'll get truer CD-quality sound. With iTunes, you can set sampling rates for AAC & MP3 encoding in just a few minutes.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Things You’ll Need:

• Computer (Mac or PC)
• iTunes
• Your favorite CD

1. Start up iTunes on your computer.
2. Go to the "iTunes" menu and select "Preferences" on a Mac. On a Windows machine, go to the "Edit" menu and select "Preferences".
3. Select the "Advanced" Tab when the "Preferences" window comes up. This is the same on both Mac & PC.
4. Select "Importing" within the "Advanced" screen in iTunes. This should bring up a screen with options on what to do when you import a CD.
5. Select your preferences for "Import Using" - AAC is the default iTunes encoding. You can also select AIFF, Apple Lossless, MP3 & WAV.
6. Select the quality of the encoding with the "Setting" option if you've selected AAC or MP3. If you have a lot of music and only a limited amount of space on your hard drive, set the encoding to 128kbps for AAC or 160kbps for MP3. If space is not an issue, the highest quality settings are recommended.
7. You can also create a custom setting using the "custom" selection on the Setting drop-down if you're so inclined.
8. Hit the "OK" button at the bottom of the window to save your settings.
   Now when you import from a CD, the songs will be encoded using your new settings.

Tips & Warnings

• Keyboard shortcut on a Mac to get to the preferences menu: "Command" ","
• Keyboard shortcut on a Windows PC to get to the preferences menu: "CTRL" "+"
• The higher encoding quality you select, the larger the files will be.
• Unfortunately, you cannot increase the sampling rate for songs you already have in iTunes. You'll have to re-import them.
• Depending on the version of iTunes you're using, the options may differ.