iTunes "create mp3 version" - does it degrade?

This question may seem strange, but I'll try to explain.

I have another post on here about my iPod freezing, that turns out it was some bad MP3 files I have. Quite a lot of them it seems. I have found a number of them, and using "Create MP3 Version" from the iTunes Advanced menu repairs the files.

I apparently still have some bad ones on there I haven't found. I have over 8000 songs on this Classic, so finding them isn't so easy. I have found a few just by watching my iPod in shuffle mode. When it gets to one of these bad files, it can't play it, so it just skips ahead to the next song. All these songs play fine in iTunes by the way, so there's no way I can use the computer to troubleshoot.

My one thought was to do a blanket 'Create MP3 Version' on everything in my library, as this would repair anything that was bad. But here's my question...

Say I take a 192 mp3 file, and I do a Create MP3 Version to that file, at 192, will there be any degradation, or should I basically have an exact duplicate (sound quality - wise) of the original file? If the dupe won't have any degradation, I can do a bit for bit repair on everything and just fix this once and for all.

Thanks.

This is a rule of thumb and always true.

Going from one Lossy format to another will always degrade the sound. Whether you hear the difference or not, it's there. If you go from a 128 MP3 to a 320 AAC there will be a little loss. Only way you would not get loss from your original file is to go to a non lossy format like WAVE, AAIF or even Apple Lossless.

Since what you are doing is fixing bad MP3's, just do it on the ones that are messed up. I would use the highest bitrate for the copy I could and also I sound use AAC over MP3 as I find AAC to have less loss.

dtravis7 said:

This is a rule of thumb and always true.

Going from one Lossy format to another will always degrade the sound. Whether you hear the difference or not, it's there. If you go from a 128 MP3 to a 320 AAC there will be a little loss. Only way you would not get loss from your original file is to go to a non lossy format like WAVE, AAIF or even Apple Lossless.

Since what you are doing is fixing bad MP3's, just do it on the ones that are messed up. I would use the highest bitrate for the copy I could and also I sound use AAC over MP3 as I find AAC to have less loss.

Click to expand...

I have been doing it to the files, when I can find them. See, I only find out they are bad if I actually "see" that they won't play. The iPod will try to play the song for a second or two, then move on to the next track. That's my indicator. If it's in shuffle mode while I'm at work, and I'm not watching the iPod screen, there's no way to hear if it encounters a bad track, cause it silently moves along to the next one. Problem is, I've figured out that if it encounters even one of these bad tracks, the iPod will freeze up the instant it's plugged into a computer.

This really is becoming a PITA. I was hoping a blanket conversion would do it for me, but I don't want all my files to suffer in quality because of some bad apples.