Long time question about iTunes

PLEASE HELP: Long time question about iTunes

Yo guys.. Ive been a Mac and PC user for several years now but there's always been this question bout iTunes that bugs me. Now with my new Macbook, I really want to get this resolved!

Okay so the situation is that usually when you import CDs, they should take up 60 + megabytes on ur hard drive (assuming it is 160kbps) because each song is around 4 megabytes each.
But everytime I pop in a cd into iTunes on a Mac including my Macbook, it says it will take up 300+ megabytes! I don't understand this because ive set my preferences to Mp3 importing and 160 kbps so it shouldn't be this high.

Windows Media Player doesn't do this so it's always confused me.

Your help is much appreciated on how to solve this!

thanks

Try importing the windows 160kps MP3's into your mac's iTunes and see what size they are.
You also need to compare a 160 kbs MP3 from windows with a 160 kbs MP3 ripped on the mac to see if they have been encoded exactly the same in regards to quality, joint or stereo, Variable or constant bit rate etc........

I did part of what ur saying in the past. I would rip the CDs using Windows media player and they would be the correct size and stay that way when importing into iTunes.

Well the 'correct size' is relative. I can only imagine that a setting is not the same, or that the encoding is different somewhere. I just ripped a CD the other day at 192kbs and my files average from 5 to 8 MB depending on the length of the song, which is about what I'd expect.