propaganda

Ok first I don't even know if this would be the proper section to put this in but looking at the threads in Tilted Music I assumed it would be.

I decided to make a network drive to rip all my CDs and assorted music into one directory. As I was doing this I was thinking about the actual quality of the music I have and starting looking into it. Apparently most of my rips have been in .wav which don't seem to get many raving reviews so I'm asking here.

Not only do I need to know what is the best sounding format but also what would be the best format for iPods. I ask for iPods because I keep reading that .ogg format is the best for audio but iPods don't support it. Quality is what I'm going for and space doesn't really matter much unless your talking about 70-100MBs per song (.wav)

Another thing would if someone could give me a good breakdown of bit rates, sample rates, VBR, channel modes and random assorted stuff like that. Or possibly just a good guide

All of this stuff could be pulled up on google but a lot of the "tests" that they do is based on the persons own ears. I can't tell the difference in any of the files at all but somehow they did which makes me skeptical.

Thanks