Date: Mon, 23 Aug 2010 21:49:20 -0400
From: "Mike B." <yahoo at omniphile.com>
To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at KeithLynch.net>
Subject: [WSFA] Re: Give Me That Old Time Technology!
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at KeithLynch.net>

Ted White wrote:

> That said, music is usually saved in a computer as either MP3 or .wav
> files, the latter being preferable (no compression, no loss).

Those are two very common formats, but there are a whole bunch of
others. What is most common for a given person will depend on what OS
they are running, whether they are professional or not, what software
they prefer, licensing restrictions, etc.

Some formats are compressed without loss, some are lossy compression
formats, and some are not compressed at all.  Some include redundant
copies of data and/or error detection codes.  Capture rates for
digitization of audio varies even within a format (MP3 can be stored at
all sorts of bit rates depending on the desired tradeoff between space
and quality).  There are formats, such as MIDI, that capture the
performance, not the sound, and get played back through synthesis of
sound, perhaps using different instruments than were used to record
them. Some formats can contain non-sound data as well, such as artist
name, album name, copyright year, publisher, length, digital rights
information, etc.

> But it can
> be saved in a "hard" medium. .Wav files are saved as CDs, for example.

You can write a .wav file to a data CD as a .wav.  You can also use .wav
files as input to create an audio CD, which does not involve .wav files
other than as inputs.  You can do the later with MP3 and other formats
as well.  An audio CD is in its own format, not in MP3, .wav or other
typical computer audio file formats.

-- Mike B.