Which Format Do You Record In? And Why?, .wav, .aif, .sd2 ??? Options

[editbrain]

Which audio format are you recording you music to? and why?

[Francois Déchery]

Not having to convert between formats when you want to use your samples in any application is really confortable and creative... On Mac, AIFF is nowadays defacto the best compatible format. SOme apps read wavs, others (rarest on OSX) read sd2, but all read AIFF.
Also the advantage of AIFF versus SD2 is that both formats can store regions definitions inside the audio file, but only AIFF can store the base note of your sample, which is really convenient when you import a muilti sample instrument on a virtual sampler which smartly recognize theses base note informations encoded inside the AIFF files to automatically spread your samples on the keyboard map.

AIFF is the right choice if you want to avoid spending time to convert samples before being able to use them, and to offer the most features.
IMHO, the less time you spend on technic (converting, importing...) , the more time you can spend to be creative, which is the essence of music.

Of course, if you are working on a multiplatofrm environnement , often switching between macs and PCs, WAV would be the best choice.