by In a grab-bag installment of The iTunes Guy, I look at how to ensure that tags and metadata get retained when you re-rip CDs, how to deauthorize computers for iTunes Store accounts, and how to change the name of your iTunes library for Home Sharing.
Q: I have a standard-quality MP3 album on my Mac that I’ve listened to for several years, added lyrics to, and so on. Now, because I discovered the Apple Lossless format and still have a CD of that album in my house, I would like to rip the CD again in higher quality. However, I don’t want to lose any of the metadata, because I have smart playlists that rely on the songs’ play count. Is it possible to do this without too much hassle?
It is. There is an easy (mostly reliable) way and a slightly more complicated (but better) way.
With this AppleScript, you can copy tags from older rips to newer, higher-quality rips and not lose any metadata.
The first method is to launch iTunes, insert the CD into your drive, and then check to see that all the tags—Album, Artist, Album Artist, Name, Genre, Composer—are exactly the same as yours. When you rip the CD again in Apple Lossless format, iTunes will ask if you want to replace the existing tracks. When it does so, it will keep your other tags, such as album art and lyrics, and iTunes-specific metadata, such as Last Played Date, Plays, Rating, and so on. However, in my experience, this method is hit-or-miss.
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