itunes match replacing Apple Lossless Files with .AAC

I have not deleted any of my Apple lossless tracks which I painstakingly put on itunes from the cds. Many of them are now aac. Apple claim that they don't touch the files on my computer. I'm threefore confused as I haven't downloaded aacs and as I said before haven't deleted any lossless files. It's confusing.

iTunes Match does not touch the files on your computer. These files will be "downgraded" only if you delete the original file and download the matched track. The service does not upload ALAC files to the cloud. It converts the ALAC to a temporary AAC file, which is uploaded to listen to on iOS devices. On your computer, the ALAC files stay ALAC.

Michael Allbritton wrote:

iTunes Match does not touch the files on your computer. These files will be "downgraded" only if you delete the original file and download the matched track. The service does not upload ALAC files to the cloud. It converts the ALAC to a temporary AAC file, which is uploaded to listen to on iOS devices. On your computer, the ALAC files stay ALAC.

Hmm, that's interesting because on Apple's iTunes Match page it says (my emphasis):

Which music formats can iTunes Match handle?

You can match or upload music formats that can be played with iTunes. That includes AAC, MP3, WAV, AIFF, Apple Lossless, and more.

which clearly suggets that it will upload ALAC to iCloud 😕

That text could be interpreted that way. But ALAC files are not uploaded. They are transcoded first and the temp AAC files are uploaded, if they are to matched.

Michael Allbritton wrote:

That text could be interpreted that way. But ALAC files are not uploaded. They are transcoded first and the temp AAC files are uploaded, if they are to matched.

OK, thanks for confirming that. I am thinking about re-ripping my CDs as ALAC but that would make Match pointless.

Not entirely pointless. For me, before I moved out of the country, the way iTM did it was perfect for me. I had the ALAC files on my computer for playing over my home theater system, and I also had the lossy AAC files available for my iPhone without having to keep two copies of everything in the iTunes library.

Valid point, although I am planning to put the ALAC files on my iPhone. It's not my entire music collection, only those tracks for which I still have the CDs, so there's sufficient space.

I'm wanting to use iTunes Match but I'd like eto have ALAC on my iPhone as well, for my 'favorites' playlist which are all ALAC. For the rest, they are all 320kbps CBR. Can I supposedly put the ALAC hard files in my iPhone and then use iTunes Match for any other song I have? Or is it all this or all that?

iTunes Match is really an either/or proposition. However it is possible to sync the ALAC files to the iPhone, then turn on iTM and use it. But what refresh the ALAC content you'll have to disable/enable iTM every time you want to sync new ALAC music.

So, each time I want to put another ALAC file in, I'd have to disable ITM which means everything from ITM will be erased, and then redownloaded when I want to listen again?

Michael Allbritton wrote:

iTunes Match is really an either/or proposition. However it is possible to sync the ALAC files to the iPhone, then turn on iTM and use it. But what refresh the ALAC content you'll have to disable/enable iTM every time you want to sync new ALAC music.

No, downloaded or synced music will not be deleted. But, yes, you'd need to disable iTunes Match anytime you want to add new ALAC files to the iOS device.

Alright so the only hassle is just disabling and re-enabling, nothing will be deleted, not even my cache of music, just a mere on and off switch in settings?

If by "cache" you mean the cache of streamed music that is stored in volatile memory, yes, that is deleted when iTM is disabled. However any music that is explicitly downloaded to the device will not be deleted.

Alrighty, that's probably going to bug me a little bit but that's fine. Any song like non-mainstream Korean songs won't be matched but it'll just be uploaded to the cloud for access, correct?

Yes, tracks that are not matched will be uploaded. ALAC tracks will have a temp AAC files made, which will be uploaded to the cloud.