I can not get a cd imported into iTunes in Lossless format to play on the 4K NEX

I don't believe NEX plays ALAC. Try to convert the songs back to Flac.

Ok I assumed FLAC was the same thing

All of my music is ripped in Apple lossless and plays off my iPod just fine, I don't know what quality it actually plays but it does play...

Thats great but we are talking about getting apple lossless to play on the pioneer nex

What medium are you playing it from?  ipod, SD etc?  If it's an ipod it should play just fine as the ipod is converting it a plain audio, if it's SD etc, then I can understand why as I doubt any HU can convert it... if so, then just convert to something else like flac or just plain ol mp3.  

I was trying to play from sd but no go, all my stuff is mp3 anyway I just wanted to compare the two

Yes , the HU can play flac natively from an SD but not alac. I'd be interested to hear if there is a worthwhile audible difference with higher bitrate aac or mp3. 250kbps aac sounds better than my iphone when played from usb on my kenwood.

WIll iTunes import a cd in FLAC?

Nope. iTunes uses ALAC for lossless. If you have Flac files you have to use a converter to import them into iTunes. I use FlacTunes, available from the App Store. 

If you have tunes in ALAC, the best workaround I have right now is to export the music using Playlist Export (app) and then use XLD (app) to convert ALAC to FLAC. 

I dont have any FLAC files anyway. Im not going to bother with FLAC

Beyond audio bitrates, I find there is a difference between listening to low quality .mp3 (even if ripped at 320 which is the new max that iTunes will do) and listening to FLAC if you have a quality setup.  I'm running Focal mids and tweets with a JL amp and 12" JL sub.  I can diffentitely hear the difference.  I ripped all of my music to Apple Lossless (Apple's proprietary FLAC) for my iPod Classic and straight FLAC for my USB flash drive. 

Alot of people debate this, but in my experience there's a difference.  If you want a good converter check out dBpowerAmp.  I rarely buy software, but their software is truly top notch, especially for batch conversion.  I use it all the time.

I hear a notable difference. Even more so because the audio is being processed by the head unit. It took some time but I have a 128GB flash drive filled with my favorite albums after converting my ALAC back to FLAC. Beats carrying CD's around.

Thats great but we are talking about getting apple lossless to play on the pioneer nex

Get and connect an iPod.  I believe iPhones support apple lossless, too.  Other phones may support ALAC with a media player app, but not sure about the NEX supporting the playback via the app through USB.

Using other forms of media storage (flash drive, hard drive, SD, CD, DVD), you'll have to convert to FLAC.

I'm using a 32g sd card not a ipod

That's why my post started "Get and connect an iPod."

Using an SD card you have to go FLAC if you want lossless playback.  BTW, iTunes does not support FLAC.  You'll have to use other means to convert.

If you're on a Mac you can use XLD which will convert ALAC back to FLAC. It's time consuming but if you have the space to do the conversion it can be done. 

I dont want to bother hooking up my ipod if I dont have too. THats the great thing about the sd card slot no wires no fuss

I dont want to bother hooking up my ipod if I dont have too. THats the great thing about the sd card slot no wires no fuss

The other side of the coin is the HU does not support ALAC, playlists, or gap-less playback... and it really shouldn't be that hard to include these features.

I agree on the playlists and gapless playback, but if Apple demands a royalty for ALAC, I say Pioneer should respond "Bite Me!"

I agree on the playlists and gapless playback, but if Apple demands a royalty for ALAC, I say Pioneer should respond "Bite Me!"

Seems to me Pioneer is already in bed with Apple to some degree with the tentatively imminent certification of CarPlay.  ALAC should be a drop in the bucket by comparison.  Heck, there are free computer media players that support ALAC.  How do you suppose Apple gets royalties from their developers?

FLAC is an open specification and works (well); Apple, as they did with USB charging, is playing games (again) when there was utterly no reason to do so.  They have a minority of the device market at present and shrinking; they're not exactly in a place where they dictate terms.

Minority of the device market, are you sure about that?

Btw, Apple opened up ALAC years ago. It's been open source and royalty free since 2011!

Apple no longer holds a majority of the market share; in fact, it's about a third on phones now, down almost 10% y/o/y.

The "we're the fanboi and tweeny must-have" game is fading, as fads always do.

Apple has always strove to lock you into their accessories and "other things" dating back to the original Macs.  In the portable device arena they started that crap with their "custom" implementation of the "fast" charger USB protocol (there already was an industry standard -- shorted data pins; Apple decided that a voltage divider across them was what they'd use) which is why you now can't buy a single USB charger that will fast-charge BOTH Apple units AND every other device out there.  Then, not satisfied to have fragmented that market on purpose (and unhappy that people reverse-engineered the voltage divider requirements; after all, they were rather trivial) they changed the connector ("lightning"), instantly destroying compatibility with hundreds of other manufacturer's add-on products (e.g. nightstand alarm clocks, etc.) that had sold through millions of units worldwide.

ALAC is just another example of this; FLAC has existed since 2001 and was originally released both as an open format and a free reference implementation.  Rather than adopt what already works (really well) and is cross-platform Apple again did their usual crass crap of attempting to force people to remain within their "walled garden."

The same is true for iTunes; with essentially every other device out there you can simply copy media files to the device's storage and it will play them.  Only Apple insists that you use their software to do so, and we have now found out that as soon as you allow that connection your iPhone's security is permanently destroyed as the unit exchanges a keyring with the computer that bypasses all encryption permanently.  If that keyring is compromised (say, by a virus or physical theft of your machine) remote and unprompted access to damn near everything on your device goes with it.  Worse, said access cannot be revoked except by a hard reset of the phone or tablet in question.  The intentional design decision renders any pretense of enterprise (or regulated industry, say much less individual) security an utter and complete farce.  Oh, and the best part of it is that Apple doesn't disclose this either; it was discovered by forensic researchers and has been present in every version of IOS (including the current ones) going all the way back.

The correct response to this sort of thing by consumers would be to say "Bite Me!" rather than molly-coddling a company that has demonstrated every intent to lock you into their garden by any means possible and make available to them anything on your device they might want access to, ever.

I very much appreciate that Pioneer (finally) supported FLAC; the presence of an open-source, royalty-free and cross-platform lossless audio format on these head units is in fact the reason I bought a NEX over competing products.

SO what's the program for cds to Flac?