itunes store- different bitrates

[mopppish]

Hi, all.
I know that most of the music purchased from the itunes store is encoded @ 128k AAC, but I've heard that some buyers have found the occasional song to be encoded at a higher rate. Is there any way to tell which songs/albums have this higher encoding BEFORE buying? I am crazy enough to have encoded almost all of my music @ 320k (I've got a 5G 60gb ipod... with 1gb left!) but would be willing to buy more from the itunes store if it was at least 192k. Otherwise, I'd rather just buy the CD. But the itunes store can be convenient when the only place in your town to get music is Walmart...
For the record, I do have sensitive ears, and I do understand the trade-off beween sound quality and convenience. I encoded most stuff at 320k because I could tell the difference, but I think that soon I will began re-encoding some things @ 192k as I am almost out of space and can live with that level of sound quality.

 

[jimthorn]

Is there any way to tell which songs/albums have this higher encoding BEFORE buying?

No. Even if you Get Info on a track in the iTMS, you can't see what the bitrate is. I think Apple claims that all the tracks are 128kbps (and every one I've bought is), but if there are a few that are higher, it's just a lucky bonus.

To my knowledge, the music is not encoded by Apple, but is encoded by the record label and given to Apple with tags and art in place. So I suppose someone at a particular record label might have encoded some albums at a higher bitrate.