WAV

Standard: WAVeform *.wav The proprietary WAV format was developed by Microsoft and IBM. WAV is part of a PC-based set of standards of multimedia formats.

Risk Assessment: Advantages: WAV is widely used, as it is easy to record and distribute. There are many tools available for editing and playing WAV files, making interchange of files easy. WAV is a lossless format meaning that no audio information is discarded on creation of the file - an important factor for long-term preservation.

: Disadvantages: WAV is proprietary and comes with the problems associated with proprietary formats. For general use, players are distributed free of charge, but should this policy be changed or Microsoft withdraw of significantly modify the format this will inhibit the long-term preservation of the files.
: If migration between versions of WAV needs to take place, the success of this will be dependent on the quality of tools supplied by Microsoft or their third-party developers.
: Another disadvantage is that WAV files tend to be very large. This creates short-term preservation problems for those with limited server space. Other lossless files (used in specialist communities) create smaller file sizes.