At risk of resurrecting a tired thread, but trying to be constructive, it might be worth mentioning that if you do want to save storage space, you can use lossless compression and you'll not be throwing anything away.
For about a year now I've used wavpack in conjunction with AA1.5 for editing classical music concerts for radio broadcast, and it effectively halves the amount of disk space required (when working with 16 bit recordings - you save less with 32 bits). Crucially for me, wavpack retains all cue information and labelling and in practical use is fully integrated with AA - if you use wavpack 4.0. It often seems to save faster than wave too - but takes longer to open. But usually you're in a hurry to save, less rushed when opening.