On a personal level I do not want to batch process my RAW files,the major advantage of using RAW is that when importing into Photoshop there are a range of adjustments you can make using the introduction applet ( colour balance, exposure adjustment, shadow, brightness, contrast,saturation etc ) before actually getting to work in Photoshop proper. If you do not have this facility I would suggest you visit the Adobe web site and browse the download section and see if the RAW import file for your particular camera is there, this section is upgraded on a regular basis as new cameras are launched, even cameras from the same manufacturer need a more recent import file, despite promises RAW is not universal and still has some individual requirements depending on your camera. Working with RAW files gives so much control over what you can do with the image, when your work is complete then is the time to save it as a tiff or jpeg dependent on end usage but always keeping the RAW file untouched as the digital negative in case you wish to revisit it in the future. The point raised about using jpeg for normal use and if you know you need a high quality print then shoot in RAW, I would just ask you to consider shooting RAW all the time as you can always make the image into a smaller file size but you cannot succesfully reverse the process, once the camera has compressed a 10 Mb image down to maybe 2 Mb that large quantity of information is gone for good, the shot you take as jpeg just may be the best shot you take in your entire photographic life ! As you can tell I an a dedicated RAW file user, I compare the control it gives me to the work I used to do in a wet darkroom, memory card these days are relatively inexpensive, I always work on the premis that my next image will be my best. I would respectivly suggest you experiment as TwoPynts has done above, one shot as a jpeg and one as RAW and see the improvement.