Is filtering necessary if I'm not downsampling? My data is sampled at $f_s$, and I'm interested in analyzing certain frequencies $0&lt;f_1&lt;\ldots&lt;f_N&lt;\frac{f_s}{4}$. I then take $T$ samples of data, $\{x_1,\ldots\,x_T\}$ where $T\gg \frac{1}{f_s}$, FFT it after padding to the next power of 2 after $T$ and then pick the FFT bins closest to my $f_i$ of interest to proceed with the next step.

My question is: Is it necessary to (or is there any advantage if I) bandpass filter (BPF) my data between $f_1$ and $f_N$? I figured that since there was no downsampling involved, there won't be any aliasing and I needn't BPF it. Besides, a well designed filter should not modify the frequencies of interest, so it makes no difference. Am I missing something or is filtering a necessary step before FFT?

Note: I won't be inverting it back to the time domain. I'm just interested in the specific bins (but several that FFT is much faster than Goertzel).
Filtering is not necessary as it would only effect those frequency bins outside of the passband.

However, depending on how small your passband is, you could potentially save yourelf a lot of FFT processing by low-pass filtering and then downsampling before your perform your FFT.  For example, if you downsample by 4, the resulting FFT could be 4 times shorter and still have the same frequency resolution.