Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Technical Questions Ripping CDs to your computer -- the audiophile way

Because of all the HTPC projects hovering around, I'd thought I would share with some of you a wonderful program called Exact Audio Copy. If you take your music seriously, Exact Audio Copy (EAC) will give you the best results in ripping your music, period. Any mp3 encoded by say, iTunes doesn't hold a candle to the quality you could get with EAC. It may take a while to set up, but this guide makes it incredibly easy and is very detailed.

Link

My recommendations:

If you want to go the MP3 route (for compatability reasons) I would highly recommend encoding all of your music at 320 kb/s. It's the last option they give in the guide for the LAME mp3 encoder named "CBR (best quality)"

I would recommend going the lossless audio route. Lossless audio files lose no quality whatsoever compaired to a CD. Some of you who use squeezeboxes, no go. You are going to need to use winamp as your mp3 player to play these files. It's arguably the best one out there, anyways. For lossless audio, I use a format called Monkey's Audio with .ape extensions. Kinda funny, but it is an excellent file format.
In anticipation for my axioms to arrive, I started to encode all of my music in 320 kbps format. I just switched to a lossless format and havn't looked back. Even with 320 kbps, you are going to lose a ton of high end. Cymbols will not have the crunchy, crisp sound they should have. I looked a software stereograph, and after a certain high frequency, the highs were litterally just lopped off after a certain frequency. In mp3 files, the high end is what gets comprimised.

Lossless audio is going to weigh in at around 20-30 MB per song, but it is very worth it.

I have no idea how many people will be actually interested in this, but if you are, I'm open for questions!

I didn't want you guys listening to inferior music on your HTPC's. Do your axioms a favor and feed them high quality music.

You'll probably get some opinions. I don't know enough to have any

Why not VBR?

Does EAC create folder trees nicely and automatically?

That is a very cool link and I really appreciate you sharing your expertise.

How does the software you suggest compare with Nero Burning? I do a lot of CD ripping, but it's mostly speech (training CDs) and I can't really tell the difference between the original and the ripped MP3 files I use. I guess that's just speech, though.
What is this "software stereograph" you mention? Where did you get it? I'd be interested if you can pass this info along. Thanks.
--Martin

Now your speaking my language! (Computers is my primary hobby/job).

At work, I use a very unique method of "ripping" that I have yet to find a replacement that works the same way...

Years ago, Plextor used to have a software called "Plextor Manager 2000" that had came with a device driver (written by Oak Technology I believe it was, now owned by "Simplisoftware") that was called the "AFS driver". The software has looooonnnnnnggggg since been abandoned, and Simplisoftware doesn't even support the driver anymore.

Basically, at work I have all the computers setup with limited user access rights (I'm the admin). Most of the software we use (Vegas Audio, SoundForge, etc) that has built in ripping capabilities DOES NOT WORK unless the user has full admin rights.

So, as a workaround, I "extracted" this driver out of the old Plextor software and install it. Since it operates as a device driver, it bypasses the user access restriction problem.

Basically what it does is allow you to:

a) Drag and drop files off a CD just as if they were files on the hard drive
b) Treats all audio cd files (with the normal .cda extension) as .wav files. So if you browse with Windows Explorer or whatever, they show up and act just like .wav files
c) Allow files to be opened up directly from the CD instead of having to go thru a separate "ripping" process. The "ripping" is actually done "on-the-fly" and is completely transparrent to the user. As far as the user is concerned, they are just .wav files on the hard drive.

The only caveot to this driver:

1) It only works in Windows 2000 or LOWER (not XP compatible)
2) Only supports PLEXTOR drives. Will NOT work with ANY other brand

I have YET to find ANY other solution that works like this driver. I *think* Linux/Unix and maybe some other alternative OSes has the function to treat audio CD tracks as .wav files built in, why doesn't Windows?

-Alan

Tom: in the guide they give a recommended VBR setting for the LAME mp3 encoder.

Basically, once you are going that high, my opinion is that you might as well just go 320 kbps and be done with it.

Space really isn't an issue for me, so, if space is an issue, VBR would be best.

Anyways...EAC can make trees however your heart desires. In the tutorial under "File" I think they show you. You can have folders nested however you like, and your files named however you like.


Vikingships:

With speach, you can get away with very low bitrates and speach will sound just fine.

The general advantages are with EAC:

1) The audio off the CD is ripped to a .WAV (uncompressed) audio file and lots of error correction takes place. Basically, if you have a scratch in your disk, there won't be pops in your music.

2) The external MP3 encoder (in this case, the LAME mp3 encoder) that turns the .WAV file into an .mp3 file is of a much higher quality. Basically, you are going to get a higher-quality mp3 even if it is encoded at the same bitrate. It's a much more efficient encoder than anything else out there.

For casual listening, you won't hear a difference. But if you want to squeeze every once for serious listening sessions, this is the way to do it.

^^ edited the above post some

I forgot to mention, the method I use to "rip" does NOT do encoding. You still need an encoder such as the one the origional poster referred to, or in our case, the endcoders built into our audio editing software. All the driver I have does is cause .cda files to show up as .wav files (which allows them to be directly opened by any audio player/editor) and allows for drag-and-drop capability within any windows program.

But so far, the really cool thing is even though this driver was abandoned looonnnngg before Plextor even made their first DVD burner, it still functions with their current models! And, it does not interfere with any other specialized applications such as AnyDVD, DVD Decryptor, etc.

-Alan

I spent some time in the past researching this and I got excellent results using CDex together with LAME using the default -alt -preset -standard. I get really small file sizes < 7MB and very good resoloution.

I have not experimented alot since though and I did not try this setting in critical listening.

Do you find that the above missed lots of detail ?

CDex is also an excellent ripper. It's a simplified version of EAC. I think I tried it before and got mixed results.

Anyways, yes, I can hear a definate difference between mp3's at 320 kbps and uncompressed.

Cymbols have more detail and punch, and the soundstage is much more clear and defined. Mp3's tend to flatten the soundstage.

For casual listening, by all means, use mp3's. But, if you like to sit down and just listen for every bit in a recording...uncompressed is the way to go.

In reply to:

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I didn't want you guys listening to inferior music on your HTPC's. Do your axioms a favor and feed them high quality music.

---

Well I appreciate your recommendations and respect your right to your opinion, statements like this one, and similar statements in several of your other posts, tend to come across as if one does not do you as suggest, then we have wasted our time and investment on our systems. You seem to feel that what you use or what you feel are the best products is the only option: choose a differant path, and one will be settling for less quailty of sound.
Many of us forum memebers have been involved in the audio/video/computer enviroments way longer than you, so please, give us some credit for our experience and knowledge. Between my roomies and I we have over 52 years of computer expierience, and I have been playing with audio/video for over 38 years.
So as for the software we use to rip CDs, the Squeezebox to stream them to the HT system, please give me some credit for knowing what I'm doing, and do not tell me I will have an inferior sound compared to yours.

Dennis