Best program for ripping CD's?

EdwardTeach · 20 Feb 2011 at 14:23

I dont have a CD player at the moment (no space), so I want to rip all my CD's and put them on my computer.

I will be listening to the music from the computer, or via my Iphone 3GS. What is the highest quality audio format that the iphone can support?

What is the best (free) program for ripping CD's to this format?

opethdisciple · 20 Feb 2011 at 15:18

windows media player?

Google is your best freind for this kind of stuff!

I dont think I'v had problems with mp3 at 320kb on my ipod!

EdwardTeach · 20 Feb 2011 at 16:09

Is that the highest quality the iphone supports?

I just tried ripping a CD using media player, and I didn't seem to be given any option as to the file format the ripped files are converted into.

joeyjojo · 20 Feb 2011 at 16:36

The quality you need is determined by the quality of what you're listening with. Better DACs/amps/speakers/headphones will reveal more of the detail in the music, but it may be overkill to rip lossless if listening on ipod earbuds etc.

For me, space isn't an issue. I rip to FLAC (lossless and platform independent) using dbPoweramp or Exact Audio Copy (not free and free respectively). These are proper ripping software with very good error correction. FWIW I use foobar 2000 as my media player.

MP3 is pretty old hat, but CBR 320 was originally chosen as the upper bitrate limit as the devs felt 320 would be transparent to the vast majority. Therefore, MP3 CBR 320 is almost certainly a safe bet for a long term copy of your tunes. Not to mention the files are still much smaller than lossless. Personally I would use VBR level 0, 1, or 2, as the space saving can be significant with imperceptible loss is quality.

AAC can do the same perceived quality as MP3 at lower bitrates. For example, even 128 (stereo) is considered to be pretty good. Again, VBR is better, I would use q=0.4 probably if I went this route. The Nero AAC encoder is a good one for setting up with EAC.

So, what do you listen on?

Calabi · 20 Feb 2011 at 17:18

I use this. He's got a verifier thingy(database which verifies that the rip was correct).

http://www.dbpoweramp.com/

moon man · 20 Feb 2011 at 18:18

ive been told the best is eac with lame but my laptop dosnt like it so like others i use wmp with best quality vbr (drop down menu on the rip tab)
my setup is sflo2/neco soundlabs amp with opamp upgrade and ultrasone hfi-780s ,sounds fine to my ears

EdwardTeach · 20 Feb 2011 at 18:24

joeyjojo said:
The quality you need is determined by the quality of what you're listening with. Better DACs/amps/speakers/headphones will reveal more of the detail in the music, but it may be overkill to rip lossless if listening on ipod earbuds etc.

For me, space isn't an issue. I rip to FLAC (lossless and platform independent) using dbPoweramp or Exact Audio Copy (not free and free respectively). These are proper ripping software with very good error correction. FWIW I use foobar 2000 as my media player.

MP3 is pretty old hat, but CBR 320 was originally chosen as the upper bitrate limit as the devs felt 320 would be transparent to the vast majority. Therefore, MP3 CBR 320 is almost certainly a safe bet for a long term copy of your tunes. Not to mention the files are still much smaller than lossless. Personally I would use VBR level 0, 1, or 2, as the space saving can be significant with imperceptible loss is quality.

AAC can do the same perceived quality as MP3 at lower bitrates. For example, even 128 (stereo) is considered to be pretty good. Again, VBR is better, I would use q=0.4 probably if I went this route. The Nero AAC encoder is a good one for setting up with EAC.

So, what do you listen on?

I will be listening on My iphone through either goldring ns1000's or ultimate ears 700's.

The iphone cant handle FLAC.

These are the formats it supports:

AAC (8 to 320 Kbps),
Protected AAC (from iTunes Store),
HE-AAC, MP3 (8 to 320 Kbps),
MP3 VBR,
Audible (formats 2, 3, 4, Audible Enhanced Audio,
AAX, and AAX+),
Apple Lossless,
AIFF, and WAV

Of these what would you say it best quality/ and/ or the most suitable for an iphone considering it has limited space?

tuomoy · 21 Feb 2011 at 15:11

I use WMP in most cases but I would recommend something that uses FLAC compression as that will preserve most of the information/quality from the original and allow you to discard CDs allthogether.

Auraomega · 21 Feb 2011 at 15:29

For ripping I use EAC to FLAC.

When I used my iPhone for music I'd then use Foobar2000 with foo_dop to convert my FLAC files to 224 mp3s on the fly (224 is the lowest quality I can't distinguish from CD, adjust to your needs) and transfer those all in one click.

joeyjojo · 21 Feb 2011 at 21:12

EdwardTeach said:
Of these what would you say it best quality/ and/ or the most suitable for an iphone considering it has limited space?

I would suggest AAC-LC at 192 ish kbps depending on your preference. You could probably use itunes for this, I think it uses LC and CBR by default. Just select the bitrate. 128 gives itself away on hi hats etc. but 192 is very good. You might prefer variable bitrate - q=0.5 ought to do it.

I don't use Apple products - as above the Nero AAC encoder does a good job.

dave-lew99 · 21 Feb 2011 at 21:38

I use EAC to rip to FLAC then i wrote a linux bash script to convert it all into 192kbps MP3.

If i add any new FLACs it will skip all the pre-existing MP3 versions and just convert the new FLACs.

TheGedi · 21 Feb 2011 at 22:00

I heard in an Article years ago that using 128kbps MP3 will reduce search times and Use less battery than higher qualitys and ive just used it ever since not had a problem.

Global_Inferno · 21 Feb 2011 at 22:13

TheGedi said:
I heard in an Article years ago that using 128kbps MP3 will reduce search times and Use less battery than higher qualitys and ive just used it ever since not had a problem.

Except they sound awful!? :eek:

EdwardTeach · 21 Feb 2011 at 22:18

Thanks for the advice guys. I guess I should do some experimentation and see at what bit rate I can distinguish the difference.

Auraomega · 21 Feb 2011 at 22:30

TheGedi said:
I heard in an Article years ago that using 128kbps MP3 will reduce search times and Use less battery than higher qualitys and ive just used it ever since not had a problem.

This is mostly true, it's actually to do with the buffer size which is 4mb on an iPod (I think, don't quite me though), if you can fit a single track into the buffer you save on battery and search times as you said. The issue is the buffer is so small it's only optimised for average length MP3s at stupid-low bitrates, a bit of an oversight I reckon.

EdwardTeach said:
Thanks for the advice guys. I guess I should do some experimentation and see at what bit rate I can distinguish the difference.

Definitely, I did the same thing a while back hence why I know 224 is the best bitrate for me. I can distinguish 128 and 192 from FLAC, but 224 is beyond me on normal listening, I'd like to think if I really searched for it I could tell but doing that takes the fun away from music

If you download Foobar2000 and the ABX plugin you can convert any lossless file into various bitrates and then do a double blind test (I.E. listen to tracks A and B and then say which one is X and Y) to find your top bitrate.

TheGedi · 21 Feb 2011 at 22:50

Global_Inferno said:
Except they sound awful!?

They sound fine to me, On my £20 Seheinhessers (Hard ass word to spell.) and on a Sony 5.1 but maybe im not as atuned to fine details as you are

joeyjojo · 22 Feb 2011 at 00:21

Auraomega said:
If you download Foobar2000 and the ABX plugin you can convert any lossless file into various bitrates and then do a double blind test (I.E. listen to tracks A and B and then say which one is X and Y) to find your top bitrate.

This is how I recommended 192 AAC-LC. I wasn't familiar with AAC, but a quick ABX (Ruiner, Nine Inch Nails, Downward Spiral Deluxe - lots going on and the hi hat is a giveaway) left me pretty satisfied with 192.

It's always good to have a FLAC backup where space saving isn't a priority eg. big HDD. It's half the size of WAV but still perfectly lossless.

Auraomega · 22 Feb 2011 at 00:34

joeyjojo said:
It's always good to have a FLAC backup where space saving isn't a priority eg. big HDD. It's half the size of WAV but still perfectly lossless.

Couldn't agree more! I used to have crap audio equipment and used onboard where I couldn't really tell the difference, consequently most of my music was in 128 with some in 192. Upgrade my audio equipment and I can suddenly hear the difference between CD and mp3 :eek:

I started ripping my music into 320 and soon realised that it was going to be a huge task (it actually took me about 4 weeks to do because of how tedious it was) and by the time I'd reached the C's I decided to do them all again in lossless so if I needed them in another format I wouldn't have to rip, just convert.

Never looked back since! Might take up a bit more room but oh so worth it because of the time I save.

marc2003 · 22 Feb 2011 at 00:39

assuming the OP uses itunes, it might be an idea to archive your CDs as apple lossless. then itunes can convert those files to lower bitrate AAC files to go on the iphone.

but i wouldn't use itunes to rip. you want something that can use accuraterip to verify. dbpoweramp is the easiest to use but costs £££. but the 21 day fully functional trial might be long enough to get your collection done.

alternatively you can configure EAC or foobar2000 with a command line encoder called qaac. this requires quicktime which of course you would already have installed if you use itunes.

blueacid · 22 Feb 2011 at 01:25

EAC + FLAC to rip. Keep a lossless library.

Then use Winamp to transcode as it copies onto the iPod. Win