[kurt_fire]

I've been reading a lot lately about LAME MP3s. When I rip my CDs to my computer, I do not rip them to MP3 format. I rip them to WAV, then convert them to FLAC via a program called "switch."

And when I download music, it is in either FLAC or MP3 format already. Is there any need for me to download a program, such as EAC, that will allow me to rip into LAME MP3 format?

 

[Febs]

1. EAC will give you more accurate rips than just about any other program out there, and is great at working through damaged discs.

2. EAC can rip and then automatically encode to FLAC, giving you the option of either retaining or saving the .wav files. That way, you can go from CD to FLAC in one step.

 

[kurt_fire]

Sweet. That saves me a step.

Do I need to download anything besides the basic EAC program for this "feature?"

 

[kockroach]

There are also plugins for EAC such as REACT, MAREO, WACK, FLACAttack, which are used to create multiple encodings from a single rip. This would allow you to rip the cd in EAC, then encode to FLAC and MP3 (or other formats).

 

[Chri5peed]

EAC will always be an essential tool for me, seeing as how its a ripper and the encoding is done seperately. This means perfect WAV copies.

Actually does anyone know a way to make EAC compress archived FLAC files? ATM it won't accept anything other than a CD/WAV...

Urm to make it understandable, you know you can drag and drop WAVs into EAC and it uses the external encoder to change them, can you do this with FLAC?

 

[kockroach]

FLAC (or WavPack, Monkey's Audio, etc.) are compressed WAV files. As David mentions on the WavPack site, "WavPack acts just like a WinZip compressor".

Do you mean you want to convert to a different lossless format? EAC doesn't allow for that, it only works with uncompressed files. You can use foobar2000 or dbPowerAMP (or others programs) to transcode to other formats.

 

[Chri5peed]

Lol, I knew this would be tricky to explain. Right...

You know how you can open EAC and drag & drop files into it, it asks you what folder to use and it uses whatever encoder is selected. At this time only WAVs can be used.

I want to be able to have archived albums in FLAC and use EAC to turn them into mp3s automtically if needed.

 

[skeeder]

if you want to use LAME, you'll need to download it...I think. Because mine uses LAME to compress it after it rips it to a wav.

 

[kockroach]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chri5peed Lol, I knew this would be tricky to explain. Right... You know how you can open EAC and drag & drop files into it, it asks you what folder to use and it uses whatever encoder is selected. At this time only WAVs can be used. I want to be able to have archived albums in FLAC and use EAC to turn them into mp3s automtically if needed.

It wasn't tricky to explain....you just weren't clear about the fact that you wanted to convert your FLAC files to MP3. You made it sound like you wanted to compress your FLAC files even further.

And as I said, you would need to use a program like foobar2000 or dbPowerAMP to transcode your FLAC files to another format, like MP3. EAC only works with uncompressed files (i.e. WAVs).

If you want to use EAC to create FLAC files and MP3 files, then you would want to use one of the plugins I mention toward the beginning of the thread....like REACT. This type of plugin allows one to create any and all file types from a single rip of a CD.

 

[kurt_fire]

Would ripping a CD to .wav using windows media player produce an identical file as ripping a CD to .wav using EAC? I'm confused. I thought .wav was lossless, and all programs would do the exact same thing regarding .wav.

 

[kockroach]

EAC has a "Secure" mode, which will re-read the file if errors are detected in the ripping process. If it cannot correct the error, it will report it to you, such that you know the file is not accurate. In fact, EAC (and dbPowerAMP) can utilize a plugin called AccurateRip, which compares your rips against a database of rips form other participants. It will let you know if you obtained the same results as others that have the same disc as you.

With WMP, you don't have this secure ripping potential.

 

[Chri5peed]

Quote:

Originally Posted by kurt_fire Would ripping a CD to .wav using windows media player produce an identical file as ripping a CD to .wav using EAC? I'm confused. I thought .wav was lossless, and all programs would do the exact same thing regarding .wav.

It should be the same, but as kockroach says EAC is much more paranoid, i.e. in secure mode it will do multiple error sweeps if needed. Therefore you're getting almost perfect WAV rips from even badly scratched CDs.

A CD straight out of the wrapping should give WMP an easy job to rip well.

EAC has given me 100% perfect rips from over 200 CDs.