[DunninLA]

Hi.

I've got a nice budget/hi-end home audio system that I cannot use much because it is in the family room with an open floorplan, and I rarely have the chance to just sit down and listen to music without bothering everyone in the house.

I have high school daughters each with an Ipod touch 1G 4gig from last Xmas. Also an Ipod Nano 2g 2Gig that isn't being used. My daughters use iTunes.

I thought it is time to convert to digital, with all 200 cds in one little device that I can listen to at any time, any place. I googled "quality mp3 ripping" and found lots of information about shareware and other programs that convert the cds to 192 variable. I also read about lossless.

I know so little about this that I am sort of stuck on what to do or how to do it.

I have old Sennheiser HD 560 headphones and am going to get HD 580 next week. My budget will allow me to get a decent portable amp like the HeadSix, or Corda Move, and maybe a stationary amp like the Corda Arietta. I also plan to get quality in-ear phones... I have been reading about the Westone UM1 or UM2 for use on airplanes, or even occassionally at work.

SOOOOO

What software would you recommend I use to convert my cds to digital and load the songs onto a portable device like the Nano or something else I might buy down the road? I haven't even thought about buying music already in digital format.... but I suppose whatever I use for my ripped cds should be compatible with purchased music over the net....

Thanks.

 

[HipHopScribe]

EAC -> FLAC -> LAME VBR MP3 -> Digital Audio Player

This way, you only have to go through the ripping process once. You then have a lossless library, which can be transcoded to any codec you need in the future.

Here is a guide to setting up EAC & ripping to FLAC:

EAC Setup Guide

I suggest FLAC because it is open source and the most popular lossless codec. You have iPods, so you could use Apple Lossless, which is actually supported on the player itself, but iTunes isn't as good at ripping as EAC, and I don't know if you can rip to Apple Lossless with EAC. I'm not one who buys into there being a perceivable difference between high quality lossy and lossless when using a DAP in 99.9% of circumstances (you can of course test this yourself, but make sure it's a blind test), so that's why I suggest LAME MP3 as the final part of the process, you'll save plenty of storage space, MP3 has basically universal support and LAME is the best MP3 encoder. You can use any number of programs for the FLAC to LAME part of the process, I use dbpoweramp.

 

[DunninLA]

Thanks HipHopWritingGuy --

Does this mean I'll have each cd in two formats on the hardrive? -- FLAC and MP3?

Can you give me an idea of how much hardrive space this might occupy? My 3 yr. old Dell e310 tower has 160gb drive with currently 100g free space. For example if I have a 66 minute classical cd, how much space would the FLAC file occupy, and then an MP3 at 192 vbr?

 

[HipHopScribe]

Quote:

Originally Posted by DunninLA /img/forum/go_quote.gif Thanks HipHopWritingGuy -- Does this mean I'll have each cd in two formats on the hardrive? -- FLAC and MP3? Can you give me an idea of how much hardrive space this might occupy? My 3 yr. old Dell e310 tower has 160gb drive with currently 100g free space. For example if I have a 66 minute classical cd, how much space would the FLAC file occupy, and then an MP3 at 192 vbr?

You might be looking at around 400MB in FLAC, and 90MB MP3.

 

[saintalfonzo]

download DB Poweramp Music Converter and all the codecs you need. Then rip each cd to your hd in Flac format, using DB Poweramp (it's pretty self-explanatory once you start ). After that you can convert all the albums you want to put on the ipod by hilighting them, right-clicking over the selected songs, and choosing "convert to". You don't have to start the program; it's automatically a choice to use when you right-click over any music file. I think you are going to want to use mp3 320kbps if you care about sound quality.

 

[saintalfonzo]

You should invest in an external HD, you can find 500 GB for under $100.

 

[DunninLA]

Your Holiness -- If I understand you correctly, you're saying:

DB Poweramp Music Convert -> mp3 320 kbps -> Digital Audio Player

You do not suggest holding files separately as FLAC? What to you think of HipHop's suggestion to keep lossless files as well as MP3?

** edit ** Ah, I believe Hip Hop is saying the first part of the process, the Ripping to FLAC, is done free with EAC. I then pay $36 for the DBPoweramp Music Convert to get them into MP3. And you're agreeing with him except you're suggesting I pay $36, or $24? for the RIP program from DB Poweramp... is that about right?

To be honest with you when I am on the DB Poweramp website, I have no idea what they're talking about, or which product I need... they seem to have several options with names I've never seen nor do I know what the names refer to.

 

[HipHopScribe]

You don't need dbpoweramp, I forgot it wasn't free, I got it a while back. There are plenty of free programs that can convert FLAC to MP3 just fine, like Foobar2000

 

[DunninLA]

OK, I'm getting really frustrated here. I need to take some time to read the EAC installation guide.

 

[HipHopScribe]

Quote:

Originally Posted by DunninLA /img/forum/go_quote.gif OK, I'm getting really frustrated here. I went to EAC to download the software, and it asked me if it was OK to configure two drives (which ones I cannot remember). I said OK. It asked for each drive if I prefer speed or accuracy. I said Accuracy. then it went to the codec configuration. It asked me if I want Mp3, FLAC, and two others. At this point I just quit. I don't like guessing about answers when I'm asked questions. Is there anywhere like an FAQ or just a simple recipe like 1> got to eac website 2. It asks if it can configure two drives. Say Yes 3. It asks if you want speed or accuracy. Choose Accuracy. 4. It asks if you want to configure if for MP3 or FLAC. Choose FLAC.. etc. etc. does such a thing exist? My problem is that I don't know enought about these things to pick the options the download throws at me.

The link I posted earlier is a complete, step-by-step, set-up guide.

EAC Setup Guide

 

[centerfold]

You can rip your CD's into the FLAC format if you want your collection to the lossless, and then convert those files into whichever mp3 format you wish.

If you are wising to just convert your 200 cd's into "one little device", you can use EAC to simply rip the CD into you appropriate MP3 format.

FLAC files are usually for archiving purposes on your computer, but if you want to just put it on an portable music device, you can skip ripping the file in FLAC, and just rip it into MP3 format. It will save you a lot of time, and computer memory.

 

[DunninLA]

Thanks Hip Hop -- the reason I edited my post was that I noticed that setup guide did have all that stuff.

I configured EAC per its recos and I'm on my second cd ripped to FLAC. Later I'll figure out how to convert to mp3 192 vbr or 320.

 

[DunninLA]

Okay, I may have hit a snag, not sure.

I ripped a cd called Lovin' Spoonfool - Greatest Hits (2000)

It occupies 680Mb on my hardrive.

When I put the cursor over a song, it says it is:

Type: wav file
Bit Rate: 1411 kpbs
Size: 21.6MB

So has the conversion to FLAC not happened?

In the EAC program, it says it is 21.6MB, but when it was being ripped it said the size "compressed" was more like 5MB.

Where is the compressed file?? Here is the text log up till Track2:

-----------------------------
Exact Audio Copy V0.99 prebeta 4 from 23. January 2008

EAC extraction logfile from 19. October 2008, 19:34

The Lovin' Spoonful / Greatest Hits

Used drive : LITE-ON CD-ROM LTN-489S Adapter: 0 ID: 0

Read mode : Secure
Utilize accurate stream : Yes
Defeat audio cache : Yes
Make use of C2 pointers : No

Read offset correction : 12
Overread into Lead-In and Lead-Out : No
Fill up missing offset samples with silence : Yes
Delete leading and trailing silent blocks : No
Null samples used in CRC calculations : Yes
Used interface : Native Win32 interface for Win NT & 2000
Gap handling : Not detected, thus appended to previous track

Used output format : User Defined Encoder
Selected bitrate : 320 kBit/s
Quality : High
Add ID3 tag : No
Command line compressor : C:\Program Files\Exact Audio Copy\Flac\flac.exe
Additional command line options : V -8 -T "artist=%a" -T "title=%t" -T "album=%g" -T "date=%y" -T "tracknumber=%n"


TOC of the extracted CD

Track | Start | Length | Start sector | End sector
---------------------------------------------------------
1 | 0:00.00 | 2:08.42 | 0 | 9641
2 | 2:08.42 | 2:29.08 | 9642 | 20824
3 | 4:37.50 | 2:21.50 | 20825 | 31449
4 | 6:59.25 | 2:56.42 | 31450 | 44691
5 | 9:55.67 | 2:01.20 | 44692 | 53786
6 | 11:57.12 | 2:37.23 | 53787 | 65584
7 | 14:34.35 | 2:20.10 | 65585 | 76094
8 | 16:54.45 | 1:52.55 | 76095 | 84549
9 | 18:47.25 | 2:39.00 | 84550 | 96474
10 | 21:26.25 | 2:53.10 | 96475 | 109459
11 | 24:19.35 | 2:43.05 | 109460 | 121689
12 | 27:02.40 | 2:13.60 | 121690 | 131724
13 | 29:16.25 | 2:27.57 | 131725 | 142806
14 | 31:44.07 | 2:36.55 | 142807 | 154561
15 | 34:20.62 | 2:29.43 | 154562 | 165779
16 | 36:50.30 | 2:22.45 | 165780 | 176474
17 | 39:13.00 | 2:44.02 | 176475 | 188776
18 | 41:57.02 | 2:42.30 | 188777 | 200956
19 | 44:39.32 | 3:36.40 | 200957 | 217196
20 | 48:15.72 | 3:23.53 | 217197 | 232474
21 | 51:39.50 | 2:32.00 | 232475 | 243874
22 | 54:11.50 | 2:43.67 | 243875 | 256166
23 | 56:55.42 | 3:01.55 | 256167 | 269796
24 | 59:57.22 | 1:56.30 | 269797 | 278526
25 | 61:53.52 | 2:42.38 | 278527 | 290714
26 | 64:36.15 | 2:50.17 | 290715 | 303481


Track 1

Filename C:\EACrips\The Lovin' Spoonful - Greatest Hits\01 - 2000 - Do You Believe In Magic.wav

Peak level 98.8 %
Track quality 100.0 %
Test CRC F7F97D69
Copy CRC F7F97D69
Accurately ripped (confidence 11) [084E8D88]
Copy OK

Track 2

 

[DunninLA]

OK, I played around with software a little. I had earlier tonight installed LAME. Now I installed foobar2000 and using it, and it using LAME, converted the .wav files of Lovin Spoonful to MP3 v2 192. The file shrunk from 680MB to 97MB. I've got both version in the folder, so the folder is now 777MB.

As an experiment, I re-ripped another CD with EAC & LAME using the compression v0 320 kbps. It appears V0 320 takes up 21% more disk space than V2 192. But, it looks like foobar2000 only allows me to pick v2 192. Is that right? I think I don't mind another 21% overhead by using V0 320. Does Foobar + LAME allow for v0 320 conversions? It does not seem to be on its dropdown choices.

Hah! found my own answer. Foobar2000 allows me to change its default MP3 setting to V0 245.

 

[berniebennybernard]

I would only rip the CDs using Exact Audio Copy to 320KBPs MP3 only if for certain I would not be needing to re-rip my collection in the future. Otherwise ripping it to FLAC is much more handy since you have a lossless copy for both:
A) future transcodes
B) lossless listening

Since you probably use iPods, using a conversion software like dBpoweramp to go from FLAC -> Apple Lossless is painless, and quite fast as well.