[Chri5peed]

God, much rubbish spoken in this thread.

Every program on earth 'rips' WAVs[temporarily], which are then converted to whichever codec[ALAC, FLAC, mp3, OGG, AAC...].


So doesn't it make sense to use a specific secure 'ripping' program. The best being Exact Audio Copy[EAC] or dbpoweramp...both of which use AccurateRip.


The philosophy behind AccurateRip is quite simple - each time an audio track is ripped (recorded by computer) it is compared with rips from other people, this allows a confidence report to be generated. The report might say that 4 other people had exactly the same results, this would guarantee your rip was without error, or the report could say that 3 other people disagree with your rip, the likely hood is that your CD has a scratch and should be cleaned.

 

[dfkt]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chri5peed /img/forum/go_quote.gif So doesn't it make sense to use a specific secure 'ripping' program. The best being Exact Audio Copy[EAC] or dbpoweramp...both of which use AccurateRip.

QFT. How anyone could even mention "iTunes" and "quality encoding" in the same thread is beyond me...

 

[Chri5peed]

^ Not going to say that, being ignorant of something =/= being stupid.


A general rule to follow is, a garden rake will scratch your arse, but you don't scratch every itch with a garden rake.

So, to follow on, a media player/garden rake will rip CDs/Scratch an itch, but it is hardly the ideal way.



iTunes is a music-player.

 

[ozz]

Quote:

Originally Posted by dfkt /img/forum/go_quote.gif QFT. How anyone could even mention "iTunes" and "quality encoding" in the same thread is beyond me...

Can you explain why .

 

[krmathis]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chri5peed /img/forum/go_quote.gif God, much rubbish spoken in this thread. Every program on earth 'rips' WAVs[temporarily], which are then converted to whichever codec[ALAC, FLAC, mp3, OGG, AAC...].

Not quite sure about that one.
Afaik several audio CD rippers extract the raw PCM audio data, which then again are used as input for the encoders (ALAC, FLAC, mp3, OGG, AAC...). Meaning that they don't wrap the audio data into a WAV container.

I may be wrong though.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chri5peed /img/forum/go_quote.gif So doesn't it make sense to use a specific secure 'ripping' program. The best being Exact Audio Copy[EAC] or dbpoweramp...both of which use AccurateRip.

EAC and dbpoweramp are not an option for everyone you know.

No way did I see that the OP mention that he run MS Windows. So far all we know he is running Mac OS X...

Quote:

Originally Posted by dfkt /img/forum/go_quote.gif QFT. How anyone could even mention "iTunes" and "quality encoding" in the same thread is beyond me...

Huh!?

Anything wrong with iTunes' encoders? Afaik both Apple Lossless and AAC are safe choices...

 

[Chri5peed]

Quote:

Originally Posted by krmathis /img/forum/go_quote.gif Not quite sure about that one. Afaik several audio CD rippers extract the raw PCM audio data,

Actually a computer cannot read raw PCM data[do not quote me, I bet some can], a WAV is a computerised form of it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by krmathis /img/forum/go_quote.gif EAC and dbpoweramp are not an option for everyone you know. No way did I see that the OP mention that he run MS Windows. So far all we know he is running Mac OS X...

Maybe, in that case, but I was speaking to the vast majority of people.

 

[krmathis]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chri5peed /img/forum/go_quote.gif Actually a computer cannot read raw PCM data[do not quote me, I bet some can], a WAV is a computerised form of it.

Well, an audio CD is raw PCM.
The same PCM stream is usually stored in a WAV or AIFF container on a computer. But I am quite sure it can be stored in raw PCM as well.

Either way. The data used as source for encoding to APAC, FLAC, MP3, .. are identical to the one stored on the audio CD.

Quote:

Maybe, in that case, but I was speaking to the vast majority of people.

Ok, I am with you.

 

[Chri5peed]

Maybe I got it confused, as I do not think many media-players can played stored PCM data.

I'm not speaking of CDs, who knows what funky stuff goes on!

 

[E.B.M.Head]

Well, lots of players can play back RAW PCM, but you have to tell the player the Bit Resolution (8 bit, 16 bit, 24 bit, 32 bit integer, 32 bit float, 64 bit), the sampling frequency and the byte order (little endian or big endian). This is of course very incovienient. WAV and AIFF Files contain this extra info in the header followed by the raw pcm data and are therefore easier to play back. Apple Lossless takes the raw pcm and transforms the data in a way which is easier to compress. At playback the data is decompressed and transformed back bit identical to raw pcm. It's not a very efficent lossless codec (FLAC, True Audio, WavPack, TAK, Monkey Audio, MP4 ALS and OptimFrog produce smaller files), but the hardware requirements are low (thats why the iPod can play it back) and saving 30 - 60% (depending on the music) compared to a WAV file is still a lot.

Oh and Ogg is a Container Format like MP4, AVI, Matroska, ...
The Audiocodec is Vorbis.

 

[dfkt]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ozz /img/forum/go_quote.gif Can you explain why .

Quote:

Originally Posted by krmathis /img/forum/go_quote.gif Huh!? Anything wrong with iTunes' encoders? Afaik both Apple Lossless and AAC are safe choices...

I worded that ambiguously, my bad.

Transcoding might be kinda OK with iTunes (at least to AAC and ALAC, but probably not MP3, since it uses FHG and not LAME). Ripping is the real problem, since it's anything but accurate, and audio CDs don't have sector synchronization, nor does iTunes handle scratched/damaged CDs properly. Thus you never know if you have a bit-perfect copy of the original CD.

Specialized tools like EAC, CDex, CDParanoia, Max, and others double- and triple-check to make sure your rip is perfect, and AccurateRip support means even the read-offset of your CD/DVD drives is taken care of.

As Chri5peed said, iTunes is a player, for CD rippers there are MUCH better choices.

Read more about EAC here, I couldn't say it better myself: http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?title=EAC

Quote:

What makes EAC special compared to other rippers is the fact that it is capable of reading audio CDs almost perfectly. EAC uses various methods for extracting audio data. EAC can also invoke externally installed encoders, thereby making it possible to simultaneously rip and encode audio data to the format of your choice. # Hidden sector synchronization (jitter correction) # Read error and complete loss of sync detection and correction in secure modes, as far as possible # Output of time positions of all non-exact corrections and listen to these positions # Automatic Speed reduction on errors and fallback afterwards # Compression offset support for exact compression/decompression # Detection of pre-track gaps # Detection of silence in pre-track gaps # Automatic creation of CUE sheets for CDRWin, including all gaps, indices, track attributes, UPC and ISRC # Automatic detection of drive features, whether a drive has an accurate stream and/or does caching # Sample Offsets for drives with no accurate streams, including the option of filling up missing samples with silence # Option for synchronizing tracks for non-accurate stream drives

 

[Solid Snake]

Quote:

Originally Posted by krmathis /img/forum/go_quote.gif Not quite sure about that one. Afaik several audio CD rippers extract the raw PCM audio data, which then again are used as input for the encoders (ALAC, FLAC, mp3, OGG, AAC...). Meaning that they don't wrap the audio data into a WAV container. I may be wrong though. EAC and dbpoweramp are not an option for everyone you know. No way did I see that the OP mention that he run MS Windows. So far all we know he is running Mac OS X... Huh!? Anything wrong with iTunes' encoders? Afaik both Apple Lossless and AAC are safe choices...

I'm running MS windows

 

[chinesekiwi]

Apple Lossless or any other lossless format.

 

[krmathis]

Quote:

Originally Posted by dfkt /img/forum/go_quote.gif I worded that ambiguously, my bad.

No problem!

Just wondered, cause afaik iTunes encoders are fine. But as you said, there are more reliable audio CD rippers out there..

 

[Solid Snake]

Okay, it looks like another problem showed up.

My original intent was to convert my cds into ALAC and take advantage of using winamp with the ASIO plugin but it looks like winamp doesnt support ALAC.

I have done a search in google for a plugin in winamp but none of them are working for me. So...does winamp not support apple lossless format or...? I'm at a loss here...Any help would be great!

EDIT:

YAY! After a few hours of browsing, I was able to fix it!!! Now I can enjoy listening!!! I feel so proud of myself, I deserve a cookie!