Best method to rip CD for high Audio Quality?

[ed_vh]

Hi,

I have just purchased a SB3 and will have this connected through a DAC and a pretty good audio system. I am going to dedicate an old PC I have to be my server and as such want to make sure I rip high quality data to stream to the SB3. What format should I use and what program to make the extraction/convertion. Ideally I would like the files to also be playable by itunes (I have a mac as well) so would have a preference for something itunes can play too if that is possible

Is FLAC what I want to use?

Thanks for your help

Ed

[mherger]

> What format should I use and what program
> to make the extraction/convertion.

EAC - Exact Audio Copy (if you're on Windows).

> Is FLAC what I want to use?

Yes.

--

Michael

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[ModelCitizen]

> What format should I use and what program
> to make the extraction/convertion.

EAC - Exact Audio Copy (if you're on Windows).

> Is FLAC what I want to use?

Yes.
Michael

I'd be extremely surprised if iTunes supported Flac (it didn't used to and I am pretty sure it never will, but best to check). In which case if you are set on playing the files on your Mac with iTunes (is that what you want to do?) you would have to encode to Apple lossless.
My preference would be to use Exact Audio Copy, in secure mode, set up properly (pita to do, but you only have to do it once), to rip, compress and tag to Flac (setting Flac as the external encoder). This ensures you get perfect flac rips with all the tags. But you'd have to dump iTunes and use a player that supported Flac (unless I am wrong about it not supporting flac).
MC

[ed_vh]

Hi, Thanks for the replies. I want to be able to use itunes as I have an ipod and I use a Mac as well. I could play via softqueeze on the mac but it leaves the ipod out of the equation that I don't want to do.

What are your thoughts on the apple losless format and can this be encoded by EAC?

Thanks for your help

Ed

[ceejay]

Don't let your ipod drive your choice of format for listening through your SB: you will not want to use a lossless format on the ipod, the files will take up too much of your ipod drive and will shorten battery life. But you will want lossless (whether ALAC or FLAC) for SB listening, so you'll probably need to end up with two (at least) versions of your files. You might want to check out the MAREO companion program to EAC which makes it easy to rip into multiple formats in one go.

My choice would be to do double rips to AAC (for the ipod) and FLAC (for the SB) and, as you say, use Softsqueeze when you want to play music on your mac.

Ceejay

[funkstar]

I would also go the dual format route. However i wouldn't worry about adding MAERO to the ripping part, EAC is complicated enough as it is.

Once you have ripped the music, use something like FooBar2000 or dbPoweramp to transcode these files to AAC or MP3.

also, before you transcode you might want to sort out your Meta Data (or Tags) first. I use Tag&Rename but there are plenty of free apps out there too. EAC is pretty bad at its Tag handling and your SB will be much friendlier if you have your tags correct.

Have a hunt through the SlimDevices Wiki, there is lots of good info in there on ripping, compression and tagging.

[the_twin]

You could always try a little experiment and rip the same track in various formats (FLAC, Apple lossless etc) and see if you notice the difference. The advantage of iTunes is that it is incredibly easy to use and you will have music you can use on your iPod and Mac as well as a PC. Having multiple different copies of the same songs strikes me as madness.

[ceejay]

Having multiple different copies of the same songs strikes me as madness.

On the other hand, using full-rate lossless (of whatever variety) in a portable player is also madness! And listening to highly compressed stuff on my lovely SB just isn't going to happen.

Either way lies madness - you just have to choose which kind!

Ceejay

- I actually keep three copies of all my music - FLAC, AAC and MP3. Costs me absolutely no effort to create as its all automated. And the storage overhead on top of a lossless rip isn't much, and anyway storage is cheap....

[ed_vh]

Oooohhh, I am going dizzy with options. What about doing a half way house and using the apple lossless format that is supported in itunes. Is this supposedly not as high quality as FLAC or does FLAC just take up less space?

[Heuer]

Why not use lossless on an iPod? I have 60Gb of disc space which equates to 2,500 songs in ALAC. If I need a change I can simply repopulate the iPod with a different 2,500 songs - enough for weeks of listening! I use my iPod with an Aux input into my car and decent earphones (Shure 5c) so why bother to compromise sound quality anywhere? I have no doubt the next generation of iPod's will have 120Gb capacity so lossy compression will be pretty much pointless.

Having said that I use FLAC on my SB3 and ALAC on the iPod.

[funkstar]

Well for many lossless on an iPod (or similar) would be pointless. It uses more battery power (more disk accesses) and if you have a significant music collection you have to decide what to store.

I'm planning on getting a 100gig Archos AV500 so i can have all my music with me in either MP3 or WMA (not decided yet) and have a little left for some TV or films :)

Each to their own though. If lossless works for you in the car then no-one is going to get upset about it :) (if you could get a 400gig DAP i would use lossless in the car too :P )

[ceejay]

Oooohhh, I am going dizzy with options. What about doing a half way house and using the apple lossless format that is supported in itunes. Is this supposedly not as high quality as FLAC or does FLAC just take up less space?

Well, lossless is lossless, so they should sound identical. Compression will be pretty similar, too. The main drawback with using ALAC lossless on the SB is that it has to be transcoded on the server, as the SB itself can't interpret it, which means (1) higher server load (2) more network bandwidth used (3) no ffwd/rewind within tracks. None of these need be killers, though.

If you are prepared to put up with the battery drain and reduced space on your ipod, then AAC is a fine way to go. If not, AAC and FLAC would be good.

Ceejay

[grcooper]

(if you could get a 400gig DAP i would use lossless in the car too :P )

Almost - 120gig:

http://www.phatnoise.com/products/digitalmediaplayers/index.php

-gary

[funkstar]

Oooohhh, I am going dizzy with options. What about doing a half way house and using the apple lossless format that is supported in itunes. Is this supposedly not as high quality as FLAC or does FLAC just take up less space?
as they are both lossless FLAC and ALAC both have idential audio quality, this goes for WAV and AIFF as well obviously. I don't know how good or thorough iTunes is at ripping, but EAC is considdered the most accurate at ripping CDs with errors (due to its extensive error checking and correcting techniques). So in theory you might end up with higher quality rips with FLAC and EAC. But remember that has nothing to do with the codec, just the rip method.

There are several pages in the Wiki with loads of information about ripping and tagging your music.

[Wirrunna]

I was faced with the same problem - Lossless and iPod compatability.

I created two accounts on the computer with iTunes in each, one imports music with MP3 for the iPod, and the second imports music using Apple Lossless.
I rip in the account with the Apple lossless iTunes, then on the other account, in iTunes use "File, Add Folder to Library" and iTunes copies the music over in MP3 for the iPod.

As has been pointed out, iTunes is simple to use and organises the music well.

[Smiley Dan]

Having multiple different copies of the same songs strikes me as madness.I suppose it depends what's cheapest, storage or compute? And bare in mind the latter would be duplicated compute, e.g. transcoding each time you require something lossy.

[funkstar]

Well it takes about 3 or 4 solid days for foobar to transcode my FLAC library into a lossy format and i hvae plenty of storage space, so i'm going for the multiple-copies-of-the-same-music option

[wimberrypie]

Hi, Thanks for the replies. I want to be able to use itunes as I have an ipod and I use a Mac as well. I could play via softqueeze on the mac but it leaves the ipod out of the equation that I don't want to do.

What are your thoughts on the apple losless format and can this be encoded by EAC?

Thanks for your help

Ed

I have the same issue, my solution was to rip once via Itunes to 320 MP3 (VBR and switch off the below 10 Hz filter) ... its not lossless, but its a very good compramise between potability, file size and quality

[Chris OH]

I use Rockbox (replacement firmware) on an i audio X5 (also available for the i pod).

This allows me to store 60Gig of FLAC and play back albums gaplessly as God intended. No messing with transcoding and no compromise when portable (line out to a portable amp and ER4's) or on the go in the car (Line out to the head unit)

There is some messing about to get Rockbox working but I dont think I am missing out too much without all of my music with me (80% of it is on vinyl anyway!). Battery life is shorter as lossless is more demanding from a disc access perspective and it is not yet sorted on the X5 but plenty for my 4 hour runs up and down the place.

Chris

http://www.rockbox.org/

[Heuer]

as they are both lossless FLAC and ALAC both have idential audio quality, this goes for WAV and AIFF as well obviously. I don't know how good or thorough iTunes is at ripping, but EAC is considdered the most accurate at ripping CDs with errors (due to its extensive error checking and correcting techniques). So in theory you might end up with higher quality rips with FLAC and EAC. But remember that has nothing to do with the codec, just the rip method.

There are several pages in the Wiki with loads of information about ripping and tagging your music.

The iTunes ripping is pretty hit and miss even with error correction turned on. EAC is the way to go for the actual ripping to wav and then get EAC to fire up an external compressor (iTunesEncode if you want ALAC) and you will have the best of both worlds. Error free ripping and iTunes compatability!

[cepheid]

The main drawback with using ALAC lossless on the SB is that it has to be transcoded on the server, as the SB itself can't interpret it, which means (1) higher server load (2) more network bandwidth used (3) no ffwd/rewind within tracks. None of these need be killers, though.
Of these, only #3 has any impact on usage. The server load for server-side transcoding is minimal; even on my 6-year-old G4 tower (dual-500 MHz) transcoding from ALAC to FLAC (which is actually ALAC->AIFF->FLAC) takes up about 5% CPU. The higher network bandwidth is only true if you are transcoding ALAC->AIFF. If you transcode ALAC->FLAC then you're only using as much bandwidth as you would have if the file were originally FLAC anyway.

So losing FF/REW is really the only noticeable impact from using ALAC. If this doesn't matter to you (it doesn't to me), then ALAC is just as good and will guarantee compatibility with iTunes.

As for the iPod, I would simply recommend maintaining a shadow library in AAC format for use on the iPod. It's very little effort (there are a number of tools out there for managing multiple iTunes libraries) and it allows you to listen losslessly at home and still use iTunes and your iPod without a hassle.