Recommended CD/DVD to use with EAC?

[dwilliams01]

I think that this is the correct place for this and excuse me if I missed some place obvious where this is already posted/answered. I'm looking at building a new server for slimserver and ripping. The MSI Axis 700 looked pretty good, but all of the plextor CD drives recommened with EAC appear to be completely discountinued in favor of DVD drives.

Does EAC support DVD drives? Are their any favorites amoung the community? The EAC author seemed to favor Plextor quite a bit.

thanks!

[Jitterbug]

EAC has garnered a type of mythical status, however there is nothing unique about what it does. If you have a drive that does error correction, as most now do, you don't need EAC. Any ripping software will make a bit perfect copy. You can easily verify this by binary comparing ripped files.

EAC is useful if you have a badly scratched disk.

[andy_c]

I think that this is the correct place for this and excuse me if I missed some place obvious where this is already posted/answered. I'm looking at building a new server for slimserver and ripping. The MSI Axis 700 looked pretty good, but all of the plextor CD drives recommened with EAC appear to be completely discountinued in favor of DVD drives.

Does EAC support DVD drives? Are their any favorites amoung the community? The EAC author seemed to favor Plextor quite a bit.

thanks!

Hi,

One of the strange things about EAC is that there's a huge variation between drives in how fast they will rip in EAC secure mode (the mode you want to use). The fast ones have the property that they do not cache audio data when ripping. Different models come and go. I have one that can do 24x average over the disc in secure mode, but it is no longer made. Other drives I've tried can only manage 3-4x in secure mode. This makes a huge difference in how long it takes to rip your collection.

A drive that's apparently still available that rips very fast in EAC secure mode is the Asus DRW-1612BL. See this page:

http://www.cdfreaks.com/reviews/Asus...rformance.html

and scroll down to the EAC test to see secure mode performance. It looks like they just ripped a single track. If you average over a whole disc, the speed gets faster toward the end, so you should see something faster than the 17.4x they show. Note that the drive does not cache audio data when ripping. That's what you want for a good EAC ripper.

[TiredLegs]

If you have a drive that does error correction, as most now do, you don't need EAC. Any ripping software will make a bit perfect copy. You can easily verify this by binary comparing ripped files.

Maybe, but EAC can actually do the comparison for you using the AccurateRip plug-in. AccurateRip automatically compares checksums from your ripped files to those of other users who have ripped the same pressing of the same disc. If even a single bit is different, the checksums won't match. If they do match, you immediately know that your rips are bit perfect.

[Jitterbug]

Maybe, but EAC can actually do the comparison for you using the AccurateRip plug-in. AccurateRip automatically compares checksums from your ripped files to those of other users who have ripped the same pressing of the same disc. If even a single bit is different, the checksums won't match. If they do match, you immediately know that your rips are bit perfect.

This can be reassuring, no doubt. In the main however, EAC, AccurateRip etc are trying to solve a problem that except in extreme cases doesn't exist anymore. I have done binary comaparison of trackes ripped with EAC and those ripped with Windows Media Player and never found a difference (except for tags) even with scratched CDs. I then settled back and enjoyed the convenience of WMP. I use a plextor drive with C2 error correction.

[chinablues]

I have a DVD read/writer (Memorex 16x). I bought an Asus CD reader (only reads, nothing else) because of the slow ripping speed with the DVD reader. The Asus is 52x speed. About 12$ from newegg.com. For sure the plain vanilla CD reader is much faster than my DVD read/writer. I don't have numbers for speed when ripping, but subjectively, the DVD was a 'pain' and the Asus 'really quick'. EAC same settings for both drives. Agree it's sometimes difficult to find the plain vanilla CD readers as most stores want to sell/stock only the 'swiss army knife' DVD read/writers...which you don't need for CD ripping.

Dan