Wintermute Posted February 18, 2003 Share Posted February 18, 2003 Greetings All, What do you use to rip tunes from a CD? Everytime I do it (regardless of the program CDex, Sonic Foundry, etc)it never sounds as good as when I download a tune from the 'Net. Tips? Pointers? Better programs to use? Much obliged and cheers. Wintermute Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dblue Posted February 18, 2003 Share Posted February 18, 2003 Wintermute, There are many programs that will give satisfactory results, but I use Nero to do my ripping. It is a great CD burning program with lots of options (more than most people would feel comfortable with, it's pretty technical), but it's very flexible. To get the best quality, rip your mp3's at variable bitrate. I've been ripping mine at variable bitrate, highest quality, and after much listening, I haven't been able to tell any difference (I'm not saying there isn't any audible difference, I'm saying I can't hear it...and I'm pretty picky). Of course these files are much bigger, it takes about 100 to 120 MB per CD, but you need to sacrifice something for quality. Anyway, hope this helps. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
justin_tx_16 Posted February 19, 2003 Share Posted February 19, 2003 I have just started using CDEx. Rips at 320Kbps very quickly and makes a folder for the artist and then album and for me names each file Artist - Album - Track # - Title which makes it QUITE easy to organize. MediaJukebox has also been quite a great program for me in the past years. CDEx is just a smaller program and seems to be more reliable. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lovedrummin Posted March 3, 2003 Share Posted March 3, 2003 Has anyone heard anything about "Easy CD Creator 6"? Is it compatable with XP? I had heard there were some problems with Creator 5 and XP. I was kind of interested in Nero, but what I've been reading indicates it is very technical and somewhat difficult to absorb if you're among the technically challenged (as I am at times). A friend of mind had Creator 5 (but I think his system had an earlier version of Windows - not XP)and he loves it. I've seen it and it seems to be pretty easy to use. Creator 6 is rather new. Anyone tried it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dblue Posted March 4, 2003 Share Posted March 4, 2003 lovedrummin, I recently tried out Nero's (5.5 and up) newest version, and it has an interface called Nero express. I can tell you that it's the easiest interfact I've seen thus far. I still prefer the more technical interface, but you can't beat the express interface for ease of use. Check out this review on CNET: Click Here for Review Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
justin_tx_16 Posted March 4, 2003 Share Posted March 4, 2003 I use nero to burn and starting to rip with it. It is MUCH more reliable than my experiences with anyting from Roxio/Adaptec. The price is right too! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
easylistener Posted March 4, 2003 Share Posted March 4, 2003 Drag'n'drop the best program in the world for the challange person. It is hard to find, but it is fast easy and the quility is perfect everytime. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Audible Nectar Posted March 5, 2003 Share Posted March 5, 2003 I use exact audio copy. It's the best ripper out there. Want to know more?? Go to this link: http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/ This link explains why you should use EAC: http://www.chrismyden.com/nuke/modules.php?op=modload&name=Elite_DAE/eac&file=faq Also, a very good read about the CD and CDR formats in general: http://www.cdrfaq.org/ Lots of reading here, but it explains this much better than I can. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lovedrummin Posted March 5, 2003 Share Posted March 5, 2003 Thanks for all the info, links and websites folks. Looks like I have a good bit of reading ahead of me. Should be worth it though. Right now I'm just burning what I can with Windows Media Player 9, but it seems rather limited. I'm looking forward to expanding my horizons and having more fun. Thanks again. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mattbugz Posted March 15, 2003 Share Posted March 15, 2003 Wintermute, CDEx is very granular. You might want to try adjusting the different sampling rates and also use different encoders to see if there is any improvement. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wintermute Posted March 15, 2003 Author Share Posted March 15, 2003 Here's a silly newbie question for you: which drive do I use to get the best results my DVD or CD-R drive? Just wondering, Wintermute Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mattbugz Posted March 15, 2003 Share Posted March 15, 2003 CD is a digital format therefore there is no significant increase in encoding quality between your DVD or CDRW. Your computer simply takes the bits (1's and 0's) from the CD and encodes them to MP3 or whatever other format you select. If you were to copy one CD to another, there would be no performance degradation. However, there is a performance degradation when you're encoding from CDDA to MP3 since MP3 is basically a compression technology that allows you to have near CD quality while taking up less space. As far as selecting either the DVD or CDRW, I would select the faster drive speed or the one that isn't as sensitive to abnormalities on the CD itself (ie. scratches). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dblue Posted March 19, 2003 Share Posted March 19, 2003 I've been doing some research, and I learned that nero uses the Fraunhofer encoder, which is the first, but not the best, MP3 encoder. I found that it has some flaws when ripping in VBR (Variable Bit Rate) mode. I have therefore switched to Exact Audio Copy, which uses the LAME encoder. EAC is a great little program, as mentioned above, for those of you who take your MP3 quality seriously (as I do, because I stream my music off of my PC with an Audiotron, great product). Check it out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
darkpark Posted March 19, 2003 Share Posted March 19, 2003 Wintermute, If you have Nero Burning Rom, then use a program called CD-Speed which will measure the performance of your cdrom drive. Run it on both drives to see which one is the best. If you don't have the program then you can always do a search for CD Speed which is freeware and downloaded it. As for ripping, I'd use either EAC (Exact Audio Copy) or CDex. Both are great ripping programs and free. If you do use either one, I would highly recommand that you also downloaded LAME. it's an mp3 encoder that is regarded as one of the best quality ones if not the best. when you search for LAME, get the "DLL" version of it and dump it into the directory of one of the above programs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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