Support of Gracenote DB

[CJIgel]

After the death of freedb and the missing option of a premium Database like AMG, why you don't integrate Gracenote in dBpoweramp?

Especially if you rip a new CD the Metadata are often missing. On Gracenote they are there...

ITunes and Nero Burning Rom connect to Gracenote and have the newest Metadata. But dBpoweramp is the better ripper.

[Spoon]

Re: Support of Gracenote DB

Gracenote will only license if we drop all the other databases, they will not allow to be combined with others. The results from 4 database are much better than 1.

[CJIgel]

Re: Support of Gracenote DB

That sucks, of course, but Gracenote is the only one with the latest data

[schmidj]

Re: Support of Gracenote DB

If you really want access to Gracenote, does Winamp still access it? It did when I ripped much of my library to m4a using it 10 years or so ago (big mistakes, first many bad rips, second sometimes I could hear the lack of quality. Then I found dBpoweramp!)

Anyway, assuming they still use Gracenote, rip everything twice, to different directories, once with Winamp with Gracenote metadata, once securely with dBpoweramp with enough metadata to be able to find the file. Load both files (or sets of files) into mp3tag and use their tools to move the Gracenote metadata to the dBpoweramp rip.

Frankly, I'd think you will find that it is often quicker to just get the accurate metadata off of the CD artwork, or, as I do sometimes, look up the CD on Amazon or some online store and copy and paste the stuff track by track into the dBpoweramp manual meta review page. And if I don't see the correct artwork, I have my scanner right next to the computer so I can quickly scan the artwork that came with the CD.

I'll tell you that all of the metadata sources tend to be riddled with errors. Much of the data in Gracenote was crowd sourced, and had just as many errors as Freedb, in my experience years ago. One big advantage, as Smooth says, is that dBpoweramp, by accessing four sources often exposes the errors. I always open the manual metadata review page and pick and choose the correct metadata. And when I see discrepancies, I often look at the artwork (and for Jazz or Classical read the often provided booklet) to see which, if any, is correct. And it is pretty easy to select the nearest to correct choice and then edit it manually.

The dBpoweramp data entry, thanks to Spoon's efforts, is pretty flexible regarding data entry. Sometimes it is easier to use the manual review page, sometimes in the main entry page, where for instance you can select several different tracks and change the artist or composer for all with a single entry or edit.

[vilsen]

Re: Support of Gracenote DB

Gracenote aim for monopoly. Years ago they ripped the community off CDDB when they bought and commercialized it. Still demanding to be exclusive to permit a license. I say boycott that scam business.

[ik9000]

Re: Support of Gracenote DB

Gracenote will only license if we drop all the other databases, they will not allow to be combined with others. The results from 4 database are much better than 1.

+1 quite agree.

Gracenote aim for monopoly. Years ago they ripped the community off CDDB when they bought and commercialized it. Still demanding to be exclusive to permit a license. I say boycott that scam business.

Yup, and though freedb is gone, some people are trying to keep a new version going. I found this via the wiki page on freedb (RIP): gnudb.org

If you change the web reference from freedb.freedb.org to gnudb.gnudb.org you will get the functionality back. I'm not sure if the sending of data to the new address also updates via this link (Spoon will be able to confirm) but they are wanting users to keep sending new info just like before, so it is more than a simple mirror of the final freedb database from June 2020. I had downloaded a copy of that for offline use, but a live db will always be preferable.

@Spoon, I presume this is something you're already aware of but just in case you'd missed it!

[Holden4th]

Re: Support of Gracenote DB

Gracenote will only license if we drop all the other databases, they will not allow to be combined with others. T[COLOR="*FF0000"]he results from 4 database are much better than 1[/COLOR].

I don't agree. I'm reripping my collection to FLAC and CDs that I ripped 8 years ago with Winamp using the Gracenote database are not recognised with the current cddbs being used here. To check it out I looked up those CDs using iTunes which uses Gracenote. They were easily found.

The bottom line is that while dBPA is great ripping program, I'll have to enter data for over 100 Cds in my collection that Gracenote would have found.

[schmidj]

Re: Support of Gracenote DB

Well, they may well be found because you may have submitted the data to CDDB/Gracenote using winamp back when you ripped them. I have the same situation. Other than that, I found back then that much of what I ripped either wasn't in CDDB and I had to manually enter it. Also much of what little was in CDDB for my ethnic collection was in fact riddled with errors.

Unfortunately, Gracenote, owned by the audience measuring company Neilsen, bought up all the data you and I entered into CDDB and have put restrictions on who can use it and at what cost. And frankly, I'd be a little concerned about using Gracenote too much, if you read their webpages. If you don't want your librarian to report what books you read, you might not want Gracenote selling the data about what you listen to.

As I posted earlier, if you still have the rips you did with Winamp, you can easily, with a couple of clicks per rip, copy the tags from the old rips to your new dBpa rips using the program mp3tag. I've done it, although most of the time I've chosen to re-enter the metadata, as I've discovered that quite a bit of my old metadata wasn't as accurate as I'd prefer.

BTW, if your collection is anything that is at all popular, as opposed to my mostly ethnic collection, you should find metadata for most of it from the metadata sources used by dBpa. If you don't see it, either you are using an outdated version of dBpa or you have an internet access problem, possibly caused by your antivirus software or your firewall. While only a fraction of my ethnic CDs have metadata from the current providers, when I rip pop music, just about all of it has multiple metadata providers. And I've been ripping a bunch of jazz recently, 99% of it has metadata from the current providers.