Rip CD Collection/Terrabyte Hard Drive

[wurmhole]

How do I rip my relatively large CD collection for later storage on my Terrabyte HD's? I only want to have to do this ONCE and want the best possible results. Do I rip it to FLAC or ALAC or AIFF, etc, etc. There are so many different terms and it's just confusing me.

I have a Mac laptop w/Itunes, and a PC downstairs. I'd like to be able to play my songs on both laptop/computer, my ipod, and car as well.

[Spoon]

Re: Rip CD Collection/Terrabyte Hard Drive

You can rip to any lossless (FLAC, AIFF, ALAC) and then convert from Lossless >> Lossless and the end result is the same as re-ripping the CD direct to that format.

[wurmhole]

Re: Rip CD Collection/Terrabyte Hard Drive

Recently I've bumped into a good guide for what you are aiming at: http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/...pic=42488&st=0
And don't forget to make multiple digital backups of your whole CD collection ! Once you've done all this, you practically can through your CDs away \o/ ...

How does that help me exactly?

[Tennberg]

Re: Rip CD Collection/Terrabyte Hard Drive

Recently I've bumped into a good guide for what you are aiming at: http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/...pic=42488&st=0
And don't forget to make multiple digital backups of your whole CD collection ! Once you've done all this, you practically can through your CDs away \o/ ...

Does AccurateRip track accuracy just at the time a lossless file was ripped, or does it help to track file integrity long after a file was ripped? If, down the road, one of the lossless files I create (that initially scanned as accurate) becomes corrupt for whatever reason, it will no longer show up as accurate if I do a scan with AccurateRip, correct? I've always been wary of tossing CDs, even if I have backups of them.

[wurmhole]

Re: Rip CD Collection/Terrabyte Hard Drive

Recently I've bumped into a good guide for what you are aiming at: http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/...pic=42488&st=0
And don't forget to make multiple digital backups of your whole CD collection ! Once you've done all this, you practically can through your CDs away \o/ ...

I fail to see how all of that will help me.

[Spoon]

Re: Rip CD Collection/Terrabyte Hard Drive

Does AccurateRip track accuracy just at the time a lossless file was ripped, or does it help to track file integrity long after a file was ripped? If, down the road, one of the lossless files I create (that initially scanned as accurate) becomes corrupt for whatever reason, it will no longer show up as accurate if I do a scan with AccurateRip, correct? I've always been wary of tossing CDs, even if I have backups of them.

If you rip to a format with built in error checking, FLAC as example, it can self check for errors (if you convert your whole flac library to 'Test Conversion' in dBpoweramp, any errors would be shown at the end).

[wurmhole]

Re: Rip CD Collection/Terrabyte Hard Drive

^I'm ripping all of these in ALAC, but for some reason they won't play on my Ipod and automatically show up as mp3 of .wav files in the Itunes Library directory. I need help. I want to convert all of these to FLAC without any errors so that I never have to rip this collection again as it's rather big.

[BrodyBoy]

Re: Rip CD Collection/Terrabyte Hard Drive

^I'm ripping all of these in ALAC, but for some reason they won't play on my Ipod and automatically show up as mp3 of .wav files in the Itunes Library directory. I need help. I want to convert all of these to FLAC without any errors so that I never have to rip this collection again as it's rather big.

FLAC will not play on your iDevices or in iTunes, so I would reconsider using that format (based on the preferences you've mentioned).

I think you need to back up a bit and devise a basic "workflow" for your project. This needs to take your requirements into account.....things like what format is best for your specific playback requirements, whether you want to also "archive" your music, whether space is an issue, etc. Because you've said repeatedly that you don't want to have to do any of this stuff more than once, it's especially important to understand what you're doing, plan properly, and do it right the first time. Here's some steps to consider and decisions to make at each stage:


MACHINES: If you want to use dBpoweramp, your workflow should start with ripping your CDs on the PC. Your music will be playable on both, and you could manage your iPod from either, but dBp is a Windows program, so consider the PC the "work" machine for digitizing your music.

FORMAT: FLAC is out if you are using iTunes and iPods/iPhones. So for a lossless format, ALAC is probably your best bet. This is a format that will play on all your devices, and also works well as an archive format. I'd avoid .wav because it has disadvantages (tagging limitations, space requirements) that can be avoided with other formats. If you need/want to put a large music library on an iPod, you might want to consider using a secondary, lossy format for that. iTunes actually makes this very easy, if you want to automate the process. It can convert the files as they load from your computer onto the iPod.

TAGGING: Even if you get dBp set up really well and most of the tags are right (upon ripping), you should make a final metadata review the next step after ripping. The user-friendliness of your digital library is entirely dependent on how well it's tagged, so it's worth taking the time (early in the workflow) to make sure your tags are accurate and consistent. This can be done a number of ways, but I'd suggest you pick a tag editor and make that review the "step 2" after ripping.

LOCATION: Decide whether you want to rip your music directly to its final library location, or to a temporary location on the ripping computer until it's "done." If your music library is going to be a NAS or network drive that isn't the ripping computer, I'd suggest ripping locally and then moving the files to the library when you're sure the metadata is right.

ADD TO iTUNES LIBRARY: Music ripped outside of iTunes is not automatically added to your iTunes library. You have to do this manually unless you specifically send files to the "Automatically Add to iTunes" folder. You can go into the settings in iTunes and point it to wherever your music library is located, but you still need to actually add folders or files.

LOAD (and possibly re-encode) TO OTHER LOCATIONS/DEVICES: I think you only mentioned iPods, but it's only after you've gotten everything tagged and organized that you want to load onto portables, burn CDs (for cars, etc), and so forth. As I mentioned earlier, iTunes can, if you so choose, re-encode to a lossy format for your iPod. Another option is to create a separate folder of lossy versions (say on the Mac) that's just iPod use.

[wurmhole]

Re: Rip CD Collection/Terrabyte Hard Drive

I'm ripping them on my Mac. I just want to convert the ALAC to FLAC and store all of them (the lossless FLAC files) to a few hard-drives. I can still play all music on both PC and Mac though.

How do I get ALAC files to play on my Ipod and Itunes?

[BrodyBoy]

Re: Rip CD Collection/Terrabyte Hard Drive

I'm ripping them on my Mac. I just want to convert the ALAC to FLAC and store all of them (the lossless FLAC files) to a few hard-drives. I can still play all music on both PC and Mac though.

How do I get ALAC files to play on my Ipod and Itunes?

So you're ripping in iTunes, I presume? You might want to consider ripping in dBp using the multi-encoder to create both files (ALAC and FLAC) simultaneously....that would save some time and steps. But if you just want to archive your files, there's no reason to convert to FLAC......just store a copy of the ALAC files. All the lossless codecs are identical in terms of audio data; you can convert between them at any time, now or later. (I.e., if you should need FLAC or another format down the line, you can easily make those from your ALAC files.)

But if you want a FLAC version now, simply use the Music Converter with the FLAC encoder.

Add the ALAC files to your iTunes library. (File > Add Folder to library.....) iTunes will recognize and play them, and you can load them onto your iPod once they're in the library.

[garym]

Re: Rip CD Collection/Terrabyte Hard Drive

excellent advice from BrodyBoy. But regarding ripping, you should really consider ripping with dbpa. iTunes is not a secure ripper (errors can slip in and you're not even told about them) and itunes ripper doesn't use ACCURATERIP database for comparisons.

[wurmhole]

Re: Rip CD Collection/Terrabyte Hard Drive

excellent advice from BrodyBoy. But regarding ripping, you should really consider ripping with dbpa. iTunes is not a secure ripper (errors can slip in and you're not even told about them) and itunes ripper doesn't use ACCURATERIP database for comparisons.

LOL, what's the difference exactly? Accurate rip is 99.9% correct and Itunes is 97? Keep in mind that I used the Itunes "error correction" checkbox option.

[wurmhole]

Re: Rip CD Collection/Terrabyte Hard Drive

Add the ALAC files to your iTunes library. (File > Add Folder to library.....) iTunes will recognize and play them, and you can load them onto your iPod once they're in the library.

Yeah, I'm ripping the CD's as ALAC but in the library on my computer they're showing up as m4a files and whatnot and importing them into my Ipod as MP3's even though it says they're ALAC in the kbps section.

[jfo]

Re: Rip CD Collection/Terrabyte Hard Drive

LOL, what's the difference exactly? Accurate rip is 99.9% correct and Itunes is 97? Keep in mind that I used the Itunes "error correction" checkbox option.

Well, you did indicate that you wanted the best result possible and only wanted to do it once. Many of us who have been at this for years would suggest using dbpa instead of itunes. Then you can take advantage of many features of dpba, rip to flac for your main library and also rip to mp3 at the same time for your ithings. No need to use a lossless file on an ithing.

[garym]

Re: Rip CD Collection/Terrabyte Hard Drive

LOL, what's the difference exactly? Accurate rip is 99.9% correct and Itunes is 97? Keep in mind that I used the Itunes "error correction" checkbox option.

more or less. accuraterip is probably 99.99999999999 correct. Itunes, even with "error correction" checked* is probably closer to 90%. But most CDs will rip bit perfect on any old ripper. But like they say in intro to engineering. Tiny error, but it caused the bridge to fall down.....so the probability of death is very small, but if it happens it sucks.

edit * error correction is not at all the same thing as ACCURATERIP matches to many other users who ripped the same title CD on different machines with different drives and produced the same "bits" as your rip.