Author Topic: What should I do with my audio CDs? (Read 32,907 times)

Grorgy · « **Reply #25 on:** January 11, 2008, 11:29 PM »

I've ripped all of mine to MP3s and WMAs (before i had a sensible way of ripping to mp3 and was new to the whole idea of ripping them anyway

). I keep the CDs as a backup and as some sort of security to say "yeah, I did really buy these" and also because I ripped them to MP3 I wanted to have them available in the original if I could.

Renegade · « **Reply #26 on:** January 12, 2008, 12:33 AM »

What I'd like to see is for music to start coming out in truly high-quality formats like 48KHz or 96KHz and 32-bit depth or at least better recording/mastering. I've got a lot of music that the quality just isn't the greatest to start with. Great music, but the original recording & mastering is less than ideal. Makes is so that there's not much of a difference between 128 and 256kbps MP3s.

edbro · « **Reply #27 on:** January 12, 2008, 12:41 AM »

I have all mine ripped to a lossless format (.ape) but I would never get rid of the physical cds. I still use the CDs in my home stereo system.

I wish there was a hard drive based high fi component that would allow me to play all my music from the digital rips. I know I could use something like an iPod for that but I'm looking for something more substantial with a led readout of the files. I know I could do it if I had a pc based home theater but I really don't want a pc in the living room. I want something that is as easy as my current cd player and had the same look and width as my current hifi components. I can't believe there isn't a market for something like that.

Carol Haynes · « **Reply #28 on:** January 12, 2008, 01:17 AM »

You could use WiFi multimedia devices to play audio and video through your TV/Home Theatre/HiFi systems - I am thinking of going in this direction as it seems stupid to have stuff on my PC (esp. video) that I have to burn to a DVD if I don't want to sit in front of the computer to watch it.

I think though I will wait until these devices start to adopt 802.11n standard because I don't thing b or g format provides sufficient bandwidth or coverage - especially if other people are using the network at the same time for other purposes.

f0dder · « **Reply #29 on:** January 12, 2008, 12:46 PM »

It's worth noticing that part of the reason why RAR compresses wav better than zip is that "not too long ago" (considering the full lifetime of RAR; it might have been a couple of years now), RAR introduced some "compression filters" to pre-process data before compressing... including filters for graphics, sound, executables.

Apart from that, the RAR compression algorithm is superior to the one used in ZIP, and the fileformat is smarter as well (solid compression, for instance, kicks ass when you have a lot of small files, like a source code distribution).

Oh, I used to use .APE before I went .flac, ape development has stood still and while it has source code available, the license is a bit quirky; I really do prefer to keep my media library free of any trouble

(and I'd really love a SqueeezBox sometime).

Lashiec · « **Reply #30 on:** January 12, 2008, 05:47 PM »

Yeah, APE does have a pretty good compression ratio, but the highest levels take the longer time to decompress, unlike FLAC, which stays at the same speed for all the levels. Only TAK can better that.

Renegade, blame the loudness race. Higher sampling rate doesn't help anybody (human maximum level perception is around 20 KHz, but due to the Nyquist theorem, it's ideal to have that ratio doubled, that's why the 44.1 Khz), except rabid audiophiles and whales ;D. Actually, the loudness race problem is even being featured on the mass media these days, so I hope those producers take notice, and we don't get disasters as Californication (the album, not the TV series). It pays off during recording and for master copies, though.

f0dder · « **Reply #31 on:** January 12, 2008, 06:58 PM »

Btw, I think FLAC has had some pretty serious speedups during it's lifetime - I remember initially choosing APE because it had somewhat better compression ratio and it was quite a bit faster; last time I checked, FLAC had improved a lot, giving APE a lot less of an advantage there, leaving it with the "just how open is it?" and "not as supported as FLAC" disadvantages.

The loudness race is annoying

, but I must admit I almost prefer it to very badly mastered albums where the loudness level waries extremely from song to song. But nothing beats perfectly mastered albums; Pink Floyd: Wish You Were Here is the album I always think of in this regard

Ampa · « **Reply #32 on:** January 12, 2008, 08:12 PM »

Thanks for all the interesting input in this thread - some things I've learned...

EAC is now at v0.99 (not v.95 which I was using)
Accurate Rip is a good thing
I can rip to more than one format at once (using EAC profiles and the Compression Control Queue

All good stuff

Ampa

f0dder · « **Reply #33 on:** January 12, 2008, 10:20 PM »

A really great thing that happened with EAC is that it now supports AccurateRip in "one big image" mode - previously, it could only generate AccurateRip info if you ripped to individual tracks. Since I keep one flac per CD (along with a cue file), I'm pretty excited by this

I just wish EAC would implement better ripping, like dbPoweramp... EAC is darn slow, and the constant re-reads put wear & tear on your drives.

Lashiec · « **Reply #34 on:** January 13, 2008, 06:57 PM »

It will, if André implements some of the suggestions that he received upon the release of dbPowerAmp. For the moment you can use Test & Copy in Burst mode if the album is present in Accurate Rip, and returns high values of confidence. It's as good as Secure mode, but much faster (around 22-24X speeds on my drive), handy for those 20 minutes songs

f0dder · « **Reply #35 on:** January 13, 2008, 07:03 PM »

Quote from: Lashiec on January 13, 2008, 06:57 PM

It will, if André implements some of the suggestions that he received upon the release of dbPowerAmp. For the moment you can use Test & Copy in Burst mode if the album is present in Accurate Rip, and returns high values of confidence. It's as good as Secure mode, but much faster (around 22-24X speeds on my drive), handy for those 20 minutes songs

That still isn't as good as dbPoweramp using C2 error information, though... great thing about it's ripping is that it bursts through your track, and then only re-reads the parts it has to, unlike EAC which is all-or-nothing (bursting, or re-reading each CD frame multiple times). Of course your drive needs (reliable) C2 error reporting for dbPoweramp to work properly, though.

vegas · « **Reply #36 on:** January 16, 2008, 12:41 PM »

Another shout for dbPowerAmp using c2 correction, or just secure mode, ripping all albums on a second pass if they don't show up in AccurateRip to verify the same exact rip. I couldn't stand getting rid of my cd's ever, collecting them has been too much of an investment, although I am sure the day will come that putting them in storage will be best for saving space. I have been ripping my collection to big drives and encoding them to Wavpack so they can be transcoded to any lossy format as needed later.

Mark0 · « **Reply #37 on:** January 17, 2008, 12:04 AM »

Quote from: Carol Haynes on January 12, 2008, 01:17 AM

You could use WiFi multimedia devices to play audio and video through your TV/Home Theatre/HiFi systems - I am thinking of going in this direction as it seems stupid to have stuff on my PC (esp. video) that I have to burn to a DVD if I don't want to sit in front of the computer to watch it.

Have a look at the Logitech (now, they acquired them some times ago) Slimedevices Squeezebox.
Probably the Best streamer around - with a great community & lots of free software behind it.
Now there's also the new Duet that's very interesting (more intelligence in the remote, basically).

Quote

I think though I will wait until these devices start to adopt 802.11n standard because I don't thing b or g format provides sufficient bandwidth or coverage - especially if other people are using the network at the same time for other purposes.

Bandwidth isn't really a big problem. Uncompressed Stereo 16bit PCM audio take about 150KB/sec.
So it's about 15KB/sec. if you stream/listen in MP3, or 80-100KB/sec. if you go lossless.

Bye!

Carol Haynes · « **Reply #38 on:** January 17, 2008, 12:31 AM »

Nice devices but ideally I am looking for a combined audio and video streaming device.

The bandwidth problems arise when you want to stream near DVD quality video (at least I suspect that would cause a problem) - esp. if someone else is using the WiFi for file transfers/web surfing/and printing. I haven't worked out the sums but I'd guess you would be pushing it with 802.11b/g standard, not to mention much poorer coverage than 'n' devices. Plus if you have a 'b' or 'g' device on the network it has a knock on effect on all the 'n' devices you are using too. The problem is I live in a stone farm building with 2 foot thick limestone walls - n doesn't seem to have a problem but my last g setup had to have repeaters to get a signal 30 feet from router!

Lashiec · « **Reply #39 on:** January 17, 2008, 12:49 AM »

I wish Slimdevices released a Squeezebox that gave you the option to attach a external hard drive, I'd ditch my Hi-Fi system for it

edbro · « **Reply #40 on:** January 17, 2008, 01:10 AM »

I've been looking at the Squeezebox now that somebody mentioned it in this thread. It looks like you can stream from a standalone Network Attached Storage (NAS). You don't need a PC running. See here for somebody that did it:
http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=14977

Others complain about the high price of NAS units and advocated building a cheap, silent PC as a dedicated server. If you had someplace to put it besides the living room, this might be another good option. I am seriously considering a NAS solution using ethernet. I would rather use flac files and I wouldn't want to stream those large files over wireless.

f0dder · « **Reply #41 on:** January 17, 2008, 01:13 AM »

RE: fileservers vs NAS, power consumption might be something to keep in mind... although some of the NAS'es I've been looking at seem to have more or less standard PC components inside.

For me, choosing a fileserver over NAS was an easy choice, since it enables me to run a subversion repository and a decent torrent client among other things.

J-Mac · « **Reply #42 on:** January 18, 2008, 08:54 AM »

I just purchased a few Merax CD cases at Newegg and ALL my media are going into them - I'm in the middle of doing that now. (Taking long becasue anal as I am I'm trying to catalog by number where everything is!)

Music CD's, original DVD's, saved data, archived pictures, etc. I always rip my audio CDs, but later I find myself backing them up to several places with the rest of my data and media files. So why not keep the original CDs? Same with DVD movies - I always copy them to DVD and I only play the copies. If any go bad, from sitting in the car getting too hot or too cold, whatever, I simply burn new copies. I lost several original music CDs that way; sitting in my truck console in the summer they actually warped and wouldn't play - back before ripping was as common. I got the original Nero and went to town on all the rest!

Movies - if one purchased DVD bombs out for some reason, try getting it replaced! Nope! I copy each and label it. At first I made two copies of each: one for home and another for a second home we have in the mountains. Prior to that I was always trying to remember to bring them to the mountains or back and some were always in the wrong place. WE rarely stay in the other house long now so I just make one for home and use the copy. Original stays stored and in prime condition to recopy if the everyday copy goes bad.

Get a couple of the Merax cases - they hold 510 CDs or DVDs in hanging folders. Less in their original cases. You may need to re-rip them someday.

Jim

app103 · « **Reply #43 on:** January 18, 2008, 09:56 AM »

Quote from: J-Mac on January 18, 2008, 08:54 AM

Music CD's, original DVD's, saved data, archived pictures, etc. I always rip my audio CDs, but later I find myself backing them up to several places with the rest of my data and media files. So why not keep the original CDs? Same with DVD movies - I always copy them to DVD and I only play the copies. If any go bad, from sitting in the car getting too hot or too cold, whatever, I simply burn new copies. I lost several original music CDs that way; sitting in my truck console in the summer they actually warped and wouldn't play - back before ripping was as common. I got the original Nero and went to town on all the rest!

I have been doing this since the days of vinyl. Back then I was copying it all to cassette and playing the cassettes. Then bought a dual cassette deck to copy cassette to cassette.

I have even copied CD's to cassette for my husband's car. (he can't be trusted with cd's)

There are some albums in my collection, like Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon, that I have owned originals in every format: vinyl, 8-track, cassette, CD...and now ripped to mp3 so I can listen on my pc.

Before I owned a computer, I was really into the copying to protect my investment from damage. Now it's for both protection and more control over how I enjoy my collection.

And in an odd way, to save space: If I rip all the CD's to MP3, and I burn the MP3's as data back to a CD-RW, I can carry around about 6-10 albums on a single disk and play them in my portable MP3 CD player, and burn a new set of files when I get tired of what is on the disk. Much better than carrying around all those disks. (no, I don't own an MP3 player)

I wish there was a practical way to rip magazines to pdf. I'd sure love to have digital versions of a lot of my older stuff from the 70's & 80's. Crochet & x-stitch magazines tend to get mangled while doing projects.

iphigenie · « **Reply #44 on:** January 18, 2008, 10:48 AM »

I ripped most of my cds and stored them in the basement in boxes.

I always thought that CDs look quite ugly (DVDs are even worse) and CD racks are often awful, so as soon as I could afford the time and storage space I did it.