High End Ripping and Encoding CD Audio

[Rick Nebiolo]

Several years ago I converted most of my CDs to MP3s using the then popular MusicMatch Jukebox at a bit rate in of 128K (on recent albums the highest rate of 320K). This was fine with my old speakers and limited storage. Now I have a lot more disk storage and will be getting one of the better multi-media speakers (probably the Swans) discussed in this (http://tinyurl.com/6aoxz) 2+2 thread. I have been told and expect the new setup will magnify the weaknesses of my MP3s compared to the original source.

Anyway, over time I've become less enamored with Musicmatch Jukebox (as it is I reverted to the older version 7.5). From surfing around it seems there are much better ways to encode CDs and play MP3s (or other file compression formats). The place that originally got me interested was Radified's Guide to Ripping and Encoding (http://mp3.radified.com/) which eventually links to the HydrogenAudio Forum (http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/).

My questions are:

Am I pointed in the right direction (i.e., am I reading good information) regarding better ways to convert my CDs to MP3s or other formats? If not do you have better links?

What ripper/encoder/player do you use and/or recommend?

Keep in mind I'm a fifty year old guy who hasn't been near a college dorm room in 28 years so keep it simple /images/graemlins/grin.gif

~ Rick

[astroglide]

ripper: eac (http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/)
encoder: lame (http://mitiok.cjb.net/) (--alt-preset standard for 192k vbr)

download lame first and unzip it somewhere on your system (e.g. in a directory under "program files"). install eac and it will find it automatically. there should be plenty of guides on this combo using google.

if you want something simple, try cdex (http://cdexos.sourceforge.net/). most people probably couldn't tell the difference between rips on the two (despite eac's more precise rips and newer lame optimizations).

[Rick Nebiolo]

My brother seems to think that I should just transfer audio files in the full .wav (1411kb) format. He uses DBPowerAmp Music Converter (I'll check it out later). EAC (exact audio converter) should also do this.

Multiple hard disks are so cheap maybe this is the way to go for albums where I don't like all the songs. Classical symphonies (or albums where every song is good) I probably should keep on the CD and play it directly.

I do like the convenience of a jukebox player late at night when I'm so tired I can hardly even move /images/graemlins/grin.gif.

~ Rick

[astroglide]

using wav files is pretty dumb from a storage standpoint because there are lossless codecs like FLAC (http://flac.sourceforge.net/) which still compress if you want perfect archives.

[Rick Nebiolo]

Thanks. I'll soon be looking at these programs along with a new player to replace my musicmatch jukebox.

~ Rick

[astroglide]

"ape" is another format but if you ever get into trading bootlegs and that sort of thing i believe most people use flac. there also seem to be more standalone devices capable of playing flacs (like the turtle beach audiostation? forgot the name) than apes.