I use Exact Audio Copy. It has the advantage of being easy to set up a ripping profile, and then easy to run. Does as good a job as dbPoweramp (of which I also like).
One thing not mentioned here is moving files around. File transfer is not 100% reliable (hence the need for checksums).
I highly recommend FastCopy for this purpose. It is not 100% intuitive, but the built in help is concise and extremely useful. It will guarantee that files are transferred properly between devices.
I also use Exact Audio Copy. It works perfectly. I also rip to WAV. I know it takes up more space but it is Lossless while Flac is compressed. I like to have the rip as close to the CD version as possible because I have no idea what the future holds and I might want the exact copy at some time.
You get the exact copy with FLAC. FLAC contains the exact same music data as WAV. It just uses a container with lossless compression vs an uncompressed container. You can use any number of programs to convert between FLAC and WAV any time you want.
And it is trivial to document that the decoded FLAC file and WAV file are bit perfect copies of each other (and bit perfect copies of the underlying CD). Do not confuse ācompressionā in this context with ālossy encodingā such as mp3.
Actually a good way to think of this I find is:
Original photo ā .jpg = lossy encoding (smaller size, but loss of data/resolution)
Original photo ā .zip file = compression (smaller size, but retains data/resolution once uncompressed)
FLAC is similar to the .zip file in the above example.
On my Mac Mini with Apple Superdrive, I have been using Appleās Music program with Preferences->Files->Import Settings set to:
Import Using: AIFF Encoder
Setting: Custom
Details: 48.000 kHz, 16-bit, Stereo
Box Checked: Use error correction
Iām almost done. I just got the Roon email with this thread.
Given the above comments, Iām not sure if this has been a waste of time (even though AIFF is supposedly lossless). Thanks for any thoughts.
Oh dear. If you had selected 44.1 kHz, I would have suggested that you buy PerfectTUNES from the dBpoweramp folks to verify all of your rips against the AccurateRip database. Any rips that have errors might just have to be done again, or you may need to replace the disc.
Unfortunately, you chose 48 kHz, which I assume means that all of your rips were resampled from 44.1 to 48 kHz. While there are algorithms now that can do a good job at this resampling, this is still a lossy process. By this, I mean that you can not get exactly the same samples back by doing another sample rate conversion to 44.1 kHz.
If you wish to have a archival copy of your CD collection that is faithful to the original samples, you will likely need to start over with dBpoweramp or one of the other programs listed here: Digital Audio Extraction
Thanks for your response.
All good suggestions above but I will expand on something I think only one or two other posters pointed it out and itās really important so echoing it again.
There is the encoding which you want lossless. Essentially you want the bits on the CD to match the bits of the audio portion of the file. Some ripping software provides for various checks to make sure this is occurring. I prefer using AccurateRip or one of dbPoweramps āsecureā settings which reads the disc multiple times to verify there were no errors when reading/writing the data.
Then you need to choose a container which holds those bits. Different containers have advantages / disadvantages. WAV holds the bits as is with no, or very little, metadata. Advantages is easiest format to read and can be read by darn near anything. Disadvantage eats a lot of space wonāt hold any extra metadata (which may / may not be important to you). FLAC is probably the most popular. Advantages: Can use compression to reduce file size and can hold an almost endless amount of metadata including embedded artwork. Now ācompressionā, as nothing poster pointed out, is similar to a zip file. Itās not doing anything to the audio data as when you play a FLAC file it is uncompressed back to the original bits of the CD. Itās file compression to reduce disk space when storing the file. Disadvantage: ?? none? Some people believe they can hear an audible difference. Apple devices cannot play FLAC natively? I donāt knowā¦ I donāt really find disadvantages to FLAC.
Anyway, other popular containers were already mentioned like ALAC, AIFF. Just use one that keeps the original audio data, rip securely, and youāll have your ālosslessā CD audio in Roon.
Happy ripping!
@Rockhound - Can you suggest drives that are reliable for ripping? What did you end up choosing and why? I have been using a Superdrive with my Mac mini.
Re: āI found the Apple Superdrive to be somewhat unreliable for CD ripping, so invested in something better.ā
This is the one I bought, but that was 3 years ago, so maybe there is better on the market nowadays. I donāt think I have ever not been able to rip a disk with this, which was certainly not the case with the Superdrive.
Having worn out the CD drive in my desktop PC ripping about 700 CDs years ago, Iād suggest getting a disposable cheap USB attached drive, or maybe two or three or four of them because itās questionable if they will even be made much longer.
I got the āLG Electronics 8X USB 2.0 Super Multi Ultra Slim Portable DVD Rewriter External Driveā for about $25 about three years ago. It has done occasional duty (maybe 100 to 150 more CDs since the mass conversion), and it works great.
Probably (no, definitely) helps to use competent ripping software such as DBPoweramp.
P.S. You could also just subscribe to a streaming service and listen to (almost) all the music ever recorded, including your 1000, 2000, or even 5000 CDs.
Since metadata is usually added to WAV using embedded ID3 tags, WAV tags should be as extensible as ID3 tags.
There is no āstandardā for adding tags to WAV files. So, no matter how you add tags, there will be problems reading those tags with some software. Iād use uncompressed FLAC before I used WAVā¦.
Iām a Mac user and I recommend XLD for ripping. Been around for ages and is an excellent product and, itās free!
One additional feature of dbPower Amp is that you can add a DSP effect for HDCD encoded disks and it will rip the CD with a 24 rather than 16 bitrate
Is it possible to store larger FLAC files as zip which can be read by Roon?
I donāt think itās possible, but FLAC files are already compressed, so they wonāt compress much any further. I just tried to compress a few albums to ZIP and I saved only about 550KB out of 1.4GB, i.e. I saved 0.04%.