How to rip CDs? Error free?

agillis · February 21, 2018, 8:41pm

If you want a simple server that auto rips CDs and has a built in Roon Server our sonicTransporter is the way to go.

If you want something free (DIY) you can use VortexBox.

EricJ · February 21, 2018, 9:20pm

I run Roon core on my vortexbox, and consequently now rarely need to use the Vortexbox LMS interface.
But the vortexbox is still an effective ripping device so for me ripping is pretty well directly integrated with my Roon setup.

agillis · February 21, 2018, 9:32pm

Nice! Glad to see some VortexBox fans out there.

Shahryar_Sedghi · February 22, 2018, 2:00am

Please forgive my ignorance. Itunes can RIP your CD to Alac that Roon can read, what is wrong with that?

adamus · February 22, 2018, 6:57am

Nothing wrong with it.

Speed_Racer · February 22, 2018, 7:22am

Well, there is something wrong with using iTunes if you want perfect rips. iTunes can only guess that the rips are good because it relies on the CD hardware to do the job properly. .Using software that uses AccurateRip is the way to go. I prefer dBpoweramp

agillis · February 22, 2018, 2:52pm

The CD drives on many computers are not that great for CD ripping. We use TEAC drives that coupled with our software guarantees a bit perfect rip. Also you just pop in the CD and it pops out 3-4 minutes later properly tagged with cover art. The tracks show up in Roon as it’s ripping. So you can be playing the first track from Roon before the last track is even finished.

This is much faster, easier, and guarantees a bit perfect rip. Other solution take longer and are not guaranteed to produce good rips.

dBpoweramp does do a good job if you have a PC and a good CD drive you can get good rips with it. Do PCs even come with CD drives anymore?

Rugby · February 22, 2018, 3:09pm

If you build your own, like I do, then yes they do. You can even have more than 1 in a single computer and be ripping 3 or even 4 disks at the same time.

agillis · February 22, 2018, 3:50pm

What a great DIY solution. What software do you run to do that?

I know dBpoweramp has a special version that supports disc changing robots so they can do a few hundred discs at a time.

Robert_Holloway · February 22, 2018, 8:20pm

for linux users, i recommend the following
for cd ripping (and file conversion) http://ubuntuhandbook.org/index.php/2017/08/install-freac-audio-converter-in-ubuntu-16-04-higher/
for tagging https://sourceforge.net/projects/easytag/

wizardofoz · February 23, 2018, 3:00am

http://www.psaudio.com/pauls-posts/ripped/ might have some insights and comments

Robert_Kosara · February 23, 2018, 3:12am

I recently bought this cheap USB CD/DVD drive and have been quite happy with it. I picked this one because it’s listed on the AccurateRip website.

I use XLD, but I’ll give dbpoweramp a shot since people here seem to like it. I’ve ripped about 100 CDs so far, and it has worked quite well. The drive reads even fairly scratched CDs without trouble. XLD is workable, though looks like dbpoweramp is quite a bit smarter about metadata.

Speed_Racer · February 23, 2018, 5:06am

Andrew,

How do you know you got a perfect rip? Does your software compare checksums to some external database? Unless you have access to the master, which you don’t, you need to compare the rip to something to verify it is accurate.

Janne_Johansson · February 23, 2018, 7:03am

Basically you have to rip it several times and check that you get the same exact result each time. That way you can be reasonably certain there wasn’t a read error. Once this has been done by enough people and the checksums have been sent to the database, you can rip just once and check against the checksum. If the checksum matches, you can be fairly sure everything went ok.

Chrislayeruk · February 23, 2018, 7:27am

DB Poweramp has checks if the CD is in the data base. Commercial audio CD’s almost always are.
Even when I have had an occasional track that is not deemed accurate, I’d defy anyone to tell. Also, what’s the point on track 3 of a CD that you may never play anyway.
If the CD is damaged you will notice lol

Speed_Racer · February 23, 2018, 9:13am

@Janne_Johansson

Ripping a CD several times and getting the same result tells you nothing about the accuracy of the rip. All it tells you is that you have a consistent rip. The only way to know that you have an accurate rip is to be able to compare that rip to the master image for the CD you have. Most people don’t have access to the master so the only method is a crowd sourced checksum database like what AccurateRip offers.

Janne_Johansson · February 23, 2018, 10:22am

I understand that for some reason it is important to you to keep insisting about the master release, but in the real world consistent results are most likely due to an accurate read. The error correction on audio CDs is no way at par with data CDs, so reading them is trickier, but reading the same data the same way is really not about luck. Even AccurateRip is about consistent reads by different people.

And to be fair, CD is in some cases more than the sum of the files extracted.

Speed_Racer · February 23, 2018, 10:31am

I am just being factual and I am technically correct. You will never know if the read and subsequent write are “accurate” without comparing them to something other than the CD you ripped. A checksum system using a crowd sourced database in the best bet since, here it comes again, the master is not available to you.

Flashman · February 23, 2018, 1:11pm

Check out EZ CD Audio Convertor at this link. Yes, it costs money but I have used it for years and the fellow who created it updates it constantly with new codecs, languages, etc. Never had a bad rip using this service. You also point it to your music library and once it’s ripped it’s where you want it.

agillis · February 23, 2018, 3:03pm

We know our CD drive vary well and we re-read the tracks several times and compare. This has been proven to provide to most accurate rips.

People love to talk about AccurateRip but AccurateRip does not have the “masters” either. They compare the rips that other people get and try to come up with a general consensus of what is a “good” CD rip is for each CD.

Comparing to other people doesn’t really work that well because there are many pressings of each CD. And these are different by a few bits. So you can only really compare to other people with your same pressing

The most important part of AccurateRip is tuning your drive (offset) to rip CDs accurately. There are many CD drives that do their own error correction and re-reads. They will tell you you have a bit perfect rip when you don’t.

Using a combination of our own software, a special TEAC drive and known good drive firmware we can guarantee 100% of the bits on your CD are ripped. This is not necessarily what somebody with another pressing of your same CD will get but it’s an accurate rip of your CD.

We have been doing this for 15 years I have done bit for bit comparisons of what we get vs what AccurateRip gets using a properly tuned drive and they are always 100% the same.

In testing I have shown that dbPoweramp with AccurateRip and a drive that is not tuned or not on their list of supported drives does not always give you bit perfect results.

And ripping with iTunes can often come up with a non bit-perfect rips.

We are giving our customs an easy way to pop in a CD in and get a bit perfect rips every time.

You can get this quality of rips with dBpoweramp, the right CD drive and some drive tuning it’s just a lot less work to use a sonicTransporter.