With iTunes, you never know if the rip is good, bad, or indifferent. The AccurateRip database lets you know if your rip is good or not. I would not rip without using AccurateRip.
The setting for bit perfect ripping in iTunes (I guess you mean “use error correction”) is fraudulent. It gives up if it can’t rip cleanly and produces a rip with clicks without warning.
XLD is the way to go on Mac.
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Cant remember the setting name as did a big bunch over quite a few months and then couldn’t face digitising anything for a year or more! A horrible task that I wouldn’t want to do again! So it’s true iTunes isn’t perfect, but I was in a primarily iTunes env at the time and XLD was just too slow to bother with in the main for me.
Out of about 800 CDs, I’d say less than half a dozen that I’ve noticed over the past year had any errors on any tracks. Maybe 10 tracks total. I kind of knew which they’d be as the discs were so scratched it was no surprise. So I chose to live with it and fix later. From memory, XLD puts the errors in a log file so you still have to hunt for the confirmation all was OK?
As it turned out I didn’t like about half the albums I digitised as much as I thought I did and probably play streamed files or more recent purchases far more than my old collection.
I agree about the value of AccurateRip. I’ve been happy with dBpoweramp on a PC. There is a version for Mac.
I suggest getting two different USB CD drives. Some problem disks rip much better on one drive than on another, so it’s best to have two drives.
-SK
And these drives don’t need to be special or expensive. I have a few old drives salvaged from abandoned PCs at work. As noted, nothing special about them, but some CDs won’t rip securely on one drive but rip perfectly on another drive.
Exactly. You can use an old drive from a desktop with a USB adapter. Ugly but effective.
Thank you all. I see the community was absolutely unanimous on my two doubts:
- As per the hardware, anything should work just fine
- As for the hardware, dBpoweramp was recommended time and time again and I am happy with the result.
Thanks!
It is possible to polish out CD scratches to get perfect rips. I have done it many times on charity shop bought discs. Just use some gritty toothpaste and elbow grease. It does work and can also fix DVDs/Xbox games if your kids get careless with the discs.
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Thanks for the tip!
CD plastic is very soft so go easy at first. I have never needed anything more abrasive than whitening toothpaste.
Yeah, do not attempt to polish a CD yourself – unless you want to chance trashing the disc. Find a used media store that has a professional optical disc buffing machine. The best machines cost thousands of dollars. They are cost effective only for high volume sellers of used music, movies, and games because they can restore most surface scratched discs to like new condition.
AJ
Hi there Manu,
Just one last tip: try ripping in AIFF. It sounds better than flac. At least to my ears. I wonder if you could here the same difference. Of perhaps you do, but don’t find it significant enough.
If AIFF sound better than FLAC, then FLAC’s compression would not be lossless, right? That would surprise me, but let me do that experiment
Just did a quick test: AIFF vs FLAC (level 8) and result is what I would have expected.
I see no difference in sound quality. AIFF is 50,6 MB, FLAC is 30,3 MB
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You shouldn’t ‘see’ it but hear it ;-))
Too much rationalism isn’t always the best for audio.
So. No idea what level 8 means. Maybe there is some explanation there. I hear my own CD, ripped in AIFF quit differently then the same album in Flac from Tidal. Both played by Roon. The difference is mostly not the sound itself - a guitar will sound like a guitar. But mostly the stereo-imaging and spaciousness in the instruments/room they play.
Anyway, cheers for trying!!
shouldn’t be a difference unless something is broken. Both files are lossless and decoded back to original (bit perfect).
FLAC has different levels of file size compression, 0-8 (and dbpa also has a FLAC uncompressed to satisfy the needs of OCD folks that don’t understand what FLAC compression does 
)). Compression here only has to do with file size (not throwing away audio info as in mp3).
The ENCODER works a bit harder when creating a more compressed FLAC file size (=8). But this is only initially with the encoding during ripping. The DECODING is essentially the same whether 0 or 8 level.
Hmm comparing a cd Rip to tidal streaming is hardly conclusive,too many variables outside of flac there that can make it sound different. Different master of album, processing that Tidal might do to the stream etc. Compare flac rip to aiff rip off same source then see if there is a different.
Neither is not enough rationalism. I think that Roon Core does all the decompressing, sending the same decompressed PCM data over ethernet, whatever the original lossless compression format. Happy to be corrected if Roon does not work this way.
You are missing my point. I asked Manu if he could hear a difference.
I didn’t ask ‘do you think it works the same way? - flac or aiff, because in the end its all ‘bit perfect.’’ I understand the math and theory. Unzip it your file on the fly and it should work the same.
But to my ears it works out different. And i am not the only one btw.
And to make it all the more confusing/interesting - at least for me: while i seem to hear a constance difference between FLAC streaming from Tidal and aiff, When there is MQA steaming involved, it does seem to ‘undo’ this flac degradation…
People, me included ofcourse, will hear or see what they ‘think’ it looks like or what it will sound like. All i am trying here is to ‘un-think’ and ‘just listen.’ Its one of the beautiful things of good music & audio 
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