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Mass CD Ripping

E

Ensign

Senior member
Are there any great programs out there for mass CD ripping? I'm thinking of ripping my entire CD collection, and am wondering if there's a program out there that will basically let me pop a CD in, automatically rip it, eject the CD, let me place the next CD in, automatically rip it, etc.

Is there such a program out there?

Also, what bitrate mp3 would be best to rip the CDs?

Finally, any precautions I should take for trying to keep any scratches or whatever from adversely affecting the ripping?

Thanks!
 
I use Exact Audio Copy and the FLAC lossless audio format (about 300 MB per CD, but storage is cheap).

With EAC you pop in the CD, it does a FreeDB web call to get the title and track names, then you click a button to start the rip and encode.

Rip and encode takes about 8-10 minutes on my music server box, but it only has a 1.3 GHz Tualatin Celeron CPU.

Once it's done, EAC ejects the CD.

EAC supports most other formats like MP3 (using LAME encoder) and Ogg vorbis, but with a lossless format
(a) it sounds 100% exactly like a CD, no compromises
(b) it acts as a backup of your CD
(c) you can transcode to other formats like MP3 as needed with no extra loss of quality.

(c) is important to me since for example transcoding from 256 kbps MP3 down to 160 kbps MP3 will sound worse than if you created the 160 kbps version from a CD. With FLAC the quality is just as good as ripping from CD since it is lossless (throws no information away).

Use Advanced Search with "FLAC" and "EAC" to find older threads on them
 
Sounds like a good program. Is there any way to automate the "then you click a button" part though? I'm sure a programmer-type could come up with a way of doing something, but I thought there would have to be a program out there that could do this. Maybe not? I know it sounds kind of lazy, but I'm looking to rip my 300+ CD collection, so it could be a real lifesaver.

Thanks for the suggestion.

Originally posted by: DaveSimmons
I use Exact Audio Copy and the FLAC lossless audio format (about 300 MB per CD, but storage is cheap).

With EAC you pop in the CD, it does a FreeDB web call to get the title and track names, then you click a button to start the rip and encode.

Rip and encode takes about 8-10 minutes on my music server box, but it only has a 1.3 GHz Tualatin Celeron CPU.

Once it's done, EAC ejects the CD.

EAC supports most other formats like MP3 (using LAME encoder) and Ogg vorbis, but with a lossless format
(a) it sounds 100% exactly like a CD, no compromises
(b) it acts as a backup of your CD
(c) you can transcode to other formats like MP3 as needed with no extra loss of quality.

(c) is important to me since for example transcoding from 256 kbps MP3 down to 160 kbps MP3 will sound worse than if you created the 160 kbps version from a CD. With FLAC the quality is just as good as ripping from CD since it is lossless (throws no information away).

Use Advanced Search with "FLAC" and "EAC" to find older threads on them
Click to expand...

 
You can set Itunes to make MP3's (instead of apple's format) and you can set it up to auto-rip when you insert a CD and it will eject when finished. Absolutely no user intervention required. I just converted my 200 CD's to mp3....It took about a day and a half, I just dropped a new CD in everytime it spit one out.
 
Originally posted by: EnsignI know it sounds kind of lazy, but I'm looking to rip my 300+ CD collection, so it could be a real life saver.
Click to expand...

Jesus christ, are you a DJ or somethin? heh.

I just use the MusicMatch CD ripper.. atkes like 10 minutes a CD I guess , I got a slow 1.4 Intel processor though.
 
With EAC + (FLAC, LAME, Ogg, etc)

Insert CD
Wait a few seconds for title/song lookup
Click one button
Come back in X minutes to change CDs

I've done this for a little over 1,000 CDs and the few seconds of waiting per CD really is not much of a torment.

Note: doing this on a second PC does help, since while it's running it's hard to do other work on that PC. Other programs might not have this problem but Exact Audio Copy is worth using since it does actually check for errors as it reads, many other rippers do not (or do a bad job).
 
Originally posted by: Ensign
No, just a big music fan and musician.

Originally posted by: angstsoldat
Jesus christ, are you a DJ or somethin? heh.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...


You know 300 CDs is roughly $4500 , assuming you dont order any from Europe or Asia, right? (if I did my math right..)

You should be A DJ then if you arent 🙂
 
Some people spend thousands to rice up a car, some people spend $10,000 on CDs instead 🙂

I did it over close to 20 years though, so $500-600 a year is pretty reasonable.
 
Nah, probably not as high as $4500. I used to join BMG a bunch of times and get other people to join in college. I also used to work in a music store, so I got a bunch of promos and stuff too. Plus, some were purchased used. My collection has been going for about 15 years too.

Probably wouldn't make too popular of a DJ these days either. 🙂 I have every album from several different groups, so that limits the diversity somewhat.

Originally posted by: angstsoldat
Originally posted by: Ensign
No, just a big music fan and musician.

Originally posted by: angstsoldat
Jesus christ, are you a DJ or somethin? heh.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...


You know 300 CDs is roughly $4500 , assuming you dont order any from Europe or Asia, right? (if I did my math right..)

You should be A DJ then if you arent 🙂
Click to expand...

 
I'm doing this same thing right now....

EAC + LAME ripping away on a seperate athlon 1800+ box w/win2k. I'm getting about 10 min. per cd.

Not significantly slowed by the button press
 
I've got about 750 cd's and I started ripping them 2 years ago....damn I'm a lazy bastage. I think I'm only half way done. 😀

Anywho, I've been going the EAC/Lame route doing VBR mp3's.
 
You honestly probably took more time posting this and checking it than it would have taken to left click 200 times.

🙂

In my book, rippers are rippers. I use EZ CD-DA Extractor or winLame.
 
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