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CD ripping, if you were to start anew.......

I’m going to use this thread to ask a tangential question, if the OP wants me to delete it just say and I will.

Here goes.

Why do some CDs take longer to rip than others? Is there any trick for speeding up the process?
It depends partly on how many defects/scratches and dirt are on the discs. Cleaning the discs before ripping may help. If you are using something like dbPoweramp the settings you use will also make a difference. For example when it makes the first attempt at ripping the track it checks the accuraterip database to see if the checksums are the same, if the disc is not in the database then it will re-rip a number of times depending on how you set it up before confirming that it is happy with the rip. There is lots of information on the dbPoweramp site on all the different things that go into ripping the cds (useful information even if you are not using dbPoweramp).
 
Whilst we're at it, another slight digression.

I've ripped most of my CDs using EAC to wav files. I know that wav doesn't do metadata well, but I don't need it much, so that's fine, though I do store the cover art EAC finds in the file. However, I've been finishing off using a free trial of DBpoweramp, still ripping to wav, and now, DB-ripped wav files shew the cover art in my Primare and BubbleUPnP control apps, whereas the EAC ones don't.

Weird ! Any explanations ?
 
Whilst we're at it, another slight digression.

I've ripped most of my CDs using EAC to wav files. I know that wav doesn't do metadata well, but I don't need it much, so that's fine, though I do store the cover art EAC finds in the file. However, I've been finishing off using a free trial of DBpoweramp, still ripping to wav, and now, DB-ripped wav files shew the cover art in my Primare and BubbleUPnP control apps, whereas the EAC ones don't.

Weird ! Any explanations ?
DBpoweramp also (optionally) puts the covert art in a file called folder.jpg in the same folder as the rip and some music players/control apps can pick that up,so maybe that’s how. But i believe it is also possible to put metadata in WAVs, it is just that many players don’t handle it.
 
Whilst we're at it, another slight digression.

I've ripped most of my CDs using EAC to wav files. I know that wav doesn't do metadata well, but I don't need it much, so that's fine, though I do store the cover art EAC finds in the file. However, I've been finishing off using a free trial of DBpoweramp, still ripping to wav, and now, DB-ripped wav files shew the cover art in my Primare and BubbleUPnP control apps, whereas the EAC ones don't.

Weird ! Any explanations ?
dBPoweramp is more fully featured/polished than EAC - expected as it is a paid for product. WAV specs didn't take much account of providing rich Meta Data/Cover Art functions - use a 3rd party App to fixup.
 
For any Linux users out there, I use whipper, a command-line tool that does ripping in an EAC-like manner. It automatically fetches metadata from musicbrainz.org. It's free, it works and I'm satisfied. But obviously it's a different user experience from something like dBPoweramp.
 
Right...I'm all set up for ripping my cd's, got apple superdrive, got 2tb sandisk extreme, bought dbpoweramp & Perfect tunes and I'm away....but before I dive in I thought id better format the ssd first - from what ive read on Roon forums the preferred format for ssd is exFAT and for scheme use Master Boot Record, is this correct?
 
I used to rip my CDs in iTunes but that was looooog ago. I just can't see your points mates. Your Spotify (say) playlists can be available offline as well.
I have a nice collection of vintage players and I like to play my equally vintage CDs on them, just for the sake of it (yes the sound is good too).
Now for the rest of my listening it's streaming only.
I totally get why people like streaming and there are may plusses for it but......I prefer CDs and LPs for similar reasons. I like something tangible in my hands that I own and though my entire collection is ripped I still like taking them out and spinning them. I like to take my time reading the liner notes. I like that my HiFi does not depend on anything but some juice to give me great music. One my favourite things about CD/LP collections is the conversations they often start when company is around. Like a good library my collection says something about me. Lastly it's one less thing I have to look at a screen to do and in this increasingly screencentric world that to me is just a bonus!
 
Phew, it’s been a busy week, managed to get two boxes of CD’s (500ish) ripped with db poweramp in ALAC to a sandisk 2tb extreme pro ssd, all correctly copied and it was surprising to see the very varied ripping speeds for certain discs, some discs took seconds (yay!), others took 20mins+ and on inspection the discs appeared to be in brand new/box fresh condition so I can only surmise that the ripping time is relevant to the quality of manufacture and perhaps the engineering/mastering process plays a part?. Out of 500ish cds I only have a few tracks that could not be copied due to damage on the disc itself which is a pleasant surprise as some of the discs were particularly dodgy looking.

I’ve used up 280gb so that leaves me with 1.7tb of storage, as there is 8 boxes cds (2000ish - I vastly underestimated how many I had) left and a few hold-all’s with cds I guess I’ll be busy for the next couple months but it’s been quite cool digging through my memories as I prepare and load all the cds into the SuperDrive. Having all the cds accessible with the roon software is amazing, so much more so than holding the physical copy as roon sends you down musical rabbit holes and it’s very easy to spend hours browsing on the iPad whilst streaming from my CXN V2.

Overall it’s been a painless, enjoyable job so far.
 
I think part of the CD speed variation is due to the quality and thickness of the layers that make it up and their reflectiveness - if that's a word, some make the laser read harder and it hunts/retries/corrects - guesses the errors
 


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