Mp3 or WMA Lossless????????

[admin_exported]

Ripping my CD's to the PC - Advice needed please!!!

At last I'm about to begin putting my CD collection onto the PC! For several years I've been building up my collection which now amounts to (a guess!) 1000+ CD's. I have a full seperates Hi Fi system (of course!) but no mp3 players - quite simply I listen to music on the Hi Fi or put CD's in the car (VW Passat, good sound)

I have decided to rip all my CD's to the PC - not sure why yet!!! Maybe it's back up, maybe to listen to on the PC, maybe I'll want to connect a laptop to my amp, maybe I'll get an mp3 player???????

Here's my burning, or should that be ripping question:

What quality should I rip at? I've started ripping CD's at WMA Lossless - as I'm conditioned to doing things at the best quality. Is this wise given the size of file that each CD is? If I continue to rip at this level I'm assuming that each of my CD's is then stored on the hard drive exactly as it was produced on CD. I appreciate this will probably fill a 500gb hard drive. If I subsequently wish to put this music (or some of it) onto a laptop (or an mp3 player) will I be able to reduce the file size to smaller WMA or mp3??

If so, how? or should I be ripping at something less than WMA Lossless?

Many thanks in anticipation of some audiophile advice on this!

Cheers Steve Mac

 

[idc]

Hi Steve, since you mention WMA lossless the you can easily do a comparison test and rip a CD onto WMP at two different bit rates and see if you can hear a difference. Generally speaking I cannot, though occasionally an album will sound a little flat. In the end the higher the bit rate the more guarantee you give yourself and your hifi the best SQ.

As for reducing the file size, I do not know of a way that WMP can do that, in standard mode anyway. There may well be a plug in that allows a lower bit rate copy to be made. I keep my itunes music files on a hard drive. Itunes does have the means of creating a lower bit rate copy, which you can the put onto a playlist. However, I found that when I was copying files from my hard drive to my laptop both myself and itunes ended up in a real fanckle.

Most of my music is lossless and I have more than my ipod can take. I get round this by unchecking albums I do not want to synch with the ipod. So my ipod acts like a massive multi CD player. For the music I keep on my laptop I use WMP. That stopped the problem of itunes and me mixing things up. A regular post on the forum is 'where have my music files gone?' or 'itunes has lost its link to the music files, what do I do?'.

So, my advice would be import at lossless, but do some listening tests first to see if it really worthwhile. Then keep your file system as simple as possible.

 

[manicm]

Since you're playing off a PC, and one can acquire an external HDD for additional storage, I would say go for WMA Lossless - WMP is an excellent organiser and I think you'll notice the difference to MP3 on a good sound system.

 

[cutter74]

Since you have a taste for high quality music; having hi-fi seperates and all, and considering the size of your music collection, i would recommend to consider only lossless formats, like FLAC. This way, you can say goodbye to the physical media (and the considerable space 1000 CDs will undoubtedly occupy in your house), while not having to compromise sound quality. As far as playback is concerned, all home media streamers support the FLAC format, and I'm sure it's only a matter or months before the next generation of iPods/Sony walkmans etc support it as well. If you even don't want to invest on new hardware for the road, you can always convert FLAC to mp3 and burn on a CD.

Personally speaking, this question touched a very sensitive nerve, since i made the wrong choice with my collection years ago, when i decided that converting to mp3 was good enough... this only lead to ripping and tagging my entire collection once again a few years later at FLAC....

Just my 2 cents worth...

Oh, and if you go that way, make sure you take regular backups of your collection!

 

[Anonymous]

FLAC is best format to archive CDs as mentioned above. The other important factor is to use software like Exact Audio Copy (FREE!) to rip your CDs as it has a lot of built in mechanisms for ensuring 99.9-100% accurate ripping depending on the condtion of the disc. It may be slower than other rippers such as the one built into Windows Media Player, but you will get better and more accurate results.

Quality at the archive stage is far more important than speed.

 

[Anonymous]

I ripped my (300) CD collection in FLAC - it takes a long time so with 1000+ CDs you'll need patience.

I use FLAC because it is compatible with Squeezebox.

It can be hard to distinguish between lossless and other formats but I wanted to stream at the highest quality possible.

Its important for you to decide why you're ripping in the first place and then make your decision about lossless vs other on this.

Software is available to convert lossless into smaller file sizes if you change your mind.

My advice would be:

- use one of the lossless formats.
- at some point you probably will buy an mp3 player so bear this in mind.
- at some point you probably will buy a wireless music system so bear this in mind (within 5 years I reckon wireless home systems will be common place)
- make sure you back up your music files on a separate hard drive.

 

[Alec]

Personally i would just go with whichever lossless format is supported by whatever you'll use it with.

Couple of other points just to be argumentative.

Squeezebox Duet supports apple and wma lossless too.

Im not sure we can just guess that FLAC will be so much more widely supported in a few months...

I'm not sure EAC is quite as wonderful as people think. Dont get me wrong, ive used it and it was good once the faffy setup was complete, but im not sure of the advantage of it being more accurate except in the case of disks which are not in good condition. It also wants to be set to rip in one lossless format only and its difficult to change between them.

On the other hand, ive heard someone say that EAC wouldnt successfully rip a damged disk, but a "lesser" ripper did, without audible imperfections. Indeed, even when EAC has (rarely) told me there were issues on a rip, i havent heard them.

Meh, i dunno.

I wonder if anyone here has ripped the same format in EAC and a different ripper and heard difference?

Also, if anyone has compared WMP rips to rips of the same format with "better" dedicated ripping software.

Sorry to be argumantative and sorry for the interruption OP, but its all in the best possible taste.

 

[manicm]

al7478:

Personally i would just go with whichever lossless format is supported by whatever you'll use it with.

Couple of other points just to be argumentative.

Squeezebox Duet supports apple and wma lossless too.

Im not sure we can just guess that FLAC will be so much more widely supported in a few months...

I'm not sure EAC is quite as wonderful as people think. Dont get me wrong, ive used it and it was good once the faffy setup was complete, but im not sure of the advantage of it being more accurate except in the case of disks which are not in good condition. It also wants to be set to rip in one lossless format only and its difficult to change between them.

On the other hand, ive heard someone say that EAC wouldnt successfully rip a damged disk, but a "lesser" ripper did, without audible imperfections. Indeed, even when EAC has (rarely) told me there were issues on a rip, i havent heard them.

Meh, i dunno.

I wonder if anyone here has ripped the same format in EAC and a different ripper and heard difference?

Also, if anyone has compared WMP rips to rips of the same format with "better" dedicated ripping software.

Sorry to be argumantative and sorry for the interruption OP, but its all in the best possible taste.

I agree with you Al - EAC is a wonderful thing but it's also a pain in the rear.

 

[bretty]

heystak:I ripped my (300) CD collection in FLAC - it takes a long time so with 1000+ CDs you'll need patience.

I use FLAC because it is compatible with Squeezebox.

It can be hard to distinguish between lossless and other formats but I wanted to stream at the highest quality possible.

Its important for you to decide why you're ripping in the first place and then make your decision about lossless vs other on this.

Software is available to convert lossless into smaller file sizes if you change your mind.

My advice would be:

- use one of the lossless formats.
- at some point you probably will buy an mp3 player so bear this in mind.
- at some point you probably will buy a wireless music system so bear this in mind (within 5 years I reckon wireless home systems will be common place)
- make sure you back up your music files on a separate hard drive.

I can't imagine how long it takes to rip a collection in lossless. I'm doing mine in 320kbps (because of HDD space restraints, couldn't do lossless). I have around 950 cds. I'm down to my last 45 cds to rip, as I type this. How long has it taken? I started on the Friday before last doing 18 hours a day on the weekend and 9 hours a night during the week! so, about 120 hours to do 950 cds at 320kbps! Never again!

 

[j4mm3r]

in answer to one of steve's questions, the lossless format tend to reduce the file size by approx half, the average track on a cd is about 45/50mb and a lossless file is about 25/30mb.

think you need to consider what mp3 player you might get and maybe look into wireless streaming such as squeezebox/airport express... obviously an ipod supports apple lossless but not flac & not sure about wma lossless. the squeezebox supports both flac and apple lossless and prob wma files of sort, whereas the airport express is probably apples own formats such as apple lossless again.

if your playing on a stereo dont go below a lossless standard, mp3 players the file can be reduced to lower bit rate.

 

[davydmx]

bretty:heystak:I ripped my (300) CD collection in FLAC - it takes a long time so with 1000+ CDs you'll need patience.

I use FLAC because it is compatible with Squeezebox.

It can be hard to distinguish between lossless and other formats but I wanted to stream at the highest quality possible.

Its important for you to decide why you're ripping in the first place and then make your decision about lossless vs other on this.

Software is available to convert lossless into smaller file sizes if you change your mind.

My advice would be:

- use one of the lossless formats.
- at some point you probably will buy an mp3 player so bear this in mind.
- at some point you probably will buy a wireless music system so bear this in mind (within 5 years I reckon wireless home systems will be common place)
- make sure you back up your music files on a separate hard drive.

I can't imagine how long it takes to rip a collection in lossless. I'm doing mine in 320kbps (because of HDD space restraints, couldn't do lossless). I have around 950 cds. I'm down to my last 45 cds to rip, as I type this. How long has it taken? I started on the Friday before last doing 18 hours a day on the weekend and 9 hours a night during the week! so, about 120 hours to do 950 cds at 320kbps! Never again!

That's an epic ripping session! But i'm suprised you opted to rip at 320kbps rather than shelling out for a 1tb drive! An album in Apple Lossless/FLAC averages 300-500mb in size, so i'd guess your 950 cds would fit on a dedicated 1tb drive(which of course, can be had for £60 odd).

Perhaps my post is hopeless/futile, seeing as you've already ripped your music collection, but thing is, i can hear a clear sq difference between lossy vs lossless on my stereo, and your mentioned stereo looks far from shabby!

Actually, lossless sounds better than mp3/aac on my iPod/earphones too...

 

[bretty]

davydmx:
bretty:heystak:I ripped my (300) CD collection in FLAC - it takes a long time so with 1000+ CDs you'll need patience.

I use FLAC because it is compatible with Squeezebox.

It can be hard to distinguish between lossless and other formats but I wanted to stream at the highest quality possible.

Its important for you to decide why you're ripping in the first place and then make your decision about lossless vs other on this.

Software is available to convert lossless into smaller file sizes if you change your mind.

My advice would be:

- use one of the lossless formats.
- at some point you probably will buy an mp3 player so bear this in mind.
- at some point you probably will buy a wireless music system so bear this in mind (within 5 years I reckon wireless home systems will be common place)
- make sure you back up your music files on a separate hard drive.

I can't imagine how long it takes to rip a collection in lossless. I'm doing mine in 320kbps (because of HDD space restraints, couldn't do lossless). I have around 950 cds. I'm down to my last 45 cds to rip, as I type this. How long has it taken? I started on the Friday before last doing 18 hours a day on the weekend and 9 hours a night during the week! so, about 120 hours to do 950 cds at 320kbps! Never again!

That's an epic ripping session! But i'm suprised you opted to rip at 320kbps rather than shelling out for a 1tb drive! An album in Apple Lossless/FLAC averages 300-500mb in size, so i'd guess your 950 cds would fit on a dedicated 1tb drive(which of course, can be had for £60 odd).

Perhaps my post is hopeless/futile, seeing as you've already ripped your music collection, but thing is, i can hear a clear sq difference between lossy vs lossless on my stereo, and your mentioned stereo looks far from shabby!

Actually, lossless sounds better than mp3/aac on my iPod/earphones too...

To be honest, I guess i'm a bit out of touch with PC based matters. I thought a 1TB hard drive would be a few hundred quid, which, on top of the spending spree i've had recently (holiday, new car, new head unit, new ipod) I couldn't afford. £60, eh? ******. Oh well, looks like i'll be doing it all again, then. Not for a while, though, cos i think i'm losing my mind!

 

[unfocused]

Another issue is if you have any live albums (or albums like 'Dark Side Of The Moon')WMA and MP3 don't have gapless playback so you get a pause between tracks.

Apple lossless or FLAC would seem like the best choice. iTunes is easy peasy to use (I prefer it to the awful Window Media Player.)

 

[The_Lhc]

bretty:I can't imagine how long it takes to rip a collection in lossless.

About two minutes.

 

[manicm]

unfocused:

Another issue is if you have any live albums (or albums like 'Dark Side Of The Moon')WMA and MP3 don't have gapless playback so you get a pause between tracks.

Apple lossless or FLAC would seem like the best choice. iTunes is easy peasy to use (I prefer it to the awful Window Media Player.)

WMP 11 is a lot better than some give it credit for - and as iTunes and others become increasingly cluttered it's one of the cleanest players out there - and this from Microsoft gasp!