Which Format should I rip to ?

[emptage]

A few years ago I bough at Ipod and ripped all my CD's using ITunes. I have decided in have a wireless muysic system so that I can play all the nusic on my Computer on the HI Fi system in my lounge. I want to re rip all my CD's to a higher quality format. My questions are which format should I rip to and how do I go about doing this ?

 

[noogle]

FLAC lossless. Buy a copy of dBPoweramp to rip your CDs.

 

[Fulmer]

AIFF is the format in which the music is encoded on the CD itself (old school red book standard from the '80s) and is the best format to use to RIP your CDs without any loss of quality as you get what's on the CD (1Mb/min). It's natively supported by iTunes, though you should check the error checking option to compensate for scratches in the CD.

Be forewarned, AIFF is exactly as you get on a CD so you're looking at 600-720Mb of storage per CD and if, like me, you've got 400+ CDs you'll need to get yourself a big external drive (mine's a 2Tb WD MyBook Studio connected via FireWire 800).

 

[michael hoy]

Just done this myself, agree with Noogle.

FLAC is lossless and takes up less space.

 

[CnoEvil]

Flac would be (and is) my choice - mostly for the reasons listed above.

Cno

 

[Anonymous]

+1 for FLAC & dbPoweramp. If you need to convert to any other format in the future, you can't go far wrong with this combination!

 

[Anonymous]

Definitely lossless, and in a format that supports tags (no wav).

Many options (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_codecs#Lossless_data_compression).

Which one you choose depends on with what equipment you want to play it on, or stream it from or to.

Unfortunately there is no single format that serves all. So make a few files and test it with your normal stereo, dlna stuff, your smartphone, NAS etc.

Flac or wma are probably the best options and they can easily be converted into eachother. Unless you are going the Apple ALAC route which is also fine.

 

[manicm]

AIFF is the format in which the music is encoded on the CD itself (old school red book standard from the '80s) and is the best format to use to RIP your CDs without any loss of quality as you get what's on the CD (1Mb/min). It's natively supported by iTunes, though you should check the error checking option to compensate for scratches in the CD.

Be forewarned, AIFF is exactly as you get on a CD so you're looking at 600-720Mb of storage per CD and if, like me, you've got 400+ CDs you'll need to get yourself a big external drive (mine's a 2Tb WD MyBook Studio connected via FireWire 800).

AIFF is not the native CD format, neither is WAV for that matter.

 

[manicm]

If space is not an issue, then uncompressed FLAC.

 

[dannycanham]

As long as it isn't lossless it really doesn't matter. Using something like poweramp you can go from one to the other. Having said that if I remember right apple lossless takes up less space but is not the most widely compatible and an uncompressed format such as wav would take less computer processing before outputting which if the analog components were nearby the cpu may theoretically cause less interferance if the processing difference kept the cpu on a low power mode.

DB poweramp is very good for most formats.

iTunes isn't bad on mac but I wouldn't bother with it on PC and it isn't as good for as many formats.

 

[shooter]

A few years ago I bough at Ipod and ripped all my CD's using ITunes. I have decided in have a wireless muysic system so that I can play all the nusic on my Computer on the HI Fi system in my lounge. I want to re rip all my CD's to a higher quality format. My questions are which format should I rip to and how do I go about doing this ?

What music system will you be using, that may have some baring on the file type.

 

[amcluesent]

Always FLAC, then you won't be assimilated by Apple

 

[emptage]

What music system will you be using, that may have some baring on the file type.

I will be using a Sonos Zonebridge and Sonos ZP90 to send to my HI Fi system which currently consists of NAD 3020 and AR 18s but this will shortly be upgraded to NAD326 and KEF Q300 or similar

 

[BillDay66]

FLAC or ALAC both work with Sonos are both lossless and support metadata tagging , if you've got ipods, etc - I'd go with ALAC, some prefer FLAC but IMO thats just an anti apple thing - theyre as good as each other, go with what suits the players you are using.

 

[Anonymous]

some prefer FLAC but IMO thats just an anti apple thing

Not at all. My reason for choosing FLAC (besides that it's a free and open specification) is that it supports free-form tagging, i.e. you are not restricted in what types of tags you use. I use this to organize my classical files by composer/performer/movement/part instead of the clunky artist/album/tracknumber tags.

From what I've heard, ALAC uses ID3v2 for tagging so is hampered by the same shortcomings that mp3 has. Of course, those shortcoming are only a problem if you care deeply (ocd-style) about those tags.

 

[hammill]

Always FLAC, then you won't be assimilated by Apple

You are surely not suggesting that one company controlling a large percentage of an industry could be harmful are you? Surely not, just ask Milly Dowler's parents.

 

[BillDay66]

some prefer FLAC but IMO thats just an anti apple thing

Not at all. My reason for choosing FLAC (besides that it's a free and open specification) is that it supports free-form tagging, i.e. you are not restricted in what types of tags you use. I use this to organize my classical files by composer/performer/movement/part instead of the clunky artist/album/tracknumber tags.

From what I've heard, ALAC uses ID3v2 for tagging so is hampered by the same shortcomings that mp3 has. Of course, those shortcoming are only a problem if you care deeply (ocd-style) about those tags.

[/quote

You can add whatever tags you like to ALAC files if you use a third party editing program like DbPoweramp, not much use though unless you have a player that can use them. The much maligned itunes seems pretty good to me.

 

[BillDay66]

Always FLAC, then you won't be assimilated by Apple

You are surely not suggesting that one company controlling a large percentage of an industry could be harmful are you? Surely not, just ask Milly Dowler's parents.

eh?

 

[Fulmer]

AIFF is the format in which the music is encoded on the CD itself...

AIFF is not the native CD format, neither is WAV for that matter.

Technically you are right, it is digital stream of 0s and 1s which en/decodes into 2-channels, each digitally signed, using a 16 bit linear PCM algorithm at 44.1Hz and it is a standard which was developed by Sony and Phillips which had no computer equivalent.

AIFF was a computer standard developed by Apple and Electronic Arts which took the raw PCM stream and encapsulated it in a Unix file format that was 100% what came off the CD so that we could manipulate raw audio streams on computers and I worked on the standard back in 1986-7. It was also adopted in to the Red Book standard by the IEC in 1992 and you can burn AIFF files straight to a CDR and they will play in any CD player - including my nearly 30 year old Sony Discman D-50 (which I had wired in to my car stereo back in 1986) that I used to test the standard as we developed it.

FLAC, by comparison, uses a compression algorithm to try and reduce the size of the PCM stream by removing what the algorithm perceives to be "superfluous data". Given that the CD is already taking a analogue stream and down sampling it to encode in a linear PCM stream, taking that information and further compressing it will further reduce quality. While the algorithm is very well written, it is still a compression algorithm and it does degrade the quality of the music from what was encoded on the CD and that is just a technical fact. Whether you're able to hear the difference is down to your ears and your playback equipment.

To be fair, the WAV standard - developed by IBM and Microsoft after AIFF as part of the OS/2 project - did originally provide for a similar 16 bit linear PCM at 44.1Hz however over the years it has been misused and was never an industry standard. Most WAV files include compression and up sample to 32 bit streams which, ironically, damages the audio as much as the compression since the algorithm "creates" data that didn't exist in order to "improve resolution". If someone properly encodes WAV files as originally intended then they would be an exact copy of the CD stream as is an AIFF and would take up similar space; it just never happens that way. Most people wrongly encode WAV files that are both compressed (to reduce space) and interpolated to 32 bit (to improve resolution) under the false impression it "improves the quality of the sound".

If you were going to have a throw down between WAV and FLAC then FLAC would win as the compromises are less.

However if you want rip CDs and keep the quality exactly as on the disc without any compromises then AIFF is your best bet.

 

[Anonymous]

Technically you are right, it is digital stream of 0s and 1s which en/decodes into 2-channels, each digitally signed, using a 16 bit linear PCM algorithm at 44.1Hz and it is a standard which was developed by Sony and Phillips which had no computer equivalent.

AIFF was a computer standard developed by Apple and Electronic Arts which took the raw PCM stream and encapsulated it in a Unix file format that was 100% what came off the CD so that we could manipulate raw audio streams on computers and I worked on the standard back in 1986-7. It was also adopted in to the Red Book standard by the IEC in 1992 and you can burn AIFF files straight to a CDR and they will play in any CD player - including my nearly 30 year old Sony Discman D-50 (which I had wired in to my car stereo back in 1986) that I used to test the standard as we developed it.

FLAC, by comparison, uses a compression algorithm to try and reduce the size of the PCM stream by removing what the algorithm perceives to be "superfluous data". Given that the CD is already taking a analogue stream and down sampling it to encode in a linear PCM stream, taking that information and further compressing it will further reduce quality. While the algorithm is very well written, it is still a compression algorithm and it does degrade the quality of the music from what was encoded on the CD and that is just a technical fact. Whether you're able to hear the difference is down to your ears and your playback equipment.

To be fair, the WAV standard - developed by IBM and Microsoft after AIFF as part of the OS/2 project - did originally provide for a similar 16 bit linear PCM at 44.1Hz however over the years it has been misused and was never an industry standard. Most WAV files include compression and up sample to 32 bit streams which, ironically, damages the audio as much as the compression since the algorithm "creates" data that didn't exist in order to "improve resolution". If someone properly encodes WAV files as originally intended then they would be an exact copy of the CD stream as is an AIFF and would take up similar space; it just never happens that way. Most people wrongly encode WAV files that are both compressed (to reduce space) and interpolated to 32 bit (to improve resolution) under the false impression it "improves the quality of the sound".

If you were going to have a throw down between WAV and FLAC then FLAC would win as the compromises are less.

However if you want rip CDs and keep the quality exactly as on the disc without any compromises then AIFF is your best bet.

Where to begin...AIFF and WAV are close to CD format, in that they both normally contain PCM audio, but the red book audio format does not use AIFF.

Wave does not normally contain compression, most wave files are uncompressed. AIFF can also contain compressed audio, it is a container format just as wave is.

FLAC does not use any perception to remove superflous data, it uncompresses exactly the same as to the source data, just like Zip does. It would be rediculous to say a word document looses some quality once stored in a zip file.

In a nutshell Wave and Aiff are very close (AIFF has the PCM data byte swapped), FLAC does not loose any quality.

 

[Anonymous]

We would suggest AIFF, WAV or FLAC but just as critically DON"T use iTunes to rip. We have found (echoing what others have recommended) that programs that offer Bit Accurate Secure Ripping, like DB Poweramp and EAC to significantly improve sound quality.

This type of rip not only helps to ensure better sound on Lossless audio but also if you then find you need to make a duplicate library (say if your wireless network proves troublesome streaming larger files) using a lossy format (MP3 and the like) you'll find the resultant files sound more cohesive as well.

Of course having a wired network (preferably on a isolated port switch rather than a consumer BB Router) would tend to avoid that problem and sound better again to boot!

 

[BillDay66]

We would suggest AIFF, WAV or FLAC but just as critically DON"T use iTunes to rip. We have found (echoing what others have recommended) that programs that offer Bit Accurate Secure Ripping, like DB Poweramp and EAC to significantly improve sound quality.

This type of rip not only helps to ensure better sound on Lossless audio but also if you then find you need to make a duplicate library (say if your wireless network proves troublesome streaming larger files) using a lossy format (MP3 and the like) you'll find the resultant files sound more cohesive as well.

Thats quite a statement, is it based on your perception of what you can hear or can you actually put some meat on the bones of it?

 

[Fulmer]

Where to begin...AIFF and WAV are close to CD format, in that they both normally contain PCM audio, but the red book audio format does not use AIFF.

Wave does not normally contain compression, most wave files are uncompressed. AIFF can also contain compressed audio, it is a container format just as wave is.

FLAC does not use any perception to remove superflous data, it uncompresses exactly the same as to the source data, just like Zip does. It would be rediculous to say a word document looses some quality once stored in a zip file.

In a nutshell Wave and Aiff are very close (AIFF has the PCM data byte swapped), FLAC does not loose any quality.

I did actually correct my earlier comment to say it had been adopted in to the red book standard rather than being the actual encoded format on the CD. I also said the original WAV standard was encoded in exactly the same way as AIFF but the reality is that most WAV files I've come across are compressed and up sampled. Assuming both formats have been encoded as intended then yes, they should both be identical to the original CD stream.

I understand lots of people like FLAC because it saves space, but I think your analogy with Word files is misplaced. Word files do contain "white space", PCM audio streams do not. Although I have not worked in the field for a number of years and am happy to stand corrected, my understanding of the algorithm is looks for commonly repeated sections, removes them and replaces them to reduce space. Since it is unlikely that anything other than a pure digital recording is likely to have repeated sections to reduce space it surely must do a comparitive analysis and "approximate" the sections? Therefore the point is that it is not bit-for-bit accurate which is always the point of compression in the first place; it's a compromise.

 

[The_Lhc]

I understand lots of people like FLAC because it saves space, but I think your analogy with Word files is misplaced. Word files do contain "white space", PCM audio streams do not. Although I have not worked in the field for a number of years and am happy to stand corrected, my understanding of the algorithm is looks for commonly repeated sections, removes them and replaces them to reduce space. Since it is unlikely that anything other than a pure digital recording is likely to have repeated sections to reduce space it surely must do a comparitive analysis and "approximate" the sections?

Why are you asking a question here? I can't believe anyone would just guess and then present it as fact, so you must know?

I don't understand a word of the following but I think it probably tells you whatever you need to know:

http://flac.sourceforge.net/format.html

 

[manicm]

We would suggest AIFF, WAV or FLAC but just as critically DON"T use iTunes to rip. We have found (echoing what others have recommended) that programs that offer Bit Accurate Secure Ripping, like DB Poweramp and EAC to significantly improve sound quality.

This type of rip not only helps to ensure better sound on Lossless audio but also if you then find you need to make a duplicate library (say if your wireless network proves troublesome streaming larger files) using a lossy format (MP3 and the like) you'll find the resultant files sound more cohesive as well.

Thats quite a statement, is it based on your perception of what you can hear or can you actually put some meat on the bones of it?

Linn espouse the same. Ask them.