Newbie to EAC, any advice before I start

[Fran]

My 2C:


1. Decide on a folder structure. This is key to being able to find stuff later - if you can't find it, it doesn't matter how well you ripped it. So perhaps you do all rock etc by artist with individual albums in between, and classical by composer.

2. Follow this guide: http://blowfish.be/eac/Setup/setup1.html

3. Ripping is a PITA at the start, so pick 5 or 10 that you want to listen to first off and rip those. Do a few at a time and don't burn out at it.

4. Don't rip more than about 20-30 CDs until you have a decent back up system in place. I use 2 external hard drives and a thing called goodsync.


Get yerself a lend of a jkdac etc

Fran

[tony]

My 2C:

Get yerself a lend of a jkdac etc

Fran

Thats the most important bit of advice. The best bit of kit you can ever get in terms of sound quality for euro spent. I am just sorry I spent money on a cdp and power supply.

[Diapason]

Well, it seems to be going well so far. I've installed it, set it to the most anal level of accuracy possible, and ripped a few albums with good success to a folder structure that makes sense to me! I also tried to rip a CD that's no longer playable on my Wadia without skipping, just to see how it would get on. Interestingly enough, it didn't fare much better than the CDP. After 15 minutes it had extracted 18 seconds and it wasn't even happy with those. I think I can safely say that CD is unsalvageable.

Realistically, I'm only going to rip a few more CDs until I have the JKDAC in my system and can hear what's what. Nearly there!

[tony]

Yes I think you are a dab hand at it already. I had the same problems with bootlegs cds that I very much wanted to rip but it took ages and often wasnt successful. I did find if I cleaned the cd very carefully on occasion it was then successfully copied so worth a try if its something you value.

[Diapason]

It's been dying for years, but when I went to clean it today I looked at it properly and the silver itself under the lacquer surface seems to be Donald Ducked. Annoyingly, it's a Naim Audio CD, so I would have hoped for better: Tears of Joy by Antonio Forcione. Audiophile twaddle in some ways, but I'd still like to be able to listen to it.

Anyway, the eac defaults seem sensible enough and seem to lead to expected results. The set up wizard takes you through a lot of it, which is great.

[tony]

I am going to try nero for some of the dodgy cds as it worked before. Even itunes copied all my dodgy cds so I reckon eac has issues with dodgy cds the other stuff might be more tolerant.

[jaybee]

wasn't there a theory doing the rounds that a stint in the freezer accentuates the information layer on a disc and can improve a dodgy disc??

[Fran]

Actually this makes a good point - a good quality rip of a cd is itself a backup of the silver disc..... So when the cd is damaged you can just burn a new one...

I have had reasonable success by washing the disc before ripping, but it doesn't always work.


Fran

[james]

Another possibility [instead of EAC] is dbPoweramp CD ripper. You hve to pay for it but there is a free trial. It also gets album art ..

http://www.dbpoweramp.com/