Lossless Audio Recording Question

  • Thread starter Thread starter BillR
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BillR

I have decided to redo my low bit-rate MP3s and also rip some
additional CDs now that I have more disk space. What do members of
this group recommend as the best free lossless format. I have ~200+
CDs and a few dozen vinyl only recordings to rip so I don't want to do
it yet again but I also don't have unlimited disk space.

I'm leaning toward Monkey's Audio at the moment, but ....

TIA,
BillR
 
BillR said:
I have decided to redo my low bit-rate MP3s and also rip some
additional CDs now that I have more disk space. What do members of
this group recommend as the best free lossless format. I have ~200+
CDs and a few dozen vinyl only recordings to rip so I don't want to do
it yet again but I also don't have unlimited disk space.
Click to expand...

FWIW re recording to vinyl. I use Wave Repair:

Program: Wave Repair
Install: n.i.
Ware: Liteware (recording and track splitting functions are free)
http://www.delback.co.uk/wavrep/

After recording and splitting the tracks I burn a CD with the .wav files
and stash it away.

If I decide to encode mp3 files in a different bit rate or switch to a
different compressed format or clean up the noise etc. etc. I intend to
use those CDs as the starting point. Recording from vinyl *once* is more
than enough for me. ;)

Susan
 
BillR said:
I have decided to redo my low bit-rate MP3s and also rip some
additional CDs now that I have more disk space.
Click to expand...

Redo your low bit rate MP3s to what? Higher bit rate ones? By
re-encoding the existing ones? Save your time, you can't improve them.
______________
What do members of
this group recommend as the best free lossless format.
Click to expand...

APE, FLAC, SHN, LPAC...six of one, half a dozen of another. All
lossless, after all...

--
dadiOH
____________________________

dadiOH's dandies v3.06...
....a help file of info about MP3s, recording from
LP/cassette and tips & tricks on this and that.
Get it at http://mysite.verizon.net/xico
 
Susan, I intend to take that approach to the vinyl rips: burn a
lossless copy to CD/DVD, then keep a post-processed version for
playing. I'll burn an archive/backup copy of those as well, of course,
so I don't have to regularly back up that disk partition.

Dadioh, I know I have to rip my CDs again. That's why I was asking
about lossless codecs. I want to avoid a third rip. Simple format
conversions of disk files in large batchs is easy. I don't care if a
batch conversion runs for hours as long as I'm not trying to use my PC
while it is running: lossless to mp3, m4a, etc. is of much less concern
as long as the codec is sufficiently popular to be maintained and
integrated with at least a few popular freeware tools (e.g., Audacity,
CDex, dBpowerAMP, EAC)
 
I have decided to redo my low bit-rate MP3s and also rip some
additional CDs now that I have more disk space. What do members of
this group recommend as the best free lossless format. I have ~200+
CDs and a few dozen vinyl only recordings to rip so I don't want to do
it yet again but I also don't have unlimited disk space.

I'm leaning toward Monkey's Audio at the moment, but ....

TIA,
BillR
Click to expand...
The most common lossless codecs are flac and ape. I mostly use flac/EAC to
rip to lossless.
http://www.saunalahti.fi/cse/EAC/index.html

regards

Dud
 
BillR said:
I have decided to redo my low bit-rate MP3s and also rip some
additional CDs now that I have more disk space. What do members of
this group recommend as the best free lossless format. I have ~200+
CDs and a few dozen vinyl only recordings to rip so I don't want to do
it yet again but I also don't have unlimited disk space.

I'm leaning toward Monkey's Audio at the moment, but ....

TIA,
BillR
Click to expand...
It depends how you're going to use the tracks. If I was going to leave
them on my harddrive or make data disks to play on my hd, monkey's audio
is probably the best. Otherwise, flac is the most versatile codec. You
can play it on the computer. It's a standard now for downloading free
music from the music archive. Some portable players are beginning to
consider flac. I think it may already be on one of the rio players.
 
I have decided to redo my low bit-rate MP3s and also rip
some additional CDs now that I have more disk space. What
do members of this group recommend as the best free
lossless format. I have ~200+ CDs and a few dozen vinyl
only recordings to rip so I don't want to do it yet again
but I also don't have unlimited disk space.

I'm leaning toward Monkey's Audio at the moment, but ....

TIA,
BillR
Click to expand...

I would go with FLAC, simply because it is an open format
supported on many platforms. Monkeys Audio is a Windows-only
format. That may be fine for your needs, but why paint yourself
into a corner? FLAC is also supported on more hardware players.

Rip with EAC, encode with FLAC, assign the proper tags, and then
you'll never have to redo any of it again. You can use
"dBpowerAMP Music Converter" to convert the FLACs to any other
format, and it will copy all the tags, too.
 
Duddits, J44xm, dansheen, Onno, and fathom,

Thanks for the reasoned advice and especially the supporting links.
Based on performance, features, and market share I'm now leaning toward
FLAC although the additional compression of Monkey's Audio is still
tempting.

BillR
 
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