I am ripping my CD collection to Apple lossless format via Itunes as I type this. I've got a 52x CD rom (CDR/RW etc. bla bla bla) I find that while ripping CD's the speed may go up to 44x as indicated in Itunes, but that's the limit. Interestingly the latter tracks on a CD burn faster than the first few. If I remember correctly, you only get max speed on the outer edgs of a disk. My guess is that the processor speed is the bottleneck here, not my drive. A whole CD might take 3-4 minutes at most on my main computer, up to 15+ minutes on my old Imac which has a much slower processor and a 24x CD-ROM. Get a new drive, they are cheap and if you have a lot of CD's it will save you considerable time if you processor is up to the task. If you find a drive you like, do a search for it online and you will probably find some reviews. For what it's worth, the 52x drive I am using is a super cheap $49 generic special.
10x vs. 40x etc. cd-roms
i'm trying to figure out how to improve the efficiency of transferring cds to hard drive. one consideration is whether to buy a 40x speed cd drive. as audio people have found, specs. of electronics are often misleading in relation to real world performance. are some cd drives that much faster than the 10x drive i now have? is there a reliable web site or other reference that evaluates cd-rom drives? any other tips on expediting the import process?