EAC - Ripping Options

2nd vote for dbpoweramp.. bit perfect rips and easy to use, but still very comprehensive

FLAC is lossless compression, as long as your playback hardware supports it, then it is recommended.

For loading portable mp3 players or burning an mp3 disc, when space is limited and sound quality is not as crucial, you can get a media manager program that will compress to mp3 (or other format) on the fly without altering your FLAC collection.

EAC is free, but I found dbPoweramp to be a real timesaver worth the money. Much easier to tag. They both use Accuraterip, so if your rip is bit-perfect, no matter the speed, settings or program used, then Accuraterip will tell you. The default settings can usually do this. The more complicated settings reserved for the occasional problem disc. You can also try EAC on the problem discs to see if you get better results.

Can anyone explain, please, how to rip to FLAC using EAC?

Compress to FLAC. It ia approx 1/2 the size of WAV and fully supports all the auto tagging features of EAC. It is compressed, but still bit-for-bit identical to the source CD when uncompressed for playback.

And in my case, my McIntosh only plays FLAC or MP3; no WAV allowed.

This is a good question, and as we are on AUDIOgon, I still don't understand why some people will invariably suggest compressing your music.

Hard drives are only getting bigger and cheaper by the day.

I, too, would love to hear from the EAC experts on bit for bit perfect, UNcompressed copies.

Since I first explored this, I think EAC has made some progress in its ability to "tag" the filenames for WAV files.

If you are using a portable device or a laptop, there may be considerations re battery life.