2. pc-audio
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Rip CD to Mac - basic question

I have started to rip some of my CDs to disk using a mac. I notice a lot of people using software to do this. When I look at a CD in the finder it appears as a set of aiff files for each song, for which I have been doing a drag and drop onto my hard drive, just like copying any other file. I would rather not use iTunes.

My question is: is this a bit for bit perfect copy? If so, why use other software? If not, why not? Computer files are always bit perfect when copied. There must be some software intervention on the part of the OS anyway, as a CD doesn't contain aiff files.

Any help would be appreciated. I don't want to copy a lot of CDs like this and then find I have to do it call over again.
malcolm02

Showing 3 responses by doggiehowser

doggiehowser
672 posts
 
I prefer to use XLD. It does ripping to AIFF as well but it provides a log/report of the rip so you know if there are errors. (similar to EAC on PC
doggiehowser
672 posts
 
I don't know why there's so much anti Apple sentiments around.

You use the best tools you have and in my case, that means using Audirvana Plus which is a Mac software and using the free Remote app to control my playlist on the headless Mac Mini.

If you want to change the system, just run a batch conversion to FLAC or WAV. I use AIFF because I want embedded metadata (artist names, album art) and I want uncompressed lossless so it was either AIFF or WAV.

Besides AIFF is easily playable on most PC systems (even without iTunes)
doggiehowser
672 posts
 
I think the word you are looking for is lossless compression.

I do find a slight difference between AIFF and WAV but both IMHO are better than FLAC/ALAC.

ps AIFF has the option of having big or little endian so it can be in the same order as WAV. Both WAV and AIFF are derived from the Amiga IFF standard.
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