Ripping CD's to hard drive

@kota1 Thank you for the Sony suggestion. I just started re-ripping my CD’s to new 1TB Samsung SS drive ($64 on Amazon) into my my Bluesound Node 2i. The Sony rips FLAC @950kbps constant rate and halves the file size.

I stupidly downloaded and and then paid $8 for the cover art database for EAC (Exact Audio Copy). While I agree, it’s a very powerful yet complicated program to run IMHO.

Then I saw your Sony post the same day. And it’s all FREE with cover art database included !!

I had no clue and I’m a Sony Fanboy.

Thanks, man !

Joe

+1 for dbpoweramp. Also @tmhaudio do a Google search on SACD ripping and you’ll find the forums (lots of helpful folks) that talk about the process and steer you to download the necessary files. Unfortunately it’s not a one step deal, but once your set up it’s an easy process. Good luck. 

@m_j_s - totally agree; I can certainly tell the difference between an .mp3 and a ripped CD, and it's a big difference, at least on my system. 

I have ripped my CD's to AIFF files using iTunes on my iMac.  I have done that partly because I am lazy and partly because iTunes allows me to automatically have my ripped music collection automatically synched to my iPhone as lower resolution files for use in listening to music on my car.

In some instances, I have purchased FLAC downloads of some of the same albums that I have ripped.  In most cases there are minimal if any differences in sound quality between the AIFF files and the higher resolution FLAC files.  When there are differences in sound quality, it appears to be due to the source being remastered versions of older albums.

@flyfish77

In some instances, I have purchased FLAC downloads of some of the same albums that I have ripped. In most cases there are minimal if any differences in sound quality between the AIFF files and the higher resolution FLAC files. When there are differences in sound quality, it appears to be due to the source being remastered versions of older albums.

Yes, different mastering is usually the biggest difference.

On sites like Amazon Music you can compare different masterings, and hardly any of them sound the same.

What bothers me is that some of them can initially sound better on less ambitious speaker systems, and then worse on more revealing full scale ones.

I spent some time comparing the remastered Beach Boys 1993 Good Vibrations box set with their remastered 1999 Greatest Hits, Vol. 1: 20 Good Vibrations after reading about both on the Steve Hoffman music forum.

The former sounded better on the better system.

Listening to them on headphones was something different yet again.

Without a reliable reference source of material (or playback equipment), it is tricky to come to any worthwhile lasting conclusions.

In comparison, the difference in bitrate is usually insignificant.