Do I need a good sound card to rip CDs?

You do not need a new soundcard to rip music files. You are just putting the data on your hard drive from the cd which contains the audio files in .wav form .wma. .flac etc. The sound card comes into play when you listen to your audio files not when you rip the music.

Very true.

The keyword here is 'sound'.

All computers come with built in 'rip' cards.... in your case it's EAC.

The only time a sound card comes into the mix is when 'it' is used to import information thru it. Either via digital or analog means.

FYI, the stock iPods can't use FLAC. If you want a lossless format for the iPod, use Apple Lossless instead.

Michael