Pssst, letting you in on a little secret: You Don't Need a CD Player!

[E-Stat]

My understanding is that when you rip a CD onto your hard drive, there's no "transport" involved, and it never gets converted to PCM stream. A CD drive is not the same thing as a transport.

Yes, all "drives" are transports. And there is a decided difference in the ability of a basic $39 computer drive and better ones like Plextors or significantly enhanced variations found in dedicated players to transcribe the bits. Ever seen a Burmester 969 ? It is built like a tank with the disk secured to the platter via a threaded weight.

The concept of a large capacity digital library is compelling. There are, however, some qualitative issues on the capture end to address with basic computers IMHO.

rw

[Mike Anderson]

Yes, all "drives" are transports.

I thought a "transport" outputted a PCM signal, e.g. a 44.1khz/16bit signal you can feed into a DAC. The usual CD drive on your computer doesn't do that when you rip a CD to your hard drive, does it?

And there is a decided difference in the ability of a basic $39 computer drive and better ones like Plextors or significantly enhanced variations found in dedicated players to transcribe the bits.

And I thought the whole point of error-correction software like Exact Audio Copy was to deal with any problems presented by the CD drive.

For example, I don't have a real fancy CD drive or anything, but on 99.9% of the CDs I rip with EAC, once it does the error correction, it says I've got an error-free rip. Are you saying that's a lie?

[bubslewis]

One problem I didn't mention is the unreliability of Windows itself. As long as Windows is prone to lockups freezes and blue screens of death it is unusable for me as a music server system. I am looking into building a Linux box to try this. Burning CD's that I already have to DVD-R's seems kind of redundant. If you're getting rid of the CD's I understand. I am in the market for used CD's. State title and price.

Seems to me I read something recently where a guy found that burned cd-r, cd-rw, dvd-r's etc begin to deteriorate after only a few years. This was not the case with manufactured cd's, dvd's that are pressed, but only with burns.

I have no idea if this is true or not, but I'd hate to back up my computer with hundreds or thousands of burns and then find out they don't sound that good when my hard drive crashes in five years.

[Mike Anderson]

I have no idea if this is true or not, but I'd hate to back up my computer with hundreds or thousands of burns and then find out they don't sound that good when my hard drive crashes in five years.

1) I use archive quality DVDs (Taiyo Yuden).

2) Once they're burned, I put them in a case and pack 'em up, store 'em in a cool, dry, dark place.

3) They aren't audio discs, they're data discs. But to tell you the truth, I have a large number of audio cds I burned a long time ago (when the technology was first commercially available), and I've never had any problem with them.

I'm guessing that I'll move to a new hard drive long before the DVDs go bad.

[superpanavision70mm]

A squeezebox is an accordian right? J/k

[Mike Anderson]

These guys are still debating this stuff:

http://forums.slimdevices.com/showth...t=24670&page=5

It's an interesting technical discussion, but I can't figure out who's right.

[noddin0ff]

Mike, I'm with you all the way. Keep up the good fight!

[bonsaiguitar]

Interesting. How do you remotely control it from the couch?

I use a dell wireless mouse and keyboard with my laptop connected to the plasma and receiver. Dual tap kegerator on the left right next to the kitchen. Now all I need is a porta potty.

[bonsaiguitar]

Wow! This is freaking getting technical. I work on computers for a living so the last thing I want to do when I get home is get into the techno mumbo jumbo.

Here's what I can tell you. With my setup running my laptop to a plasma TV and A/V receiver I play I-Tunes radio and hardly touch my CD collection. In fact I don't even burn anymore. Just a high speed stream of very high quality music, and so many stations to choose from. The sound is better to my ears than CD's playing through my player. In fact this setup is what got me back into audio. And my sons I-Pod also sounds excellent. Hard to beleive it gets much better than this.

We can sit here and do calculations and it won't change what your ears hear. Even age has a large impact on this. It's and individual thingy.

I remember when LP's were the $hit, and then people were arguing about which was better metal or CR02 cassette tapes. LMAO.

[emorphien]

[/INDENT]Reputedly, external USB-connected sound cards such as I use, reduce the effect of EMI/RFI found inside the computer.

Wouldn't surprise me.

There's a huge amount of variation in the quality of sound cards, but overall I still find I prefer the sound of my CDP (as humble as it may be) running through my amp than any computer I've compared to it. The sound card in my shuttle is not stellar (integrated but it's enough for my needs), and to be honest the mac mini I picked up from a friend sounds more energetic and dynamic.

Of course I could always put a real sound card in the shuttle or get one of those external sound "cards" and it'd likely be better than both. I can't say I care, I don't do critical listening through my computers.

[shokhead]

You mean you dont sit back in your computer chair for the night with a drink and listen to your new remastered cd you just bought and then put in a DVD/DTS movie thats 3 hours and watch it on your big screen computer monitor?

[Mike Anderson]

There are plenty of people on this forum who don't care about HT (including me).

And I don't sit in my computer to chair to listen to music. My amp and speakers sit about 25 feet away from where the computer is. And the rig doesn't include a TV...

It's a real shame there's so much built-in prejudice about this topic. People here about music on a computer and they simply can't get past the image of crappy MP3s coming out of those tinny little computer speakers. That's too bad.

People who see my setup in action are blown away by the power, elegance, and sound quality. I've won more than one convert.

[shokhead]

Tongue in cheek dude,tongue in cheek. But if you want to get down with it, i like to enjoy a DVD and enjoy music,not just watch a DVD or have music on,like a computer.

[bonsaiguitar]

People who see my setup in action are blown away by the power, elegance, and sound quality. I've won more than one convert.

Same here. And I don't even have a great system. But then again I'm listening to a high speed stream most of the time. I also listen to my sons band on Myspace and it's very good quality. They're recording their debut CD on a computer. Something most in the music industry are doing now days. So PC recording can't be too bad.

[ericl]

scott nixon usb tube and chibi dacs

[bonsaiguitar]

Guy from China is selling these on Ebay. Getting good feedback too.

[noddin0ff]

So, back to the question of reading data off a disk and whether reading a disk to write to a hard drive is more error free than a CDP reading a disk to send to a DAC. I put the question to a friend of mine who is very smart, into chip design, etc...

I asked him if a PC reading data of a redbook CD is the same as reading a data file off a CD with regard to error correction (assuming lossless copying).

His reply was very illuminating and corrected my incorrect assumption...

Yes it is fundamentally different, although it depends on the format of the disc. Most audio CDs (older usually) can not be mounted like like a CDR or CDROM. They don't have any kind of filesystem on them, so you can't just move the tracks around manually. They are kind of like the old tar format VMS/DEC tape drives in that sense.

The error checking/correcting codes are built into the filesystem (FAT32, NTFS, EXT3, Reiser, ISO9660, etc).

The ripper here is a special piece of software that access the drive at the lowest possible level and basically just streams the serial bits into a raw file (WAV on ms). So the only error checking/correcting you get is what is built into the firmware of the drive, usually not much if any. Which is why programs like CD Paranoia exist; it basically adds that layer of error correction that was lost by not having a true filesystem on the media. Also this is why it is kind of a misnomer to "rip to MP3", you are actually ripping to WAV(or AIFF) and converting to MP3, the WAV file is usually not kept (with most converters).

Newer CDs actually have ISO9660 filesystems on them, and can be mounted like a read-only USB thumb drive. In fact a disc that I just got (Wolfmother, Australian power rock trio, kicks serious ass) actually had MP3, OGG, AIFF, and WAV formated files on it, that could be copied. In this case, yes you do get the error coding benefits "for free". These types of discs also have the old style "unformatted cdda tracks" on them as well, so you can play it in a traditional cd-player. The PC readable section of the disc is ignored by the cd-player. and the cdda portion is ignored by the PC (unless your ripping).


Clear as mud, right?

He commented in an earlier exchange that real CDP's have much better error free reading. and that PC-CDROM drives aren't really designed for error free reads and rely on detection correction of errors (which I understand to require the above mentioned filesystems).

So with regard to getting the correct bits off the disk, CDP's have the advantage unless it is a newer disk with a filesystem. Now, we can continue on down the chain...

Learn something every day.

[Mike Anderson]

He commented in an earlier exchange that real CDP's have much better error free reading. and that PC-CDROM drives aren't really designed for error free reads and rely on detection correction of errors (which I understand to require the above mentioned filesystems).

He commented in an earlier exchange that real CDP's have much better error free reading. and that PC-CDROM drives aren't really designed for error free reads and rely on detection correction of errors (which I understand to require the above mentioned filesystems).

So with regard to getting the correct bits off the disk, CDP's have the advantage unless it is a newer disk with a filesystem. Now, we can continue on down the chain...

But I think you missed part of what he said -- on the software end (he mentioned "CD Paranoia"), you DO get error correction, even with the older types of CDs. And it is "free" because the software is now free. Whether the CD drive is producing errors doesn't matter anymore.

Ask him about Exact Audio Copy, and whether it provides error-free rips on the vast majority of CDs. If he knows what he's talking about, he'll say "yes".

Exact Audio Copy will confirm that you have an error-free rip. Unless someone wants to prove the developers are lying (and they have no motive to lie; after all, it's free software) or the software is defective, I don't know what the fuss is about.

The bottom line is that if you use a program like EAC, you will get error-free rips on the vast majority of your CDs.

[noddin0ff]

I agree with you Mike, I just wanted to break the problem apart step by step. There was a statement earlier that PC's gave inferior reads and error correction came up. I always assumed that all data going into a PC was buffered, checked, and corrected and couldn't imaging why bits from a redbook CD would be any different - but I see this is not the case with CD's lacking filesystems. My friend mentioned a program called CD Paranoia which probably functions much like EAC.

I just started reading a link he sent, might be more info there, might not. I do agree that it is possible to get perfect data. I'm just surprised it's not automatic.
http://www.xiph.org/paranoia/faq.html#play

[bonsaiguitar]

I beleive most of the newer recorable drives have error checking built into the firmware. Also most newer burning programs due this and also prepare logs for errors if any, and also show the corrections. These are usually shown as C2 errors if you happen to view one.

It's pretty much a non issue unless you're using an outdated burner. And I'm pretty sure all dual layer rippers on the market have the error checking in the firm.

[noddin0ff]

I beleive most of the newer recorable drives have error checking built into the firmware. Also most newer burning programs due this and also prepare logs for errors if any, and also show the corrections. These are usually shown as C2 errors if you happen to view one.

It's pretty much a non issue unless you're using an outdated burner. And I'm pretty sure all dual layer rippers on the market have the error checking in the firm.

You're probably right. I wouldn't know. But, for the Mac users out there who want an application similar to EAC there's one called MAX
http://sbooth.org/Max/

Unfortunately for me, it may only run under OS 10.4 (see help forums on the site). I'm running 10.3.9 and it won't launch. It looks like the most powerful and FREE ripper and encoder available for the Mac.

[Mike Anderson]

scott nixon usb tube and chibi dacs

Looks like a nice DAC for the money. What are you using for your transport?

[Feanor]

But I think you missed part of what he said -- on the software end (he mentioned "CD Paranoia"), you DO get error correction, even with the older types of CDs. And it is "free" because the software is now free. Whether the CD drive is producing errors doesn't matter anymore.
...
The bottom line is that if you use a program like EAC, you will get error-free rips on the vast majority of your CDs.

That is, as read by the computer DVD/CD drive? I would say not very. I was playing with Exact Copy a couple of weeks ago and ran through a dozen of so CDs. In fact, the highest number of errors any any of the discs I tried was 3 and several had zero errors, (as detected by Exact Copy). Exact Copy corrected them 100%, so it claimed.

That is, with the exception of the CDR that purposely scratched deeply in several places as an experiment. Exact Copy persevered and was able to copy virtually all of the discs but indicated that it could not guarantee that the correction was 100%. The process to 1.5 hours!!

[E-Stat]

I thought a "transport" outputted a PCM signal, e.g. a 44.1khz/16bit signal you can feed into a DAC. The usual CD drive on your computer doesn't do that when you rip a CD to your hard drive, does it?

Transports are merely devices to transfer a datastream. A CD drive has no idea whether the output is music or data. Doesn't care. If you purchased a tape deck from Crown back in the 70s, you chose the transport and separately, the electronics. A data tape transport reads the tape and outputs the bits. When you rip to hard disk (I also use EAC), you must specify the coding (WAV, MP3, etc.) that the software uses to encode the bitstream coming off the CD. Ever burn a music disk as a "data project"? Won't work. It was not the transport's fault.

And I thought the whole point of error-correction software like Exact Audio Copy was to deal with any problems presented by the CD drive.

While there is not yet consensus on the issue, I understand the challenge to be one of timing. The exact timing may not be returned.

rw

[noddin0ff]

Transports are merely devices to transfer a datastream. A CD drive has no idea whether the output is music or data. Doesn't care. If you purchased a tape deck from Crown back in the 70s, you chose the transport and separately, the electronics. A data tape transport reads the tape and outputs the bits. When you rip to hard disk (I also use EAC), you must specify the coding (WAV, MP3, etc.) that the software uses to encode the bitstream coming off the CD. Ever burn a music disk as a "data project"? Won't work. It was not the transport's fault.

I think that this is no longer strictly true. Because of error correcting mechanisms that are integrated in the transport for CD drives. On a PC the error correction, as I posted above, relies on filesystem data resident on the disk and on firmware incorporated in the transport. I suppose CDP's also have error correcting firmware. So as I understand, the passage of info is not strictly passive.

When you rip to MP3 the data is still written temporarily to the HD as a WAV file. You rip to WAV and then convert to MP3. A data disk has a file structure not recognized by a CD player but it still works for music on machines that can read it.

Not trying to be argumentative, just trying to clarify and learn. Please correct me.

While there is not yet consensus on the issue, I understand the challenge to be one of timing. The exact timing may not be returned.

rw

I'm still of the impression that if the bits are not corrupted all timing issues are resolved by DAC (which has its own buffer and clock) to the best of the DACs ability. I still don't quite get where these timing problems you're bringing up come from?