Okay, after this post, I got to wondering..
Which encoder do ya'll prefer? I never really thought about it, and I have a vague recollection from (a loooong time ago?) that LAME was, well, Lame was.
I used to encode everything at 128k (now I do VBR), and I do everything 'manually' - from ripping (CDDAO) to encoding (Cool Edit or Sound Forge) I think both are using FhG (or something like that?)

I never gave it much thought until the other post. So, what is the general consensus? (FTR, I have WinXP, and never get any pops, clicks, scratches or noise, unless it's in the source to begin with.. Pink Floyd on Vinyl. Played thru an MP3 player. Gotta love it.)

Me.

EAC with Lame is the pretty much the undisputed champion. Some people use other things for convenience, but for audio quality, nothing really comes close.

Mattnew

I have said this a few times before, but WHY does everyone choose EAC over dbpoweramp? I used to use EAC but found dbpoweramp to be much better, faster, more options, smaller.

I haven't heard of dbpoweramp until recently. And I'd be willing to try it if I had an issue or two with EAC. But since I don't, I generally play the part of "leave well enough alone."

I think you should give it a try. It's free. It also add's functionality to windows for encoding and id3 tag editing ( tag editing with powerpack addon). The windows functionality that I used to use all the time for my rio 600 was right clicking on the mp3's I wanted to lower the quality on, usually 192k -> 96k so I could fit usually 2 cd's on it and then selecing "convert to" -> which format/codec (MP3/LAME) -> then you would select your quality and type of bitrate (CBR/VBR) along with some other options if needed, more with the powrpack installed.

Cd ripping is just as easy by bringing up DMc audio cd input, it detects yuor cd and downloads the cddb info automatically, you can then just click the rip button if have already set your default settings or "rip with options" to change them right then .... while ripping you can also select the cpu priority it uses ..great for when I don't need to be using my computer and just set it on highest.

Sounds pretty good. But I do happen to have (more than) a few CDs that have never ripped successfully under anything except EAC; older ones with um, booboos.

And now that you mention it, I can't seem to get tag info from the internet with EAC. I suppose I just decided to ignore it because it takes about the same amount of time for me to type it in... and I do it correctly, unlike some people.

In reply to:

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and I do it correctly, unlike some people

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Wait! You mean "brItNeY SpEaRs (CUTE!!)" is not "correct"?

Aargh! Now I have to change everything!!

Thanks guys, for your babble - I'll go check out EAC (and db..whatever it was) and see how it holds up.

Me.

The easiest way (and at least some would argue the best) is to use Chris Myden's settings. Download EAC and LAME, download Myden's program and let it do all the configuration. For an audiophile, I'm sure this takes all the fun out of it, but it allowed me to make excellent rips BEFORE I really knew what I was doing. The more I learn about it, the less I want to change configurations.

(dbpoweramp music converter)
Sounds pretty good.

The feature set surely sounds interesting, at least for anything besides ripping (to me).

But I do happen to have (more than) a few CDs that have never ripped successfully under anything except EAC; older ones with um, booboos.

That's exactly the point: EAC is just that: an exact audio copies. dMC doesn't seem to support software error recovery like EAC does. With EAC, I don't have to worry wether a scratched disc rips nicely or with pops and crackles. EAC either rips the CD perfectly or not at all (well, "not at all" means with clear error message in this case). I haven't found one single ripping program that does such a fine job on almost any scratched disc (well, CDDAO and cdparanoia may be exceptions, I haven't tried them).

See, I used Audiograbber, CDex and many other rippers, but I always had to listen to the rips before I could be sure they didn't include random pops and crackles. With EAC, a look at the result window tells me wether there is any chance of read errors (and where to look for them. If EAC didn't report any possible errors, there hasn't been a single pop so far.

Ciao,
Sven

I've been very happy with cdparanoia... the only discs that I found it couldn't rip were a couple that a friend wrote on CDR for me, and were completely screwed up, I never found anything that would read or play them. cdparanoia wouldn't quit trying though