Rippers: Are there better ones because of?

[dimfer]

just got my Nova Physics Memory Player back from Mark Porzilli for software upgrade and dac install - he converted all my files to 32/44, will try them tomorrow if it is any better. I could tell 24/44 is better than 16/44, hopefully 32 bit takes it to another level.

[egay]

just got my Nova Physics Memory Player back from Mark Porzilli for software upgrade and dac install - he converted all my files to 32/44, will try them tomorrow if it is any better. I could tell 24/44 is better than 16/44, hopefully 32 bit takes it to another level.

I am curiously awaiting your results

.e.

[egay]

This is an off-shoot of the thread below [i had to separate so as not to hi-jack the original thread]
viewtopic.php?f=65&t=23987&p=391353#p391353

i started ripping last year & tried several apps like the WMP & iTunes because they are part of or comes free with the OS; i've also tried DbPoweramp, EAC, some other smaller less known apps, & lately, the WINAMP.

of these, i still gravitate back to WMP [now in v11/XP & v12/win7] because it is so easy to use & quite intuitive - for that, at least, i'd say it is better than the rest i tried; i didn't like the iTunes because no matter what i do, the album cover or artwork is not included and i am required to register in their "store"; the EAC is tough to learn - what i hate most is that instead of guiding you with some "recommended settings" it sort of "asks" you - heck, what do i answer?; the others have a lot of features that make them look like some japanese low-fi radio-amp with dancing lights - useless features & burdensome to me.

but in truth, those were not strictly my concern - my real "worry" is that - in terms of the quality of the ripped product, which of these would give me the best output? or would they just produce the same output QUALITY? i know some of these have some kind of "corrections", but what do i care about them? or should i care?

i'm starting to enjoy ripping all my discs - redbooks, xrcds, sacds - because i can listen to my current ripped music continuously for a week and not even touching any buttons [except for volume & some occasional jump to other albums].

in simplicity: would there be a "better" ripper out there than can produce better quality outputs?
...

.e.

Going back to my original post quoted above, I have, for the past 4 months, settled down using ZUNE in my windows machine and the past 6 months using RHYTHMBOX in my Ubuntu machines.

I find the SQs in both machines very similar that I really cannot tell the difference from which ripper I did the original source from and the interesting thing is there is a difference between them: the windows machine uses USB2.0 while the ubuntu machine uses USB1.x, so I'm thinking that the USB speed does not matter , any thoughts here?

.e.

[Squirrelnutzipper]

This is an off-shoot of the thread below [i had to separate so as not to hi-jack the original thread]
viewtopic.php?f=65&t=23987&p=391353#p391353

i started ripping last year & tried several apps like the WMP & iTunes because they are part of or comes free with the OS; i've also tried DbPoweramp, EAC, some other smaller less known apps, & lately, the WINAMP.

of these, i still gravitate back to WMP [now in v11/XP & v12/win7] because it is so easy to use & quite intuitive - for that, at least, i'd say it is better than the rest i tried; i didn't like the iTunes because no matter what i do, the album cover or artwork is not included and i am required to register in their "store"; the EAC is tough to learn - what i hate most is that instead of guiding you with some "recommended settings" it sort of "asks" you - heck, what do i answer?; the others have a lot of features that make them look like some japanese low-fi radio-amp with dancing lights - useless features & burdensome to me.

but in truth, those were not strictly my concern - my real "worry" is that - in terms of the quality of the ripped product, which of these would give me the best output? or would they just produce the same output QUALITY? i know some of these have some kind of "corrections", but what do i care about them? or should i care?

i'm starting to enjoy ripping all my discs - redbooks, xrcds, sacds - because i can listen to my current ripped music continuously for a week and not even touching any buttons [except for volume & some occasional jump to other albums].

in simplicity: would there be a "better" ripper out there than can produce better quality outputs?
...

.e.

Going back to my original post quoted above, I have, for the past 4 months, settled down using ZUNE in my windows machine and the past 6 months using RHYTHMBOX in my Ubuntu machines.

I find the SQs in both machines very similar that I really cannot tell the difference from which ripper I did the original source from and the interesting thing is there is a difference between them: the windows machine uses USB2.0 while the ubuntu machine uses USB1.x, so I'm thinking that the USB speed does not matter , any thoughts here?

.e.

This is a little out of my experience, however, I believe it would depend on the bit depth and rate you are sending over the USB. At some point, data transfer speeds for higher bit depth and rate may be too much for USB 1.0 to handle. You would experience dropouts. If you are not, then I think that you are safe to proceed.

[carbondated]

I think it'll matter only if you're playing high-res music; anything at 44.1/16 or even 48/24 should be okay. But I remember USB 1 had problems with long cable runs.

[dimfer]

I am still learning the features of my updated/upgraded Nova Physics Memory Player, for the first time listened to some 32/96 high res files shared to me by Mark Porzilli, and it just dawned to me that digital can sound so analog. Even Mark will tell you that we are still away from zero jitter, but the new NPMP is getting it down to femtosecond territory, and boy oh boy it can sound so good ( I hope I don't come across as nagbubuhat ng bangko).

The new version of the software, called RUR-2 will re-read data up to 750 times until it gets the right bit order and bit count. other re-readers let's ecc attach the bad bits to the next good bits after 100 attempts to satisfy the bit count, therefore more jitter is introduced. Flac for example can scramble data as much as 83%, thus jitter is increased typically.

the cool thing, the new player is employing another software (I.D.E.A.S.) to create a perfect environment for playback, part of this software defragments and aligns the memory to flush out any non cd data error (source of jitter) on the memory itself to reduce jitter even further (claim is 10x lower than rubidium of digital clock like that of dCs and Esoteric). I have compared the sound using vs not using this software and I can tell the difference.

Mark Porzilli believes that claims that there is such a thing as inaudible level of jitter is totally false.

I used to be very impressed by the performance of my Modwright Transporter, high res files playback through the Memory Player is another level. I think this is the closest I had come to vinyl (and we're not talking entry level vinyl here).

(at bago pumutak ang inahin ng mga manok na walang bait, ako po ay tindero ng NPMP at nagsasaad lamang ng aking personal na karanasan at walang layunin na makabento dito sa WS)

[egay]

This must be nice, but this is just another hardware that is bound to fail soon and be obsolete in a matter of weeks (well, that's an exaggeration, I guess, but you get my point).

I believe it is safer to go with a computer music server and the main worry would only be your DAC. Computers are aplenty and cheap so the maintenance cost is smaller. And I mean a DEDICATED MUSIC SERVER... At least this is how I am approaching this music venue.

I am already tired of shelling good money for the likes of Wadia or McIntosh or Krell or for any high-named hardware that when they conk-out in 3-5 years, the parts are no longer available OR the parts cost an equivalent hardware, too! S - - T, I can use the money to buy more top-of-bunch software

.e.

[carbondated]

@SNZ More specifically, the creative genius of the *marketing* people at Nova Physics!

[dimfer]

You gotta love the creative genius of the folks at Nova Physics. One of the more recent gems to add to many others is I.D.E.A.S., which stands for Impulse Discharge of Events in Atemporal Space. The patent is even pending. Sounds something like T.A.R.DI.S., Doctor Who's travelling police box, referring to Time And Relative Dimension In Space. I think the Nova boys hired some of the writers from Doctor Who to help design this stuff. Virtual CDs and Virtual Time Travel. All science fiction.

that's it.. I am done in this forum. I don't think I can ever have an audio related discussion here at WS without out ever being cyber bullied and insulted by this fellow and I wonder why the administrators and moderators are continiously letting this happen, to the point of sanitizing his posts to make him look good again.. this comment has no technical merit and totally unrelated to the topic, just a plain INSULT.

see you at Facebook, at least there you can unfriend and block people you don't want to interact with.

[Oldfogey]

OK guys, stay cool and keep to the topic at hand. We can be civilized and agree to differ without disparaging others' preferences.

Dimfer, no "sanitation" going on here. Just some humble advice to fellow enthusiasts.

Squirrelnutzipper, we can do without the allusions to science fiction. I don't know a thing about ripping CD's, but keep it kewl,ok?

[dimfer]

OK guys, stay cool and keep to the topic at hand. We can be civilized and agree to differ without disparaging others' preferences.

Dimfer, no "sanitation" going on here.

there were

[JackD201]

The MP is a very interesting product not just because of what it does but WHEN they started doing it. Playback of music ripped from CDs became all the rage in Y2K and began it's decline in the early part of 2001. The significance of Napster is not the fact that quality wise, it could compete with CD but rather that it had modified consumer behavior. Why buy a CD when you could get the song online? Of course audiophiles came very late to this. We're talking lossy formats here and at the peak of Napster in 2001 dial-up was king people weren't trading .WAVs and AIFFs. Those that were into listening to files were using Winamp for MP3s. At this point in time the iPod had yet to hit the market but the Rio and HanGo existed but weren't exactly what one would call successful.

Fast forward a few years and iTunes had become the first successful mass market cross platform server application. The year was 2004. Even audiophiles had iPods and iTunes or comparable Music Server Apps to go with whatever device they had. Now a funny thing happened. People started noticing that music from drives ripped to WAV or AIFF sounded better through the same DAC. The culprit? It was postulated correctly that mechanical jitter from transport mechanisms and the requisite error correction was to blame.

Now I did say the year the server craze started in earnest was 2004. Coincidentally that was the year I said on this very forum that the future of Digital would be HI-Rez tracks purchased over the internet. HD Tracks launched four years in 2008 and remains a niche provider. Next year, iTunes is expected to begin the offering of HD material in a bid to boost sales of computers and portable devices with higher memory capacity effectively rendering older units obsolete. In any case the year was 2004.

The Memory Player following a parallel timeline was released as a finished product that same year using proprietary applications. This is decades in computer years before Sooloos and the like which only began demonstrations in 2007 and 2008. To slam it for having funky acronyms is simply shallow. To accuse the company of not being innovators, of being also rans, etc. Is being ignorant. This company was ripping to memory and playing them from there before many CDP makers even began using memory buffers. They were among the first to do away with error correction in the first place.

There was a snide remark here about the audibility of jitter. I find this funny because the notion that low jitter is nothing but a marketing ploy was popularized by some guy who eventually admits on an online debate with a programmer for microsoft (who helped develop .wma) that the results of his test carried statistical relevance that wouldn't have gotten past his high school teacher due to shoddy methodology by way of a makeshift DBT instead of a properly structured one. The fact is that jitter continues to be studied and methods to reduce it refined. The cumulative effects of jitter are both audible AND measurable.

For the record, I have absolutely nothing to do with MP. I do however have CDs ripped and burned from files using MP's proprietary programs. While I will not say that they are better or that the skies parted. They certainly are no worse.

As for me, I've become a creature of habit. I still play predominantly LPs. I still play CDs. I'm vacillating between USB and Firewire even as my iMac and DAC await patiently. That puts the MP totally out of my radar. Still I don't see why it or any of its owners should be slammed.

[rtsyrtsy]

I'm vacillating between USB and Firewire even as my iMac and DAC await patiently.

I don't mean to put you on the spot, JackD, but above statement is I think a good segue into getting this thread back on track.

What's the fundamental (read, layman's terms) difference between USB and Firewire that can affect jitter or other things that can affect digital playback?

I can understand for instance that due to clock synchronization issues on Toslink or coaxial, USB's asychronous approach can be a better alternative. I remember reading up on the differences between coaxial and BNC but can't remember the exact arguments to post here--the point is, what is different between USB and Firewire methods that can affect digital music playback?

[JackD201]

To be honest quality isn't quite the issue for me bro. Async USB is to me, audibly at par with Firewire if playback is all that's entailed. Golden ears may debate this but I'm no golden ear. It's more the availability of devices and what I ultimately want to do with the rig. Firewire's wider bandwidth gets me pro stuff if I ever want to play bedroom mastering engineer and use the better DJ toys because of less latency. I get hiccups on my Vestax USB interface so frustratingly never recorded a set. I've got an audiophilio in my shopping cart for playback but I can't get myself to press the button. The thought of the Weiss converter (Firewire to AES/EBU) or an I/O like Metric Halo keep on stopping me. I feel I will relent very shortly though.

In turn what's keeping me from diving headlong into Hi-Rez is still limited titles, my sorry a$$ download speeds, and the cost of Mac based players like Amarra. It's become a chicken and egg thing at the moment. Add to that that sites like HDTracks are still screening material after a debacle where labels were sending them SACDs that were made from non-hirez masters. Ouch. To make my own transfers of my SACDs I'd need a Pyramix or Sonoma to catch the stream from my EMM. These things are five figure stations in dollars. Ouch again. I still have faith in the future of Hi-Rez, I'm just not sure it's going to be soon.

On the CDs on my server side. I'm happy ripping with Toast Titanium to .AIFF. There is a huge lack of urgency because I have the CDs anyway and I really like my CDP. So the going is very slow.

To get the thread really back on track, IMO we have to go back to mechanical jitter as opposed to the data jitter. The thread after all is about which rippers are better. That means what do the best job of extracting and writing the new files. Only recently, it was found that power supply issues in DAC and output stages had effects on transports tracking properly hence more MJ. The transport has always been the bogeyman as MJ has always caused more problems for a DAC than transport to DAC interfaces with regards to SPDIF or AES. The problem with Toslink was not so much the interface but the quality of the optical cable which if bent.........Even this took a long time to be accepted. I couldn't fathom how transports could possibly have a sound when digits were digits until I learned that correct speed determined correct digits because the string is determined by the time taken to traverse the pits and lands. Very different from what one might expect that the lasers were reading actual 0s and 1s in perfect order.

Too little too late but now you'll find players with multiple lasers with as many independent power supplies. It doesn't make for copy as good as handsome bulky and impervious transports so this doesn't get much press. While convenience has always been the driving force behind every single format, doing away with a transport reading in real time was an unexpected bonus because we say bye bye to MJ and the focus goes to just Jitter and lets face it the players with good transports and those with standard transports aided by effective buffering cost as much as or more than computers.

TBC

[egay]

So Jack, you're saying that even with the technical merits of the MP, you're still not buying because you still believe your present setup provides what you need - did I get the gist right?

If I did, then that was what I was saying, too.

Whether a pieceof equipment is a breakthrough, an exceptional improvement of an existing technology, or simply a repackaging of an old idea, I still look at them as a piece of machine that will breakdown and add to the scraps I already have. I supposed I got this from getting frustrated with top$$ named-units such that if I can't see any life-changing benefit in any of them, then I'll just hold on to my hard-earned $$ and enjoy what I have.

It is good that you can discern the technical goobledegooks of equipment and that added dimension helps you make your decisions, too. But for mere mortals like me/us who simply depend on sonic value, appearance, and overall value (not just cost), our decision tree is lacking compared to yours and others who have the same capability as you.

So are these 'new' ideas or designs capable of changing our view (or hearing) of music?
I am guessing they won't.

And I am also guessing that unlike when the CD came and altered audiophile view, causing a mass migration into digital, new hardware professing 'better' reproduction is just another hardware.

Ok, I'm ripping a bunch of CDs now; so catch you all later

.e.

[carbondated]

Hello everyone,

I'm cutting and pasting this write-up by Andrew Rose on ripping vinyl that I stumbled across on this thread because I it's still ripping, after all, and I think you guys might be interested. Andrew Rose, as many of you probably know, is the man behind Pristine Classical, and probably knows more about remastering old vinyl than anyone else alive -- at least, to my ears, no one does it better. Enjoy!

Editorial - Transferring records to computer
How to get the very best results


I received an e-mail last week suggesting this topic, so I hope I'll be able to do it justice. I suspect much of what I'm about to write will be seen as common sense, but I know that what seems obvious to one person can be a new insight for someone else. I'll basically be running through how I do things here at Pristine and why, and I hope it'll be of some interest.

I'm going to start with the assumption that you already have the records you wish to transfer, be they LPs or 78s, and therefore the condition of them is predetermined.

To begin with I start with one of the most important yet easily dismissed procedures of all - cleaning the records. Over the years I experimented with all sorts of potions, products and techniques, the majority no better or worse than any other. What works consistently for me, and is without doubt worth every cent I've spent on it, is the range of Disc Doctor record cleaning products - their "Miracle Cleaner" and disc cleaning brushes. This really does have the ability to shift caked-on microscopic gunk from grooves of both LPs and 78s (and acetates) that nothing else I've ever tried can manage. Coupled with a vacuum cleaning machine your discs will never be cleaner and you've just saved yourself a huge amount of work and grief trying to clean this up after the event.

I've read a number of posts and e-mails in the past from people who've said "but it takes a long time" or "but it's too expensive" - well the time investment is about 1-2 minutes per side, and the cost is perhaps 5 cents a side. Not too much for the best possible results in my opinion! What's more, once this type of cleaning has been performed, thereafter you can generally rely on a carbon fibre brush to remove any light surface dust and won't need to repeat the wet-cleaning procedure again.

Now we move over to the record player. Again I'm going to assume your equipment is pretty well pre-defined. You have your turntable and some kind of pre-amplifier, either built into a main amplifier or separate. If you're playing 78s you may be aware of the different equalisation curves used by different record companies, something which also affects early LPs, and there are pre-amplifiers available which allow you to 'dial up' specific treble and bass equalisation curves. I've used a Graham Slee Jazz Club pre-amp for this purpose for a long time now - though the development of XR equalisation has pretty much rendered this unnecessary for me as I tend to try and fix all matters of EQ in one go after transfer.

What can make a difference though at this stage is the stylus. For 78rpm replay it really helps to have a cartridge which allows interchangable stylii, and with it a small selection of different profiles stylii. Changing the stylus width by the tiniest amount will allow it to ride a fraction higher or lower in the groove - potentially avoiding all sorts of issues, most usually excessive noise or swish. I few years ago I transferred some early UK Columbia sides for a Divine Art CD release which involved going incredibly low into the grooves in order to avoid persistent and overwhelming swishing. It took a number of goes to find the right stylus profile, but thankfully my suppliers at Expert Stylus in the UK were able to send a range to try with the understanding that I'd only pay for what I decided to keep - the rest went back at no extra charge.

The same is true, to a lesser extent, for vinyl - especially if you're wanting to transfer mono LPs. The grooves of the majority of 1950s LPs - and some mono releases later than this - were quite a bit wider than the stereo LPs which arrived in 1958. Thus a regular stereo stylus, some 30% narrower than its mono equivalent, may pick up a considerable amount of noise and muck in a mono groove. I'm lucky to have a turntable where two tonearms allow two different stylus profiles, one for mono and one for stereo, but if you don't have this facility and plan a lot of mono transfers, it would be worth investigating a special cartridge or stylus for this work and carrying it out all in one go before switching back to a conventional stereo stylus. Again, Expert Stylus are very helpful in this regard. They don't have a website, but you'll find contact details here.

By this stage you should have actually done a huge amount of the work - you have discs as clean as they can possibly be, such that their only shortcomings are down to the quality of the original pressings and the amount of wear they've suffered. You have the best replay stylus which is, of course, spotlessly clean (I bought a cheap handheld microscope a while ago which allows me to examine the tip of my stylus - a fascinating lesson in dust and dirt!).

There's just one last thing to check - is the disc you intend to transfer properly centred? An enormous number of records, especially but most certainly not exclusively in the 78rpm era, have off-centre spindle holes. This leads to your tonearm moving slightly from side to side during playback, and the pitch of the recording varying up and down with it. A lot of discs have a small degree of movement available from the centre hole, and it may be possible simply to adjust the placing of the record slightly on the turntable to prevent any tonearm swinging. If not, my solution involves the use of a small circular metal file with which I can file away a little of the vinyl or shellac from the side of the centre hole in the direction the disc needs to move. It's a tricky business of trial and error, but once it's done and you're ready to go you know you won't spend the next few years regretting you skipped this bit as you hear the warbling pitch of your otherwise lovely transfers.

Now you're ready to go. If you've not done so already you'll need to connect your turntable's output, via a suitable pre-amp, to your computer's sound card. How precisely you do this will depend on the sound card you have - ultimately you want to achieve a good input level which never, ever gets anywhere near overloading. If you have a variety of sources - records, tapes, cassettes - it may be worth investing in small inexpensive mixer from a company like Behringer which will allow you to control your sound levels precisely before they reach your sound card - depending on your amplifier set up this may also prevent a lot of regular replugging of cables, something I generally try to avoid.

You're now at the point where you start transferring music to your computer. For many years now I've used Adobe Audition (and its predecessor, Cool Edit Pro) for this job - it's an excellent editor and recording tool, but there are a lot of alternatives, many of which are a lot less expensive. As far as the job of recording is concerned, none is likely to be any better or worse than another, so use software which suits you and your wallet. The job of analogue to digital conversion is being done by your sound card and not your software, so if you want improvements at this stage in the process it's the hardware you need to consider, and again that's a potentially vast subject I'll avoid for the present article.

What I do think is important if you're going to do any declicking or otherwise clean up your transfers is to use high bit depths for all transfer and restoration work. A 16-bit transfer is fine if it's going straight to CD, but if you then start working on it using digital processing at 16 bits, every time you do anything to it you incur arithmetic rounding errors, effectively dropping the bit depth down. Your lovely transfer may end up being effectively a 12-bit recording as a result!

That's why I work using Adobe Auditions 32-bit floating point audio resolution, which consigns any numeric rounding errors to a volume level thousands of decibels below what will ever be heard or reproduced.

For many years I used Adobe Audition's built in declicker for all my record transfers, but more recently I've moved to a newer product, Izotope RX, which also handles hum removal, decrackling, noise reduction and hands on editing. It's a brilliant, powerful tool and I've heard no better, but it's not cheap - though far from the most expensive option out there. What you look for in a declicker is one which can excise as many clicks as possible without doing any damage to the music or leaving behind any residues or artefacts. This has proved surprisingly difficult to achieve, but other solutions are out there and you may find something which suits your needs for a lot less than you'll pay for RX.

I'm going to assume you're not going to go the full XR-remastering hog - there's perhaps a book to be written on that - and that because you look after your record collection you now have a lovely, declicked recording, ready to save and possibly transfer to CD.

I save my masters at 32-bit resolution, or as 24-bit FLACs for archiving. The difference between the two is really down to the different file formats at this level - no audio hardware will ever be capable of resolving the differences between the two. If I'm going to produce a CD I'll use a dither routine wihle reducing the bit depth, leaving a 16-bit file which for the purposes of human listening has properties closer to that of an 18-20 bit recording. The concept of dithering, what it does and why is once again beyond the scope of this article, but it's established practise and very well documented elsewhere.

Rather than splitting my finished WAV files into individual tracks I tend to keep them as complete albums, and work with a cue sheet just as we do with our MP3 files. I use Audition to add cue markers at the beginning of each track, then give each marker a title which matches that of the track. Cue List Tool is a handy little application for dealing with cue sheets and associating them with audio files. If your finished audio file is a 16-bit one you'll be able to burn it directly to CD using Nero or Roxio (or other CD writing software) using the cue sheet; if you wish to split your transfer into individual tracks on your computer you can do so either within Audition or using a cue splitter.

In conclusion, the most important part of the whole business here is to produce the very best possible replay of your record, and most of this happens long before you carry out the transfer. Having a spotless record, properly centred and being replayed on high quality equipment the sound of which pleases you is 90% of the work done. any half-way decent sound card will do an adequate transfer job, and if your vinyl is immaculate you'll not need too much declicking.

[JackD201]

So Jack, you're saying that even with the technical merits of the MP, you're still not buying because you still believe your present setup provides what you need - did I get the gist right?

If I did, then that was what I was saying, too.

Whether a pieceof equipment is a breakthrough, an exceptional improvement of an existing technology, or simply a repackaging of an old idea, I still look at them as a piece of machine that will breakdown and add to the scraps I already have. I supposed I got this from getting frustrated with top$$ named-units such that if I can't see any life-changing benefit in any of them, then I'll just hold on to my hard-earned $$ and enjoy what I have.

It is good that you can discern the technical goobledegooks of equipment and that added dimension helps you make your decisions, too. But for mere mortals like me/us who simply depend on sonic value, appearance, and overall value (not just cost), our decision tree is lacking compared to yours and others who have the same capability as you.

So are these 'new' ideas or designs capable of changing our view (or hearing) of music?
I am guessing they won't.

And I am also guessing that unlike when the CD came and altered audiophile view, causing a mass migration into digital, new hardware professing 'better' reproduction is just another hardware.

Ok, I'm ripping a bunch of CDs now; so catch you all later

.e.

In a nutshell, yes Egay. I'm satisfied with what I have CD wise and there are other reasons too. While I appreciate what you call "gobbledegook" or what I call architecture, it actually makes up a small part of the decision process. Like you and almost everybody else the tree is more like a shrub. Do I like how it sounds? If yes, can I afford it? If yes, is it reliable? This is a tricky one because everything breaks down sooner or later so we go to, Is the manufacturer known for good support and will the dealer take care of me now that he's got my money.

Hi-Res wise, while I am 24/96 capable, the catalog is still small. A look behind the scenes will show that the HiRez files for sale are transfers from mainly SACDs, a smattering of DVD-A, a smaller smattering of Tape and smallest of all DXD. Here are the major curveballs. You still can't rip an SACD's DSD layer. Beyond the DXD, chances are you'll be able to find...gasp...a vinyl counterpart of an SACD or DVD-A title. You and I are both LP addicts so beyond convenience, I'm sure you know which format I will pick.

Not everything new is better. The proof is in the pudding. Even when differences are obvious, as a good friend in another forum likes to say, different isn't always better. I think we've all come across pieces of equipment or entire systems before that have, even in isolated areas, pushed past our preconceived notions of what we thought were possible. Two areas that are noteworthy are relative scale and resolution, the latter via the reduction of masking and intrusive distortions that those of us who are serious with LPs and have been with digital from its commercially successful but aurally shaky beginnings have experienced. In the end however, the cumulative portrayal and not the "why" rules. When anybody reaches a certain point of enjoyment, I believe there is a corresponding point beyond which the individual will not willingly regress past when it comes to his main system. So, rare as it may be, new technology not only can change our views of music, historically it has. It's more a question of degrees.

As someone who makes a living evaluating risk, you more than probably anybody else here, knows that every solution comes with its own and sometimes unique problems. Like you, I've had my share of transport problems. I know I will face transport problems for as long as I have transports. Doing away with it however doesn't mean I can't be rendered unplayable. A busted drive or even a virus could wipe out my drive which has about 70G worth of AACs so I back up. Why AAC? I have the CDs and need the exercise and my CDP sounds better than my server.

[Oldfogey]

I know I will face transport problems for as long as I have transports.

Ah, huwag naman sana, Jack Transports are getting few and far between! I do hope that CEC stays in business

[JackD201]

You and me, both OF. Hopefully by the time they give way we can have migrated already. My trusty ol' Theta is 15 years old now and has never needed servicing. If your CEC and my main transport is half as hardy we should be ok

[egay]

"A matter of degree" JackD

I agree with this.
And I agree that there comes a point when incremental improvements just no longer matter as they do not have the capability to shake our established "current norms" in measuring our musical enjoyment. In other words, the proverbial upgrade path becomes a matter of vanity/want rather than a need.

At the moment, my ripping needs do not require any exotic equipment or such specialized software that Zune is simply enough. But unlike you, I can't get myself to try AAC because it's a lot of added work which I don't see getting any added benefit at the moment.

My CDP gets more playing time lately vs my analog setup because of convinience; well, it is a toss-up with my server actually, although in the past few weeks I get to play a lot with my CDP, getting some SACDs in there once in a while (although I've stopped purchasing SACDs momentarily).

Music is going digital.

And tomorrow, cheaper Hi-rez will be arriving and perhaps there will be reasons to look; meantime, simple is my game plan and I am happy.

10 CDs + 10 SACDs ready for ripping here.

ciao!

.e.