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[Sauzee]

I've been doing a lot of CD ripping today, comparing MC with EAC, CDex and Nero.

Thought you guys might be interested in the results.

One CD, in particular one track,  was causing me problems as it was pretty badly scratched.  So I compared how various rippers coped with it and found MC produced the best results.

This track when played at 1x speed on all my players skipped like mad.

For MC I used secure mode, maximum speed and got a ripped wav that had one audible skip on it.  The ripping log highlighted lots of  problems and showed me where the problems were.  Only one of the problem areas resulted in audible imperfections.

Cdex using full paranoia mode was worse than useless.  The ripping status details said the ripped track was 100% OK but it had loads of skips.

EAC using secure mode with C2 errors and cache diasabled took forever. It was taking more than a minute per second to rip using the lowest error correction quality setting.  Estimated time for ripping the track was 9 hours - so I abandoned it.

Nero using jitter correction obviously ripped without error correction as it didn't take long and the results were poor.

EAC and MC using burst mode both produced poor results.

So whilst it didn't manage to provide a perfect rip, MC in secure mode produced by far the best rip and the wav played far better than the actual CD it came from.  The log file was very useful so I'll be doing all my rips in secure mode from now on.  Even if the CD is in perfect condition, it provides some re-assurance that the rip is good without listening to the whole rip.

Perhaps EAC would have produced similar results to MC if I had let it continue, but who wants to wait hours to rip 1 track?  Don't think that can do the CD drive much good either.  I didn't time MC for the badly damaged track but I reckon it took about 5 minutes.

So in my humble opinion I reckon MC in secure mode is the best at ripping from CD's in poor condition.  Until I carried out this wee test I always used EAC as my main ripper - no more!

[JimH]

You're going to make JohnT _very_ happy.  Thanks for the nice report.

[Matt]

Thanks Sauzee!

By design, Media Center's secure ripping engine should be more secure and less hardware dependent than any other secure ripper I'm aware of.

Kudos to JohnT for all his amazing work in this area.

[Sauzee]

My compliments to JohnT as well.   I didn't know who was responsible for the ripping part of MC.

I've seen quite a few comments from folks worrying about whether MC was as good as EAC at ripping.  Well it looks like its better.

[JimH]

My compliments to JohnT as well.   I didn't know who was responsible for the ripping part of MC.

I've seen quite a few comments from folks worrying about whether MC was as good as EAC at ripping.  Well it looks like its better.

Want to try telling them that at Hydrogenaudio?  Flame retardant advised.  

[Cmagic]

Thanks for the report Sauzee,

I was in fact wondering wether MC's secure mode was better than EAC, but since all my CDs are in perfect shape I could not tell myself !

seems like it is !

thanks

C.

[phelt]

<sarcasm>
No yuo!! Never can something with a GUI be better than my open-source command-line util! NevAr!!
</sarcasm>

Seriously, I stopped using EAC for anything but some special ripping circumstances. I didn't do a comprehensive test, but did some difference compares in Sound Forge, and came up with the same impression: MC's ripper kicks *ss. Nice job.

[Sauzee]

My compliments to JohnT as well.   I didn't know who was responsible for the ripping part of MC.

I've seen quite a few comments from folks worrying about whether MC was as good as EAC at ripping.  Well it looks like its better.

Want to try telling them that at Hydrogenaudio?  Flame retardant advised.  

You bet.  I thought about posting my results to the Hydrogen, CDex and EAC forums which I follow, but I'm not sure.... ?

What I know for sure is that CDex ripping reports can't be relied on and that EAC takes forever.  

In case anyone wants to know my system details I attach them.  My ripping drive is a rebranded Lite-On which caches audio.  

Media Center Registered 9.1.273 -- C:\Program Files\J River\Media Center\

Microsoft Windows XP  Workstation 5.1 Service Pack 1 (Build 2600)
AMD Athlon 1403 MHz MMX / Memory: Total - 785 MB, Free - 447 MB

Internet Explorer: 6.0.2800.1106 / ComCtl32.dll: 5.82 (xpsp1.020828-1920) / Shlwapi.dll: 6.00.2800.1226 / Shell32.dll: 6.00.2800.1233 (xpsp2.030604-1804) / wnaspi32.dll: 4.71 (0002) , ASPI for Win32         DLL, Copyright © 1989-2002 Adaptec, Inc. / Aspi32.sys: 4.71 (0002)

Ripping /   Drive E:   Copy mode:ModeSecure   CD Type:Auto   Read speed:Max
  Drive F:   Copy mode:ModeSecure   CD Type:Auto   Read speed:Max
  Drive G:   Copy mode:ModeBurstBigBuffer   CD Type:Auto   Read speed:Max
  Digital playback: Yes /  Use YADB: No /  Get cover art: Yes /  Calc replay gain: Yes /  Copy volume: 32767
  Eject after ripping: Yes /  Play sound after ripping: No  

Burning /  Drive E: CD-RW    CDR-6S48           Addr: 1:0:0  Speed:12  MaxSpeed:48  BurnProof:Yes
  Test mode: No /  Eject after writing: Yes /  Direct decoding: Yes /  Write CD-Text: Yes
  Use playback settings: No /  Normalization: None

[rocketsauce]

I wouldn't post at HA unless you're really prepared to defend why/how your testing methodology is valid.

Rob

[KingSparta]

I wouldn't post at HA unless you're really prepared to defend why/how your testing methodology is valid.

Rob

And Have Shields at Full Power with Warp Drive Engines On Standby.

[Sauzee]

I wouldn't post at HA unless you're really prepared to defend why/how your testing methodology is valid.

Rob

Well it's real simple.  I wasn't trying to examine the minor detail of whether one lame codec version is better than the other [with superhuman ears].  I follow those debates with interest but have never been able, in blind testing, to detect a difference.

What I did earlier today, well yesterday now, was rip a scratched CD and the results were very clear.

If anyone can point out how EAC is better than MC I'd be glad to hear it [as I want the best quality rips from my CD'ds].

[Sauzee]

I wouldn't post at HA unless you're really prepared to defend why/how your testing methodology is valid.

Rob

Could you post on my behalf then

I can't see what could be wrong about my methodology.  Perhaps you woudn't get the same results with every drive, but my feeling is that if your drive caches audio, MC is better. If it doesn't cache audio,  I don't know.

PS.  EAC does a bizarre thing in recommending the poorest drive  I have for audio extraction ripping[because it doen't cache audio].  So EAC advocates are saying that EAC works better with the poorest drive for digital audio extataction, purely because it doesn't cache audio?

Come on JohnT, let us know your opinions on why MC is so good, to convince the doubters:D

[rocketsauce]

I can't see what could be wrong about my methodology.

Me neither. BTW, I wasn't trying to say whether your test was bad or good , I was just kind of offering an opinion on what sort of response you might expect if you posted at HA.

Could you post on my behalf then

I'm not really the person for that. My knowledge of the technical aspects of the whole DAE process is limited, at best.

Rob

[JeffB]

I can back up Sauzee's findings.  I have a CD with one GOOD track and haven't been able to listen to it for a couple years (almost since it has been released).  EAC couldn't rip it without errors no matter what I tried (also took and ungodly amount of time) and earlier versions of MJ's ripper couldn't either.  But, two weeks ago I tried ripping it with MC in Digital Secure and there is only two small skips in one track.  I was shocked.

Here is one of the songs from that CD:

Listening to: on Media Center 9.1

[kiwi]

I can't see what could be wrong about my methodology.  

I think that people would complain that you were performing your tests with an "N" of 1.  And that the controls in the experiment were not properly setup.

I'm downloading the program from this page and will give it a try:
http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/eac13.html

For the test, insert the CD in the drive to test, and extract the track to a file at the same position as the reference file. It is important to use a buffered burst mode for the test (for example, the burst more in EAC is buffered). Burst mode is important because the error handling qualities of the drive should be rated, not the ones of the software. Changing the extraction speed might change the result completly, so it may be a good idea to set the drive speed to different (or directly to the slowest) speeds. If EAC does not support the drive speed of the drive to test, you can try if CD-Bremse (only available in german) or a similar tool can set the speed of your drive.

Then I guess that I'll probably perform the rips in both burst mode and in secure mode to see whether or not there are differences.  And to see whether ir makes a difference in either of my two drives.

kiwi

[Sauzee]

My friend, I want to know you're results.

It is a real pain using an external app to rip a CD.  I'm a wee bit anal about these things.  

I want to believe that MC is the best ripper. It provides me with the "security" I used get to from EAC without the long wait

If I'm doing something wrong, let me know,  I said before
 that this is the best.  If  EAC is better, plesae give an exampe.

What is for sure is that CDex isn't worth a donkey - shame - it was my intro to ripping.

[Sauzee]

I can't see what could be wrong about my methodology.  

I think that people would complain that you were performing your tests with an "N" of 1.  And that the controls in the experiment were not properly setup.

I'm downloading the program from this page and will give it a try:
http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/eac13.html

Kiwi my darling

I am telling you that if you have a damaged CD go with MC.  IF it is a good CD i'm guessing it doesn't matter a toss what you use to rip it, but EAC or MC, at least will give you some re-assurance that your rip is OK.  But you might have to wait a long time for EAC to finish....... So on balance MC seems the best ripper to me.

For the test, insert the CD in the drive to test, and extract the track to a file at the same position as the reference file. It is important to use a buffered burst mode for the test (for example, the burst more in EAC is buffered). Burst mode is important because the error handling qualities of the drive should be rated, not the ones of the software. Changing the extraction speed might change the result completly, so it may be a good idea to set the drive speed to different (or directly to the slowest) speeds. If EAC does not support the drive speed of the drive to test, you can try if CD-Bremse (only available in german) or a similar tool can set the speed of your drive.

Then I guess that I'll probably perform the rips in both burst mode and in secure mode to see whether or not there are differences.  And to see whether ir makes a difference in either of my two drives.

kiwi

[kiwi]

Kiwi my darling

I am telling you that if you have a damaged CD go with MC.  IF it is a good CD i'm guessing it doesn't matter a toss what you use to rip it, but EAC or MC, at least will give you some re-assurance that your rip is OK.  But you might have to wait a long time for EAC to finish....... So on balance MC seems the best ripper to me.

However, if MC isn't ripping the data as accurately, even if it takes less time, then I might still end up going with EAC.  (I also don't mind reripping single songs, if they are handled poorly in one or the other.  As long as I know that they are a problem.)  I know that EAC has some options that let you skip songs if they take "X" times longer than their length.  Also, You can have EAC let the drives cool down for X minutes every N minutes of ripping.


I've downloaded the DAE test program and am going through the setup procedures now.  

kiwi

[shAf]

I wouldn't post at HA unless you're really prepared to defend why/how your testing methodology is valid.

You could preface your HA post with "Practically speaking, ..."

I had similar results with an old double CD Buddy Guy album.  Since I rip with MC using Lame and 'custom' settings, I figured I'd save some time, and rip CD1 on one computer with MC9.1, and rip CD2 with EAC on another computer.  EAC simply hung on one track ... although it implied it was making progress.  After MC had  finished with CD1, I aborted EAC, and ripped CD2 with MC.  MC took very little time, reported 95% for the bad track, and when the problem occured ... but I couldn't detect the problem.

Good job MC!

[kiwi]

I'm still creating the DAE Reference file.  I started it in the evening and it's just at 82% now... with 3 more hours to go (on a P4 2.4GHz).  i hope it all works (or doesn't work appropriately).

kiwi

[nameless]

<sarcasm>
No yuo!! Never can something with a GUI be better than my open-source command-line util! NevAr!!
</sarcasm>

EAC isn't a command line application, nor (as far as I know or can tell) open source.

[Ce.D]

Well, as for damaged CD: I had one that was COMPLETELY unreadable (a friend's portable CD player managed to scratch the disc with its reading lens, ALL around the disc...). Even MC Secure mode couldn't get pass it.

My half-a-penny trick:

Since I had nothing to lose, I tried to polish my CD to get rid of the scratch, using a 'general polish for kitchen's chrome sinks' !!! (I had tried with tooth-paste, but it was not "strong" enough). It took me 10 pass (each pass getting the ripping better in Secure mode) until I was able to COMPLETELY RECOVER the CD, even for my home player ! I recovered 3 others completely unreadable CDs since then, using the same method.

Tip: start polishing "hard" (get rid of the main scratch) then finish "soft" (get rid of "barely visible" "hard"-polishing-induced scratches).

Note: polishing the CD this way leaves the CD with "almost invisible" scratches all over the surface. So far, CD players don't care. Better this than an unreadable CD. Also better do this only when nothing to lose.

BEWARE: CD's surface "hardness" varies. Be warry of the polish you use. Avoid polish that have a "grainy" kind-of-feeling (like some tooth-pastes).

BEWARE: I tried with a damaged DVD and completely screwed it up! DVDs seem MUCH MORE sensible to "almost invisible" scratches than CDs (since even finger prints bother them, no wonder).

I know this really sounds like some "do-it-yourself-and-maybe-screw-it-up-all" stuff but when one really wants to try everything to salvage a CD before throwing it away, it might actually work.

:-)

[kiwi]

BEWARE: I tried with a damaged DVD and completely screwed it up! DVDs seem MUCH MORE sensible to "almost invisible" scratches than CDs (since even finger prints bother them, no wonder).

This isn't that surprizing, as there is considerably more data in the same physical space as a CD, the data has to be paced more densely.

You might also try using a grittier abrasive for the first go, and then slowly move to finer and finer abrasives.  I've had a friend say that he has used diamond polish to "refinish" CDs and DVDs w/o a problem.

As for the DAE tests, I have created the CD and am not trying to locate the appropriate tape, black marker, and knife to render the disk damaged.  Hopefully tomorrow night I can start running some tests.

kiwi

[JohnT]

Thanks for the great feedback everyone. Let us know how your tests turn out Kiwi.
Version 10 should be right on "cue" with some new features.

Happy ripping  
John T.

[xen-uno]

Sauzee > So EAC advocates are saying that EAC works better with the poorest drive for digital audio extataction, purely because it doesn't cache audio?

If they are saying this, it is for the simple reason that the data from the second pass is guaranteed to come off the disk, and not from the cache...which is a good thing. If EAC detects that the drive caches (or it doesn't, and you know it does), then the "Drive caches audio data" must be checked for an accurate comparison to be made between the 1st, 2nd and any subsequent read. Not to repeat myself, but EAC can rip many tracks into one and is vastly more flexible when it comes to external encoder options. In my world, EAC & MC are complementary.

10^-27

[Matt]

So EAC advocates are saying that EAC works better with the poorest drive for digital audio extataction, purely because it doesn't cache audio?

MC is always caching-drive safe because of how it is designed.  In this respect, it is as good or better than EAC.

[bvm]

EAC can rip many tracks into one and is vastly more flexible when it comes to external encoder options.

I've seen several references to this ability of EAC to rip several tracks into one file, but when running EAC, I don't see where this option is.  How do you do it?

This is one of my big wishes for MC's ripper (somehow be able to tell it which tracks I want to cluster into one mp3 file) -- if it did that, I wouldn't need to muck about with external programs to join mp3's.

[nila]

Thanks for the great feedback everyone. Let us know how your tests turn out Kiwi.
Version 10 should be right on "cue" with some new features.

Happy ripping  
John T.

BVM - Notice how the word 'cue' is emphasized - I have a VERY strong feeling that v10 is going to allow you to use this feature.

Hopefully in the same way that helium2 does where the cd can be ripped as one track but then treated as seperate tracks!

[kiwi]

Thanks for the great feedback everyone. Let us know how your tests turn out Kiwi.

It's been a fairly slow process so far.  I'm just collecting the data now.  Following the procedures I created the test CD and have attempted to rip it.  I started out first with the "Secure" mode on both MC and  EAC, but after 5 hours on MC (with it making no progress for 4 of them) and 8 hours on EAC, I gave up on the test.  {Note, I was much happier leaving EAC running since it has a feature that will note use the drive for N minutes every X minutes.}

I am now performing the tests in their "error correction" on setting, but not secure.  EAC didn't have a problem with this.  MC is currently running.

I will then perform the same tests with just the Digital Large Buffer on each.

Once these tests are performed, I will remove the black mark that is part of the tests and see whether or not MC or EAC can handle just the scratches that are in the disk, as they should have "damaged" a far smaller portion of the disk.  I will post all of the information, including log info when I finish the test.

Depending on time, I will also perform any of the tests that are different on my DVD drive to see whether or not the drives have an effect.  I may also try slowing down the read speed; as in the results section of the above link, decreasing the speed on some drives allowed their error correction to be far better.  On that note, EAC says that it will automatically slowdown to reread data in secure mode.  I don't know whether MC does this, but it would seem to be a logical thing to do.

Version 10 should be right on "cue" with some new features.

Yeah, an "Advanced Advanced" set of settings would probably fix any of the complaints that people have between EAC and MC.  Hopefully the tests above will complete and will give me at least some ideas on MC vs. EAC when ripping a cd with errors.

I was thinking about trying a similar test and using sand paper to scratch up a known area of the disk and see how both rippers handle that.

That said, (again) from looking at the results in the above link, there is quite a bit of variance between drives and that may or may not have more of an effect on one's ripping output.

A features that I can think of are (or have seen mentioned and think are good):

• Having a cool down time for the CD Drive.
• Having a max time for any track (maybe in multiples of the track time)
• At the very least, having multiple settings for different drives, at best, being able to rip from two devices at the same time. (right now, it appears that you can queue up rips on different drives, but that they run sequentially. You may do some of all of this already.)
• Creating Cue sheets for recreating CD w/ exact timing
• Offset Correction (if it's an issue.  I don't know how much of an issue it is, but would love it if someone could comment one way or the other, or more likely, probably both ways...)

I guess that some questions that I have w/ regard to ripping with MC are how it deals with C2 Error Information?  How are offset differences dealt with?  I guess that knowing a bit more about the secure ripping process would give me more cofidence in it.  And/or imperical tests that show that data ripped from MC is as good or better than EAC (or any other ripper out there.)

If my tests work, I'll happily try to explain the whole testing procedure so that others can perform the test as well.  Then we might be able to get some more data to make informed decisions with.

I've seen several references to this ability of EAC to rip several tracks into one file, but when running EAC, I don't see where this option is.  How do you do it?

I've never done this, but I imagine that if you select the tracks that you want and then play around with the different actions available in the action menu "Copy Selected Tracks", "Copy Range", "Copy Image and Create Cue Sheet" and "Copy Selected Tracks, index based".  I don't know what they all do, but there are lots of options.  The other thing you could do is rip the CD as one track and then split it up as you want, as opposed to trying to join afterwards.  (it might also be easier to rip to wav, join the wav files and then convert to MP3.

MC is always caching-drive safe because of how it is designed.  In this respect, it is as good or better than EAC.

 This is the sort of information that helps give confidence to the ripping capablilities.  

I don't want you guys to expose any secrets/tricks that you use, that could give competitors advantages, but where ever possible, it would be great to have information and/or tests to help determine ripping quality.

THanks, sorry about the long post.

kiwi

[kiwi]

Does anyone know whether I can rip only a portion of a track with either EAC or MC?  I'd like to try ripping just sections around errors to speed up the process a bit.

kiwi

[Sauzee]

Also, I'm confused as to why you had the "Drive caches audio data" setting disabled in EAC (per your first post), since your drive does cache audio data.

I didn't.  I had the drive cache disabled ie. the setting to disable the cache in EAC was enabled.

I take your point, and others, that EAC is more flexible, offers more options etc for ripping.

But does it produce better rips?  I'm not convinced.  Interestingly, I saw a fascinating post on Hydrodgen comparing EAC and CDex which was done far more scientifically than mine.

Unfortunately I can't find the link.  Its conclusion was that EAC was superior to CDex because it reported ripping problems better but, it ultimately concluded, that there were the same number of audible imperfections with both applications' rips.

[JohnT]

I guess that some questions that I have w/ regard to ripping with MC are how it deals with C2 Error Information?  How are offset differences dealt with?  I guess that knowing a bit more about the secure ripping process would give me more cofidence in it.

MC doesn't do anything with C2 error information, since it's not always reliable on many drive/firmware combinations. There is no offset calibration in MC, it seems a little extreme to worry about less than 1/100 second at the beginning or end of a track, but this is something that could possibly be added to the next version of the program.

IMHO I think MC's handling of caching drives is better than the competition. In EAC, you have to manually run a test on each drive to see if it caches and the test is quite lengthy and in my testing it didn't seem to always correctly calculate the existence and the correct size of the drive's cache (I could be wrong though). MC automatically tests for cache existence/size the first time it tries to rip from a new drive and the test is quite short and painless (and accurate I think).

[nameless]

I'm not convinced either, Sauzee.  My only point was that we can't derive a conclusion from such a limited test.

I really appreciate the info provided by Matt and JohnT in this thread.  I am going to dump EAC and stick with MC from now on.  Worrying about offsets is pretty ridiculous, methinks.

In the "I'm a moron" category, I will mention that while I always had the "Drive caches audio data" option enabled in EAC, I don't think I ever used the "Detect read features" function it has--so I have no idea what, if any, effect the "Drive caches audio data" setting had.  And I ripped about 200 CDs that way!

Edit: Come to think of it, I remember that EAC reported errors on a great many tracks.  I had to re-rip a couple as well.  So it must have not been re-reading the cache.

[xen-uno]

bvm > I've seen several references to this ability of EAC to rip several tracks into one file, but when running EAC, I don't see where this option is.  How do you do it?

kiwi > Does anyone know whether I can rip only a portion of a track with either EAC or MC?  I'd like to try ripping just sections around errors to speed up the process a bit

Multiple tracks or a section of a track are handled the same way...see EAC>Action>Copy Range. Just drag the Start Position / End Position sliders around to suit. To have it start or end at a particular track, push the Snap Track button


nameless > so I have no idea what, if any, effect the "Drive caches audio data" setting had

If the drive caches audio and you didn't have the DCAD box checked, then you did not rip in secure mode, because the 2nd read more than likely came from the cache...not the disk. You may as well have done burst mode rips, which is not the real intent of EAC (though it will do them as well as any other ripper).

10^-27

[nameless]

I had DCAD selected, but I hadn't used the EAC feature to "Detect read features".  So, maybe EAC used some default cache size setting, or maybe it used a default cache size of zero--I don't know.  Oh well.  All my tracks sound perfect, so what do I care?

[nameless]

Also, I'm confused as to why you had the "Drive caches audio data" setting disabled in EAC (per your first post), since your drive does cache audio data.

I didn't.  I had the drive cache disabled ie. the setting to disable the cache in EAC was enabled.

I'm confused then.  In EAC, did you use "Secure mode with the following drive features (recommended)", or did you use "Paranoid mode (not recommended)"?  I ask because if "the setting to disable the cache" was enabled, that very strongly implies that "Paranoid mode" was used.  (Because, had you used "Secure mode...", there is no option to "disable the drive cache", only an option that tells EAC that the drive caches audio data.)  Then again, you did mention the C2 option, which is not available in "Paranoid mode"...

But if did use "Paranoid mode", which isn't recommended by the EAC author, that may explain what happened...

[kiwi]

Well, testing progress so far.  MC won't complete the rip in Error Correction mode.  It just stops with no message left on the screen saying why it stopped or where it stopped.

I'm going to try ripping it one more time with my DVD drive, then I'm going to remove my permanent marker mark on the bottom of the disk and see if that helps things out.

So far, I've been able to rip with large digital buffer with both EAC and MC, EAC was able to rip in its burst and syncronized modes. Neither seemed able to complete the rip in their respective "secure" modes.

Trying the DVD drive now.  Then I'll erase the mark and try again.

kiwi

[kiwi]

MC doesn't do anything with C2 error information, since it's not always reliable on many drive/firmware combinations.

Cool.  Again, just the information that I wanted to hear.

There is no offset calibration in MC, it seems a little extreme to worry about less than 1/100 second at the beginning or end of a track, but this is something that could possibly be added to the next version of the program.

Didn't know that the differences were so small.  I guess an offset of a few hunder samples, when you're reading 44,000 samples per second doesn't make much of a difference.   I've never really worried about it, it is something that I've thought about calibrating at times.  

btw, for some more esoteric(sp) features, I know that I wouldn't mind editing/creating config files.  I guess that one of the benefits of MC is that it has a wonderful interface and you want to use that, but for some of these features/functions, it might be better to have a more hidden way of controlling them... so that you don't have every person messing with settings that could cause bigger problems.

IMHO I think MC's handling of caching drives is better than the competition. In EAC, you have to manually run a test on each drive to see if it caches and the test is quite lengthy and in my testing it didn't seem to always correctly calculate the existence and the correct size of the drive's cache (I could be wrong though). MC automatically tests for cache existence/size the first time it tries to rip from a new drive and the test is quite short and painless (and accurate I think).

Yeah.  I don't know exactly how they both work, but MC definitely wins out with cache testing/handling.  I haven't had problems with EAC miss testing the cache of my drives.

Thanks for all the input.

kiwi

[Sauzee]

I'm confused then.  In EAC, did you use "Secure mode with the following drive features (recommended)", or did you use "Paranoid mode (not recommended)"?  I ask because if "the setting to disable the cache" was enabled, that very strongly implies that "Paranoid mode" was used.  (Because, had you used "Secure mode...", there is no option to "disable the drive cache", only an option that tells EAC that the drive caches audio data.)  Then again, you did mention the C2 option, which is not available in "Paranoid mode"...

But if did use "Paranoid mode", which isn't recommended by the EAC author, that may explain what happened...

Sorry nameless - I see how I have confused you.  When I said I had disabled the drive cache in EAC, I had.  And I WAS in secure mode.  I ticked drive caches audio data, which has the effect of disabling the cache.

I know this because if you tick drive caches audio data the log reports that cache is disabled.

Have I convinced you yet that I used the correct settings

[kiwi]

Does anyone know why the ripper would just stop mid way through the rip?  No errors, nothing?  This time it at least left a partial file, but most of the time it didn't do that.  And the partial file won't play in any player.

Thanks,
kiwi

[JohnT]

Does anyone know why the ripper would just stop mid way through the rip?  No errors, nothing?  This time it at least left a partial file, but most of the time it didn't do that.  And the partial file won't play in any player.

Thanks,
kiwi

So you were using the mode in MC called "Digital Error Correcting" when it simply hung in the middle of a rip? You weren't using "Digital Secure Mode"? If that's the case, I'll do some testing with my test "bad" CD that's extremely scratched.

[kiwi]

I'm pretty sure that it's Digital Error Correcting (I check it every time).  With Secure, it doesn't complete the rip... even when left for 4 hours, with it making almost no progress for the last 3.5 of those hours.)

I've tried it in both drives, with Digital Error Correcting selected.   Double checked each time I've tried.  And it seems to die.

I'm currently using 9.1.271.  I can try the later versions if anything has changed.  I have a bandwidth metered account, so I only download the new versions every week or two (or if there is a reason to.)

This CD has some rather large error areas in it...  so it might jut be too much error.  I followed the instructions here.

Tomorrow, I'm going to remove the marker mark with a meths and give it a try.  Then it will just have 5 short scratches.

Note, the CD has only one track, so it could be an issue with that.  I have tons of space free on my drive, so I don't think that's the problem. (I think if I were going to recreate this CD, I'd split the WAV (prob w/ a cue sheet in nero) up into 20-80 different tracks... so that I could rip only the bad tracks.)

Here's my system info:

Media Center Registered 9.1.271 -- C:\Program Files\J River\Media Center\

Microsoft Windows XP  Workstation 5.1 Service Pack 1 (Build 2600)
Intel Pentium 4 2394 MHz MMX / Memory: Total - 515 MB, Free - 139 MB

Internet Explorer: 6.0.2800.1106 / ComCtl32.dll: 5.82 (xpsp1.020828-1920) / Shlwapi.dll: 6.00.2800.1106 (xpsp1.020828-1920) / Shell32.dll: 6.00.2800.1145 (xpsp2.021108-1929) / wnaspi32.dll: N/A
Ripping /   Drive D:   Copy mode:ModeSynch   CD Type:Auto   Read speed:4
  Drive F:   Copy mode:ModeSynch   CD Type:Auto   Read speed:Max
  Digital playback: Yes /  Use YADB: Yes /  Get cover art: No /  Calc replay gain: Yes /  Copy volume: 32767
  Eject after ripping: No /  Play sound after ripping: No  

Burning /  Drive D: AOPEN    CD-RW CRW4852      Addr: 2:0:0  Speed:40  MaxSpeed:370  BurnProof:No
  Test mode: No /  Eject after writing: Yes /  Direct decoding: No /  Write CD-Text: No
  Use playback settings: Yes /  Normalization: None

[kiwi]

I'll probably jinx myself, but this time, using my DVD drive, it seems to be making progress... it's got 532MB done so far...

*knock* *knock* *knock*

[JohnT]

I wouldn't bother using "Digital error correcting mode", although if you find a bug with it let me know. That mode is only to correct "jitter" which usually isn't a problem with drives with the "accurate stream" feature which most drives made in the last 5 years have.
The important mode is "Digital secure" which competes with EAC's secure mode for getting error free rips.

[kiwi]

I wouldn't bother using "Digital error correcting mode", although if you find a bug with it let me know. That mode is only to correct "jitter" which usually isn't a problem with drives with the "accurate stream" feature which most drives made in the last 5 years have.
The important mode is "Digital secure" which competes with EAC's secure mode for getting error free rips.

Yeah.  This last time, it just too a really long time, but didn't quit.  Don't know why it stopped w/o error before.  

I'm going to let me drive cool down today and try again this evening after I've removed the marker mark.

Thanks,
kiwi

[zevele10]

PS.  EAC does a bizarre thing in recommending the poorest drive  I have for audio extraction ripping[because it doen't cache audio].  So EAC advocates are saying that EAC works better with the poorest drive for digital audio extataction, purely because it doesn't cache audio?

Sauzee , i'am not sure you are right.
I was ,as you, really surprised to see than EAC told me my cd-dvd room better than my Plextor.

But ,not in secure mode  , some cds cannot be rip with the Plextor  ,with the LG dvd ,it works ok and the file is artefact less.

So ,lokk like 'the poor' can be the better...

Listening to: 'Movie Three' from 'Movies/More Movies' by 'Michael Mantler' on Media Center 9.1

[kiwi]

Just figured I'd post an update.

I performed the tests, but was not able to get either to complete.  I'm going to try again with a slightly less mangled CD.  

So far, I can't say whether one is better than the other.  But also can't say that either is worse.

kiwi