[Tfug] CD Ripping

[Rich]

On Aug 25, 2008, at 11:05 am, Nate wrote:

> What you are no doubt dealing with is the poor iPod implementation of
> playing MP3s.  I have had a theory that Apple did it on purpose to  
> make
> MP3 seem like a lesser format their their own AAC.

1. it's not their own -- it's an open format which they extended with  
their own DRM
2. iPods still glitch between AAC tracks

> 3. Rip CDs as one track.  I actually do this with most of my  
> electronica
> CDs, for different reasons.  I put my iPod on shuffle most of the  
> time,
> and I don't like it coming up with a song in the middle of a mixed CD.
> It will start in the middle of the music, and end in the middle of the
> music.  CDs mixed by a DJ are meant to be played all the way  
> through in
> order.  So I rip them that way.  However, for other kinds of music,  
> this
> would invariable be horrible, because if you wanted to listen to  
> Track 7
> of your favorite CD, you'd have to fast forward through tracks 1-6 to
> get to it.  You might as well use a cassette walkman at that point =).

There's a way around this, but currently, the only software for it  
exists on Macs.

AACs can have "chapter" marks in them. This was intended for  
podcasts, but works well for the kind of music you're talking about.  
Each chapter can have a title, but the 4th gen iPod only displays  
ticks in its play progress bar. "Next track" becomes "next chapter"  
in both iTunes and iPod.

I used to do this manually by exporting the CD tracks as an XML  
playlist, then rip the entire CD (or set of tracks) as an AAC file.  
These two would then go to the Apple "ChapterTool", and I'd get a  
"chapterized" AAC out.

These days I use a tool called "Join Together" (http:// 
dougscripts.com/itunes/itinfo/jointogether.php), which takes a bunch  
of (preferably AIFF) tracks and sends them to Quicktime for the  
conversion to a single chapterized AAC file.

There are at least two ways of doing it on a Mac. I'm sure there must  
be a way of getting Quicktime Player on Windows to do the same.

So, given that it's just messing with AACs, and AAC is an open  
format, there must be a way of doing this without using proprietary  
software. I haven't found it yet, but I'd love to know.

R.