Ripping, downloading and organising music for use on multiple platforms

PETERDGRIFFIN

I have run some searches and dont think the answer is readily available but if it is my apologies and a link would be appreciated.

I have been around the block a few times so have seen things come and go. I also end up using different devices and platforms including but not limited to ipod, ipad(3) Mp3 on CD or SD card in the car, Galaxy S and various Media players and other storage devices lurking around the place. This is combined with a variety of windows based networked and standalone devices running everything from XP, NT, to Vista to Windows 7, with an occasional linux device in the mix. Some of these are at work,and some are at home.

I may shortly end up with one of the newer Android/Iphone5/lumia phones.

I find that I have bits and pieces of material all over the place and at this stage am not even bothering to rip, download or do anything with my music because of the chance it will be orphaned on a device or platform. I have moved on and upgraded enough to realise that I lose material regularly etc.

So I am now prepared to put some effort into ripping, consolidating and downloading my music and related material if there is a means of doing so that will be (relatively) easily available to any devices I wish to use them on and will be configured in such a way that upgrades and machine changes will not leave me with less than I started out with.

I am thinking at this stage that a portable HDD is the most likely piece of hardware for storing the music etc as I would like to be able to use it with both networked and standalone machines in both home and work environments for the purposes of building the library.

So I am looking for a solution that will see me into an indefinite future. Any suggestions on quality settings for ripping/recording and software that will help manage the collection and make it available to all of the devices (and likely future devices). I am willing to spend a little time and money setting up if necessary but I favour open source or freeware that may work across a number of platforms. One of the difficulties I recognise is that the catalogue would need to 'travel' with the music so that it can be updated on any of the machines that might be used to add/edit/amend.

If the solution works for photos (currently using lightroom with many 000's of images) or video materials all the better.

If you got this far thanks for reading and I welcome any suggestions.

Peter

Rip to FLAC using EAC or DBPowerAmp

Get it right, get the album art and naming etc right at the ripping stage.

Then you'll never have to rip your CDs again. You can use a batch converter (DBPoweramp have a good one) to convert to MP3, AAC, Apple Lossless etc. Whatever devices you get in the future, you just go back to your FLAC originals and batch convert automatically.

EAC is free, DBPoweramp is a pay app but works perfectly for a few weeks so it should be enough to get it done.

Torqay

As far as ripping goes, EAC is really in a class of it's own.

dbPowerAmp is probably the best converter. If you're looking for "free", get WinFF (GUI for ffmpeg) which is almost as good but lacking support for certain proprietary formats (i.e. lossless WMA, Apple lossless audio), a portable version is available as well.

realdanbreen

Anyone know where I can get free youtube download that works. I downloaded one from cnet but it doesn't appear to work.

Torqay

realdanbreen wrote: »

Anyone know where I can get free youtube download that works. I downloaded one from cnet but it doesn't appear to work.

Read this.

RUCKING FETARD

Torqay wrote: »

Read this.

The Man from Delmonte he say, this doesn't work again/is very hit and miss.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H7HmzwI67ec&feature=g-music

I so randomly picked that ^^^ and she no work.

PETERDGRIFFIN

Thank you IKYS! and Torqay. I have downloaded DBpoweramp ripper and got a few CDs going. I will need to think of how best to catalogue the files and make them available, but at least I will now only have to rip once

Once again thanks for the guidance

Regards

Peter

Before you rip the whole lot just do a few, check your settings, naming convention, album art, folder locations, tagging etc.

Get everything right the first time and then you'll have your whole collection perfectly labelled and ripped which makes it very easy and quick to convert the whole collection to other formats and have them automatically in the right folders and tagged etc.

yoyo

I find MP3Tag excellent for tagging/finding & embedding cover art, been using it for years and no problems!

Nick