Music on the computer.

Last days I'm working to collect all the music on my computer and put it all in one folder.
That takes some work.
And I need to rip lots of new CDs so I can listen to them on my BlackBerry too.

How do you store your music on your computer.

It seems the NAS with all the music on it told me -- do it by your self.

I probably spent 6-8 months ripping all of my cds to computer.  I used Windows Media Player to do it.  I don't keep them all on my computer though (too many gigs of music) instead I keep them all on an external hard-drive and rotate them to my computer in batches to listen to.

^^ ditto, mostly. I rip to wav with FreeRIP MP3 Converter Basic, then use AIMP3 to convert to both flac and 128 mp3.  The flac I save to my external SS drive while the mp3 files get copied to a 64 gb jump drive I take to work. I also leave the mp3 files on my computer and import them to iTunes so I can put some of them on my iPhone and listen when I'm working in the yard.

I put all of my new music on the computer.  When I notice something older missing from the digital collection that I haven't heard in a long time, I will add it as well by ripping the CD.  Most of the coolection is on an outboard drive.

My Windows Media Player is not able to rip CDs anymore.
I would like it to rip all the CDs I have and put them on the computer.

I use an iPhone so I rip a cd when I first get it to iTunes. I have enough storage for all my music on my PC but I do back it up about once a month, so I don't have to rerip stuff and I do have about a dozen albums that are mp3 only releases.

Whatever I rip myself (now via Foobar2000) is done to FLAC and everything is on an external drive.

I've had to convert some stuff to AAC for my son's Nintendo but those are then kept on his PC. I'm pretty sure my phone can play FLAC files but so far I just convert to mp3 direct to the flash card and add replaygain tags so they play the same level.

topshot rhit wrote:

Whatever I rip myself (now via Foobar2000) is done to FLAC and everything is on an external drive.

I've had to convert some stuff to AAC for my son's Nintendo but those are then kept on his PC. I'm pretty sure my phone can play FLAC files but so far I just convert to mp3 direct to the flash card and add replaygain tags so they play the same level.

I need to figure out how to do that, as the music on my phone plays at all kinds of different levels...can be kind of annoying when I can't get to my phone and change the volume.

Piece of cake if you use Foobar2000. However, you also need to use a player that will use the tags. Many won't. Doing my radio show from my laptop would have been a major pain without this feature (yes, I used Foobar2000 back then also). For my Android I'm using Deadbeef.

One of these days I just need to process my external drive so I don't have to remember to do it again when I copy songs to a device. It would likely take at least a day to do that. At least I think the tags will travel if I convert - guess I need to test it whenever one of those days comes around.

I think there is also a way you can have it permanently alter the file to adjust the level but I've always used the tags.

Is there a good free FLAC player? I have been wanting to start ripping to FLAC instead of WAV and mp3. Most of my vinyl records I rip to WAV, occasionally mp3 320 kbps.

AIMP3

MikeInFla wrote:

Is there a good free FLAC player?

Foobar2000 (no mobile yet - as I said I picked DeaDBeeF for that)

You can easily convert your current WAV files to FLAC and will save about 40-50% in storage.

And some good reading on ReplayGain for those interested:
Wikipedia
HydrogenAudio wiki

MusicBee is a good one, too.

I currently have 637 GB of music ripped between 128 lowest and 320 highest.  My previous laptop had a Terabyte HDD, but that died and my new Lappy has only 750, so I've backed up my complete collection onto 3 external HDD. On my new lappy I keep only 500GB of the music I listen to the most.

I use a fantastic and free program called "MP3 GAIN" to normalize every song I have.  It brings the sound levels all to the same level preventing sound changes... and it's fast !

I have about 100 CDs I haven't ripped yet, that I need to get around to preserving sometime soon.
I've got the time, I just don't have the drive lately due to so much crap happening in my life.
I'd eventually like to rip the CDs to my computer and HDDs, then manually record some of my rare LPs that can't be found on CD- THAT is time consuming.
I also burned several albums to CD-Rs to listen to in my truck. My Sanyo plays mp3 discs, so I just load around 12 to 15 albums per CD-R and shuffle away in my truck.

Guilty/Forgiven wrote:

I use a fantastic and free program called "MP3 GAIN" to normalize every song I have.

Which does so via ReplayGain.

Thanks topshot, I want to check out Foobar200.
Maybe Foobar2000 will stop my WMP problems and I can rip my CDs again.

Guilty/Forgiven wrote:

I currently have 637 GB of music ripped

I need to tell my wife about you...

I have about 60 GB, about 120 CDs and she thinks my collection is too much...

ishmael81 wrote:

Guilty/Forgiven wrote:

I currently have 637 GB of music ripped

I need to tell my wife about you...

I have about 60 GB, about 120 CDs and she thinks my collection is too much...

Yeh, but I have mental problems. You probably don't. 
Starting back to childhood when I was given my first MAD magazine. It was then that I felt the need to get more... then when I had more, I felt the need to own every issue ever published.
Then comic books entered my life - same thing, had to have every issue.
Then I got into secular music around 12-13 (wasn't a Christian and wasn't aware of Christian rock until Stryper) -same thing, had to have as many albums as possible. If a friend got an album I didn't have, we'd be trading cassette rips asap.
Then I came to faith and began the Christian music collection -unfortunately as someone who brought home less than 700 bucks a month back then, I had to stick with cassettes and didn't get into CDs until the mid-90s. So I wound up with around 300 Christian tapes by the time I started gathering CDs around 1995-96. Ripped all the tapes to CD-Rs, then began my CD collection. The rest is history. I now have several thousand actual CDs and on top of that, several thousand "rips" of albums from different people over the years.  Though I have well over 600BG of music, I can make a guess that I dislike about 100GB worth of albums, but the hoarder in me won't erase them from the official PC collection.
Thus the reason I say "mental problem"

I have absolutely no desire to archive any cds, so I only rip what I want to listen to in the car via USB flash drives.

I stopped ripping in FLAC when I realized that most people couldn't tell the difference between 320 mp3 and FLAC. Honestly, FLAC format is really only that much of a benefit if you plan on using it as a master later one. I keep my cds, so this doesn't appeal to me.

I do rip classical, orchestra, jazz, and soundtrack cds all the time (pretty much done with most rock or metal)...

I use a paid program called EZ CD Audio Converter https://www.poikosoft.com/ , which I absolutely love. It allows me as much or as little control as I want. It also is great for tagging..as it connects to GD3, MusicBrainz and Freedb to retrieve tracks and covers. You can also manually edit it.

I also found iTunes to be very useful, despite not owning a single Apple product. iTunes will rip a cd for you into various formats, including 320 mp3, saving right into a local folder. Then you can store it or play it anywhere you want.

No need to rip cd's. I have spotify

MikeInFla wrote:

Is there a good free FLAC player? I have been wanting to start ripping to FLAC instead of WAV and mp3. Most of my vinyl records I rip to WAV, occasionally mp3 320 kbps.

VLC plays EVERYTHING...and plays it well

http://www.videolan.org/index.html

NoOneIsHere wrote:

Honestly, FLAC format is really only that much of a benefit if you plan on using it as a master later one. I keep my cds, so this doesn't appeal to me.

Moot point since you have to by law. I "archive" in case something happens to damage the CD.

topshot rhit wrote:

NoOneIsHere wrote:

Honestly, FLAC format is really only that much of a benefit if you plan on using it as a master later one. I keep my cds, so this doesn't appeal to me.

Moot point since you have to by law. I "archive" in case something happens to damage the CD.

Not really a moot point....a lot of people will rip their cds then sell the disc on eBay to "save room". Even Christians. Too many people view digital laws as not being real laws.

As for the archiving in case something happens to the original, I used to ponder doing that.....I have a huge cd collection and an ever bigger DVD collection. I used to think about ripping all of them for backups. ..then I realized that at the end of the day, none of it was really all that important to me. Even the OOP stuff.

I have gone from being hooked on buying dvds and cds to not really giving a rats rear because I figure I will be leaving it behind anyway...lol

Guilty/Forgiven wrote:

ishmael81 wrote:

Guilty/Forgiven wrote:

I currently have 637 GB of music ripped

I need to tell my wife about you...

I have about 60 GB, about 120 CDs and she thinks my collection is too much...

Yeh, but I have mental problems. You probably don't. 
Starting back to childhood when I was given my first MAD magazine. It was then that I felt the need to get more... then when I had more, I felt the need to own every issue ever published.
Then comic books entered my life - same thing, had to have every issue.
Then I got into secular music around 12-13 (wasn't a Christian and wasn't aware of Christian rock until Stryper) -same thing, had to have as many albums as possible. If a friend got an album I didn't have, we'd be trading cassette rips asap.
Then I came to faith and began the Christian music collection -unfortunately as someone who brought home less than 700 bucks a month back then, I had to stick with cassettes and didn't get into CDs until the mid-90s. So I wound up with around 300 Christian tapes by the time I started gathering CDs around 1995-96. Ripped all the tapes to CD-Rs, then began my CD collection. The rest is history. I now have several thousand actual CDs and on top of that, several thousand "rips" of albums from different people over the years.  Though I have well over 600BG of music, I can make a guess that I dislike about 100GB worth of albums, but the hoarder in me won't erase them from the official PC collection.
Thus the reason I say "mental problem"

G/F,

I think you got into the wrong field.  See, as a musicologist I can justify keeping all of my hoarded music for academic/scholarly reasons.  The same goes for acquiring more.  Am I really ever going to listen to all those De La Soul albums I downloaded when they were giving them away?  Or Mayhem's Pure F___ing Armageddon?  Probably not, but you never know when I might need them for a class or a paper.  As a historian, how could I ever pass up the fourteenth different release of Warriors of the Son in case I ever want to make my name by chronicling the career of Saint?

It's like Barney Fife said, its a "compellshun," but I manage it with plausible justifications.

It's good to be a musicologist  My minor was in Music History.