So I finally got my MythTV going (yay!). And I’m beginning the long and arduous process of ripping all 700+ of my CDs. (yes, they’re mine; yes this is legal). By default, .ogg files are created instead of .mp3 files. For those that don’t know, Ogg Vorbis is an audio compression format that’s unpatented, and popular in the open-source world. It turns out that ripping to .ogg is significantly faster than to .mp3 and compresses smaller as well. (at least in the implementation used by MythMusic, which uses cdparanoia). So, I’d prefer to put them all into .ogg format.
However, I’m sure that some day I’ll want to dump some of them to an mp3 player or such. Do many (or any or all?) of the consumer mp3 players out there support .ogg format? Are there other reasons I should go to mp3 now?
By the way, MythTV and it’s associated stuff, MythMusic, etc. is super-cool. One of the tougher Linux projects out there, but very very slick.
According to the wikipedia article on ogg vorbis, portable players currently supporting ogg include the iRiver iHP-120 and the Rio Karma.
Personally I haven’t had to worry about ogg vorbis support on portables, since I have the same attitude towards them as the guy who wrote this Onion article.
i rip my cds to monkey’s audio .ape format. its a lossless compresssion that can be converted back to WAV to recover a bit-for-bit exact copy. it can also be converted later to mp3 or whatever.
on average it compresses audio about 40% and a winamp plugin allows you to play it in winamp just like any regular mp3.
if you dont care about sound quality its probably not for you.
i use ExactAudioCopy to rip the CDs, and monkey’s audio software to compress them.
Just now you’ve decided to rip all your CDs? What were you waiting for?
Last night I ripped the last one of my 700+ CDs (including the ones in the wife’s car), on the third iteration (192 kb/s, stereo)! I never made it through on the first two iterations(96 kb/s, 128 kb/s). I started the 3rd iteration in February of 03. Of course I may have not been the most diligent, ripping 1-2 CD’s a night, skipping some nights, trying to make it up on the weekend, etc.
Enough about me. Why do you want to rip all your CDs? If you want to be able to make mix CDs (that can be played in CD players), then as long as the CD software can convert ogg to audio tracks, then it doesn’t matter.
However, if you ever want to make a data CD containing 100+ songs, then I suggest you head for mp3 or wma format. Many personal CD players now play mp3 or wma data CD’s as well as audio CD’s, like the rioVolt.
The other option, that may happen anyway, is that by the time you do finish ripping all your CD’s, all the players will support the ogg format. All my mp3 players have an upgrade-firmware feature. Maybe in 2005 you can flash your mp3 players to play ogg files.
or (looking at the crystal ball really really hard, squinting) some linux programmer will port linux to the next cellphone/camera/musicplayer/wireless palmtop thing-a-ma-bob with built in ogg support.
Your question has just been answered by a charter member, please increase customer satisfaction by providing a “holding nothing back” evaluation.
Moderator, please move this thread to MPSIMS or Cafe Society
There are a few players that support Ogg Vorbis, but MP3 is still the common denominator. Just about every single digital music player supports MP3, whether it’s a car stereo, DVD player, PDA, or portable unit.
If you’ll want to use your music files in another player soon, I’d say go with MP3. Otherwise, go with Ogg and save the time and disk space right away - you can always convert them to another format later.
Well, previous to last night I had two places to use mp3s: in my computer and in my mp3 player. My computer is either at my office where I don’t play music or in my house where I have a stereo. So though I do have some mp3s on it, they are really a novelty, as I never actually play them on the computer. My mp3 player (which is mighty ancient) I put stuff on when I workout (which is far too rare, but that’s another story). So, I have several CDs ripped for that purpose. But frankly, I’ve never had a reason to rip them all.
Until yesterday. For those who haven’t heard of MythTV, it’s basically Tivo on Linux. There’s a module in MythTV called MythMusic that is a jukebox, designed to be played through your stereo and controlled through your TV and remote control.
Up until now, I’ve had an ugly mondo rack of CDs on the wall in the living room, and now I’m excited to dump them all on a hard drive in the MythTV and physically store them elsewhere.
One other note: From what I’ve read on the topic, you don’t really want to convert oggs to mp3s or vice-versa, as they’re both compressed, and you’ll lose some quality in the translation. So, I’d prefer to make all oggs or all mp3s now, as I really don’t want to rip them twice.
If you find the process of ripping CD’s too arduous, there are commerical ventures that exist to rip them for you. I dont recall the exact details but there was a wired article on it a few months ago.
You ship them the CD’s and they ship the music back either as a set of DVD’s or as a removable Hard Drive.
i keep my music on computer, i have 460 gigs of space. i can play my music in another room through the network. and i can use any format i want, mp3, ogg or APE.
with lossless compression you make no compromises, and PCs allow you to do this due to virtually unlimited storage ( just add another disk when you run out of room )
i have an mp3 player in the car, but then i could convert an APE file any other file (like mp3, wma, wav) without loss of quality because .ape is lossless.
heh, altruistic? It’s actually quite expensive but it still works out to be better than sitting down bored out of your mind ripping 700 CD’s for some people. I’m just saying you should look into it if you have more money than time.
And so it came to pass that Bill H. ignored the sagacious advice of those around him and continued ripping to ogg’s until there was nothing left to rip.
And lo, he discovered that no major car player or portable player handles oggs.
Well, now that you have them in ogg, it should be a relatively simple matter to re-encode them to MP3 as a batch job. The sound quality won’t be as ideal as ripped MP3’s but unless you have an uber-leet car stereo system, odds are you won’t be able to hear the difference.
And if you buy one of the supported phones, you can download this software to play them through the phone to an FM transmitter and recieve the transmitted signal on your car stereo.
If you have a tape deck, you also have the option of using a cassette adapter.
