# Using Win XP Media Player to RIP CD collection - Any gotchas I need to be aware of? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 2, 2006, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-win-xp-media-player-to-rip-cd-collection-any-gotchas-i-need-to-be-aware-of/342729 "2006-02-02T21:24:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2006, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-win-xp-media-player-to-rip-cd-collection-any-gotchas-i-need-to-be-aware-of/342729/1 "2006-02-02T21:24:44Z")
The Media Player seems to be doing this fine and creating nice MP3 files. Are there any gotchas in the MP3 files the XP media player is creating that might affect future portability or burnability that I need to be aware of before I get too much further?. ---
**Author:** ![yanceylebeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yanceylebeef/32/12290_2.png) [@yanceylebeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yanceylebeef)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2006, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-win-xp-media-player-to-rip-cd-collection-any-gotchas-i-need-to-be-aware-of/342729/2 "2006-02-02T21:50:33Z")
I haven’t run into any yet, and I’ve been doing it for about a year now. The one thing I have noticed is the song titles and order sometimes get screwed up, so you might want to watch out for that. All in all it works better than Itunes, because I can use them anywhere, not just in my Itunes or Ipod. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2006, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-win-xp-media-player-to-rip-cd-collection-any-gotchas-i-need-to-be-aware-of/342729/3 "2006-02-02T21:58:11Z")
> [@yanceylebeef](#): > > The one thing I have noticed is the song titles and order sometimes get screwed up I don’t know if this is what you’re referring to or not, but my Windows Media Player will often, when I select a list of tracks to burn or play or whatever, move the last item to the top of the list. It’s no big deal, because I can drag it back down to its proper place, but I’m baffled as to why WMP engages in this bizarre behavior. But that’s not so much a complaint about ripping. ---
**Author:** ![Gary\_Robson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gary_robson/32/3448_2.png) [@Gary\_Robson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gary_Robson)\ **Post date:** [February 3, 2006, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-win-xp-media-player-to-rip-cd-collection-any-gotchas-i-need-to-be-aware-of/342729/4 "2006-02-03T00:47:29Z")
> [@yanceylebeef](#): > > All in all it works better than Itunes, because I can use them anywhere, not just in my Itunes or Ipod. Urban legend. There is a setting in iTunes to rip normal MPEG3 files–not proprietary at all. You can use them anywhere. ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [February 3, 2006, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-win-xp-media-player-to-rip-cd-collection-any-gotchas-i-need-to-be-aware-of/342729/5 "2006-02-03T02:35:06Z")
And iTunes will rip into AAC, but with no DRM wrapping. It’s hard to find a player that will support AAC besides the iPod, but they’re out there. ---
**Author:** ![Ms2001](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ms2001/32/18463_2.png) [@Ms2001](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ms2001)\ **Post date:** [February 3, 2006, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-win-xp-media-player-to-rip-cd-collection-any-gotchas-i-need-to-be-aware-of/342729/6 "2006-02-03T03:51:51Z")
> [@astro](#): > > The Media Player seems to be doing this fine and creating nice MP3 files. Are there any gotchas in the MP3 files the XP media player is creating that might affect future portability or burnability that I need to be aware of before I get too much further?. If they’re MP3 files, you’re fine. You only need to worry if it’s spitting out WMA files. However, for the best quality, you might want to use a ripper like [CDex](http://www.sourceforge.net/projects/cdexos/) that’s based on the LAME encoder. (SourceForge seems to be down right now, but I think that’s the correct URL.) ---
**Author:** ![Yeeter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/96bed5/32.png) [@Yeeter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yeeter)\ **Post date:** [February 3, 2006, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-win-xp-media-player-to-rip-cd-collection-any-gotchas-i-need-to-be-aware-of/342729/7 "2006-02-03T03:53:28Z")
If you want a different way to rip music there is a very nice guide on [AfterDawn](http://www.afterdawn.com/guides/archive/mydeneaclame.cfm) it uses Exact Audio Copy (software that has error checking in it so you know your music is copied without any skips etcetera), and LAME encoding (a very good and customizable MP3 encoder). This is for very good copies – it takes a little longer and maybe one or two extra steps, but it is what I prefer. **Thudlow** I have the same issue with the order of songs in WMP when I am setting my playlists. Very annoying, I wish my PMP did not rely on WMP for synchronization (meaning I HAVE to use WMP for building playlists after ripping with EAC). ---
**Author:** ![flex727](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/258eb7/32.png) [@flex727](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flex727)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2006, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-win-xp-media-player-to-rip-cd-collection-any-gotchas-i-need-to-be-aware-of/342729/8 "2006-02-04T16:40:04Z")
> [@Yeeter](#): > > If you want a different way to rip music there is a very nice guide on [AfterDawn](http://www.afterdawn.com/guides/archive/mydeneaclame.cfm) it uses Exact Audio Copy (software that has error checking in it so you know your music is copied without any skips etcetera), and LAME encoding (a very good and customizable MP3 encoder). This is for very good copies – it takes a little longer and maybe one or two extra steps, but it is what I prefer. Thanks for this suggestion, **Yeeter**. But I have a question, when I’m ripping my CD collection, how should I organize the songs? Create a new folder for each album or playlist, put all the songs in one folder, or what? What’s the best organization for long-term storage _and_ easy access to all my MP3s? > [@](#): > > **Thudlow** I have the same issue with the order of songs in WMP when I am setting my playlists. Very annoying, I wish my PMP did not rely on WMP for synchronization (meaning I HAVE to use WMP for building playlists after ripping with EAC). This seems to be a problem generally with Windows Explorer. There’s a neat trick you can use to splice together MPEG movie files. Simply zip them all up in a zip file with zero compression and change the file extension from .zip to .mpg. Works great except that if you grab the files in Explorer to zip, it puts them in the zip in order except the last file will be first (i.e. order will be 5,1,2,3,4 for 5 files). Very annoying. ---
**Author:** ![Ms2001](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ms2001/32/18463_2.png) [@Ms2001](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ms2001)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2006, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-win-xp-media-player-to-rip-cd-collection-any-gotchas-i-need-to-be-aware-of/342729/9 "2006-02-05T02:05:34Z")
> [@flex727](#): > > There’s a neat trick you can use to splice together MPEG movie files. Simply zip them all up in a zip file with zero compression and change the file extension from .zip to .mpg. This may work in some cases, but it’s best to use something like the free [TMPGEnc](http://www.tmpgenc.net/e_main.html) (File|MPEG Tools|Merge & Cut). Simply concatenating the files will give unpredictable results if the files use different frame sizes or stream types, and it won’t rewrite the time codes to be in order, which will confuse some player programs. Doing it with a zip file will also leave the zip headers in your file, although players should skip over them. There’s a better way to combine the files if you can’t be bothered to use TMPGEnc: open a command prompt and type… copy /b file1.mpg+file2.mpg+file3.mpg combined.mpg > [@](#): > > Works great except that if you grab the files in Explorer to zip, it puts them in the zip in order except the last file will be first (i.e. order will be 5,1,2,3,4 for 5 files). Very annoying. I think you can fix this by dragging the first file instead of the last. ---
**Author:** ![K364](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k364/32/5_2.png) [@K364](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/K364)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2006, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-win-xp-media-player-to-rip-cd-collection-any-gotchas-i-need-to-be-aware-of/342729/10 "2006-02-05T03:04:53Z")
> [@Mr2001](#): > > If they’re MP3 files, you’re fine. You only need to worry if it’s spitting out WMA files… I would be interested in the reason for that. I believe that iPod doesn’t support WMA, but other than that, is there anything else? ---
**Author:** ![Stan\_Doubt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/53a042/32.png) [@Stan\_Doubt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stan_Doubt)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2006, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-win-xp-media-player-to-rip-cd-collection-any-gotchas-i-need-to-be-aware-of/342729/11 "2006-02-05T04:52:07Z")
To expand on what **Mr2001** said, the annoying Windows behavior of putting the last item in a list first can be caused by selecting “down” in a list. The last item clicked becomes active and is most often the “handle” used to drag/copy & paste the selected items to the new folder, playlist, etc. It can often be avoided by selecting “up”, from the last item to the first, while holding shift, thereby making the first item the “handle” used to drag and drop or copy/paste. ---
**Author:** ![Ms2001](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ms2001/32/18463_2.png) [@Ms2001](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ms2001)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2006, 5:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-win-xp-media-player-to-rip-cd-collection-any-gotchas-i-need-to-be-aware-of/342729/12 "2006-02-05T05:21:07Z")
> [@K364](#): > > I would be interested in the reason for that. I believe that iPod doesn’t support WMA, but other than that, is there anything else? The OP was worried about his files being playable and burnable in the future. WMA supports Digital Restrictions Management, which may prevent you from burning the file to a CD, or listening to it on many portable players, on other computers, or even on your own computer after a hard drive crash (if you backed up the music but not the licenses). This can be disabled for files you rip on your computer–make sure the option “Copy protect music” is unchecked on the Rip Music tab of WMP’s options–but it doesn’t apply to MP3 files at all. WMA is also less compatible. MP3 is the lingua franca of digital audio; with only a couple exceptions, you can play an MP3 file on anything made in the past few years that can play any form of compressed music, including DVD players, car stereos, cell phones, and portable music players. Fewer players support WMA and AAC, and even fewer support WMA/AAC files that are tainted with DRM. ---
**Author:** ![flex727](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/258eb7/32.png) [@flex727](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flex727)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2006, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-win-xp-media-player-to-rip-cd-collection-any-gotchas-i-need-to-be-aware-of/342729/13 "2006-02-05T14:30:34Z")
> [@Mr2001](#): > > This may work in some cases, but it’s best to use something like the free [TMPGEnc](http://www.tmpgenc.net/e_main.html) (File|MPEG Tools|Merge & Cut). > > Simply concatenating the files will give unpredictable results if the files use different frame sizes or stream types, and it won’t rewrite the time codes to be in order, which will confuse some player programs. Doing it with a zip file will also leave the zip headers in your file, although players should skip over them. There’s a better way to combine the files if you can’t be bothered to use TMPGEnc: open a command prompt and type… > > copy /b file1.mpg+file2.mpg+file3.mpg combined.mpg. You’re right, of course, in everything you say, but your method(s) will not allow for restoring the separate files at a later date if so desired.