# Who has ditched their entire CD collection? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [November 13, 2009, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390 "2009-11-13T00:53:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Rigamarole](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/77aa72/32.png) [@Rigamarole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rigamarole)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 7:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/21 "2009-11-13T07:07:05Z")
> [@Freudian\_Slit](#): > > Well, that too. > > Never know what you’ll need to hurl at zombies when they come for you. In the case of zombie attacks I find the kitchen is usually the best place to be. You’ve got your pots, pans, small appliances, and of course knives. If you’ve really got bravado and want to add some flair to your zombie slaying, try to incorporate the oven or garbage disposal for extra style points. ---
**Author:** ![Freudian\_Slit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 7:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/22 "2009-11-13T07:10:49Z")
> [@Rigamarole](#): > > In the case of zombie attacks I find the kitchen is usually the best place to be. You’ve got your pots, pans, small appliances, and of course knives. If you’ve really got bravado and want to add some flair to your zombie slaying, try to incorporate the oven or garbage disposal for extra style points. Ooh, you’ve got spunk. I’m adding you to my speed dial for when the Zombiloution comes. ---
**Author:** ![Nobody](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/94ad74/32.png) [@Nobody](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nobody)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 7:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/23 "2009-11-13T07:18:27Z")
I’m burning my vinyl records to CD. Maybe in 20 years I’ll get an MP3 player and rip the songs to that. ---
**Author:** ![Mindfield](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mindfield/32/19759_2.png) [@Mindfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mindfield)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 11:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/24 "2009-11-13T11:57:56Z")
I sold the majority of my CD collection a decade ago when I was having financial difficulties and needed the money. However I kept some favourites and have ripped them. I haven’t actually _listened_ to a CD in years though. Ever since I got my first MP3 player several years back it’s pretty much all been pure digital, including anything I’ve bought in the last few years, too. I _do_ like physical media; I like the liner notes and stuff, but not enough to buy CDs. iTunes has been picking up the ball on that with “albums” that include all cover art and liner notes and stuff. However, it’s more expensive, and right now only on the most popular CDs, none of which I’m interested in. ---
**Author:** ![dhkendall](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a9adbd/32.png) [@dhkendall](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dhkendall)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/25 "2009-11-13T13:57:38Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > I haven’t, because the way Spanish copyright laws are set up, the easiest way to prove that my mp3 collection is legal is being able to take the pile of CDs to show to the cops. > > Given that there have been things like cops at traffic stops taking away home-copied CDs and MP3-filled disks, it’s… sort of like the Spanish version of keeping your tickets for tax purposes (which I don’t need to do). Gee, I bet nobody expects the Spanish confiscation! … OK, so I love bad puns! ---
**Author:** ![interface2x](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c0e974/32.png) [@interface2x](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/interface2x)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/26 "2009-11-13T14:10:41Z")
> [@Freudian\_Slit](#): > > I keep mine–just in case, of the comp crashing or whatnot. Me, too. I can’t imagine the feelings of loss if my computer crashed and took down all of my music with it, particularly with no way to replace it. I’ve been buying this music and enjoying it for almost 20 years, I don’t want to lose it all in a flash. That said, yeah, I pretty much have switched to all digital listening these days. ---
**Author:** ![I\_Am\_The\_Lorax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19adc/32.png) [@I\_Am\_The\_Lorax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/I_Am_The_Lorax)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/27 "2009-11-13T14:38:25Z")
As much as it would suck to re-rip 1000+ CDs, it would suck worse to lose all my digital music and not be able to rip it all again. I don’t trust my computer (or Windows or iTunes) enough to get rid of them all. I still buy all my music on CD too, but it’s getting much harder to find what I want. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/28 "2009-11-13T16:07:54Z")
> [@dhkendall](#): > > Gee, I bet nobody expects the Spanish confiscation! > > … > > OK, so I love bad puns! It’s not so much that it’s bad as that it got old at about the time Gutenberg was printing his Bible. ---
**Author:** ![stpauler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@stpauler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stpauler)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/29 "2009-11-13T16:34:44Z")
I’m in the long process of doing it. I’m finishing up the letter S right now. I’ve also been filling in the blanks as I’m going along which slows down the process a bit. If I notice a missing album or artist, I pick it up on Rhapsody/iTunes/Amazon etc. Each artist is getting checked to make sure I have all of their albums and I’m ripping all of the music at 320 MP3 (sure, I could use a different format, but MP3s are the most common and 320 does take up a lot of space now, but in 5 years, a terabyte will probably be a default size and 10-50 terabyte drives more available. I’m also assuming that should formats change, it will be easy to move things out of MP3 than it would be to do it out of FLAC or some other high fidelity encoding that my non-Monster-cable-ears would even notice. I’ve been using two programs to do this for the most part. iTunes (slap disk in drive, it finds info, adds it, rips it, and ejects it without having to touch anything) and Easy CD-DA (which is able to read the disc data if it’s not the exact tracks, something I wish that iTunes could do). Set up is as such: Rip to the laptop, move over to my 1.5 TB external drive and then copy to the desktop so the music is in two separate places should one fail. I would like to get a Blu-Ray burner and store the data in a third place, but I’m going to wait a bit for prices to come down. ---
**Author:** ![suranyi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@suranyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/suranyi)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/30 "2009-11-13T16:57:54Z")
In all seriousness, while I do have some LPs, I don’t really listen to them anymore. However, I don’t have an MP3 player, so CDs are still my main medium for music. I think it’s because MP3 became popular exactly when music stopped being an important part of my daily life. I am not an early adopter. Oddly, I work in IT. ---
**Author:** ![ratatoskK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ratatoskk/32/2987_2.png) [@ratatoskK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ratatoskK)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/31 "2009-11-13T17:02:33Z")
I am still upgrading from LP to CD. I would feel really weird not having any physical entity. ---
**Author:** ![minor7flat5](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/minor7flat5/32/258_2.png) [@minor7flat5](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/minor7flat5)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/32 "2009-11-13T17:36:00Z")
Mostly ripped; there are still a few outliers kicking around. I keep the original CDs though. Here’s how I know which ones I have ripped: I use a colored magic marker to put a small dot on the blank space of the center ring. That way, if the CD ever makes it back into the “to-be-ripped” stack on my desk, I know that it has already been ripped to MP3. ---
**Author:** ![Student\_Driver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3da27b/32.png) [@Student\_Driver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Student_Driver)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/33 "2009-11-13T18:12:12Z")
Heck, I bought a couple of new CDs in the last week. I’ve also been happily picking up a lot of stuff from eBay and used CD/DVD shops. I rip everything and stick the CD in storage, though. I’ve been ripping at iPod-quality fidelity (128k AAC) but by keeping the CD I can go back and re-rip at higher fidelity if needed, and can also go back and re-rip in case of HD loss. For music purchased online, I try to buy high bit rate or FLAC releases if available, burn backups onto CD-ROM, then store them. ---
**Author:** ![corkboard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e9bcb4/32.png) [@corkboard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/corkboard)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/34 "2009-11-13T18:51:25Z")
> [@interface2x](#): > > Me, too. I can’t imagine the feelings of loss if my computer crashed and took down all of my music with it, particularly with no way to replace it. I’ve been buying this music and enjoying it for almost 20 years, I don’t want to lose it all in a flash. > > That said, yeah, I pretty much have switched to all digital listening these days. Please tell me you back up your data. You do back up your data, right? I haven’t listened to the actual CD’s in years, but I haven’t gotten rid of them yet. I think they’re in a box in my attic, and have been so since I ripped everything onto my hard drive about five years ago. The main reason I haven’t pitched them yet is back in the old days circa 1985 when I started collecting them, I got into the habit of popping the CD tray out of the jewel case and writing my name on the inside of the back cover. That way, as my ingenious plan went, when I loaned one out as was the popular way of “sharing” music at the time, I could always prove it was mine if there was a dispute over it, by revealing the hidden notation with a dramatic flourish. If that wasn’t bad enough, I soon determined that there was only one completely personal identifier that would be the absolute best proof in such a situation, which was my social security number. So I have probably over 200 CD’s with my SSN inside the back cover. Then, you guessed it, I figured the belt-and-suspenders approach was the best one, and started adding my first and last name under my SSN. Probably a little under 100 CD’s containing that info. Obviously I can’t just sell them en masse in their current condition. I won’t feel comfortable unless I actually remove in their entirety, or at least cut out the affected portions of, the back covers. That’s a daunting proposition, not to mention the fact that the back cover will either have a big hole in it or will be missing completely. So until that day, they sit in a box, safe in my attic. I think. ---
**Author:** ![Bookkeeper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bookkeeper/32/281_2.png) [@Bookkeeper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bookkeeper)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/35 "2009-11-13T21:39:53Z")
I keep mine, despite ripping them to mp3s as soon as I buy them, for two reasons. 1. If I sell the CD, I also sell the right to personal use of the mp3, so my music collection would be illegal. 2. I want to have the original available in case of a computer data loss affecting the original and backup files or if I get an mp3 player with more storage space and want to re-rip the music at a better quality level. ---
**Author:** ![Driver8](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b5a626/32.png) [@Driver8](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Driver8)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/36 "2009-11-13T22:29:06Z")
Even though I listen to all my music through iTunes (unless I am in my car), I still buy all my music on CD (typically through B&N online, since I get gift cards as points for my credit card). It is an automatic backup and really pretty comparable in price. ---
**Author:** ![Nobody](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/94ad74/32.png) [@Nobody](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nobody)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/37 "2009-11-13T22:43:14Z")
I’m considering getting an MP3 player for when I’m driving, but even if I do, I’m still keeping my CDs because if you lose or break a CD that’s like what, 10 or 12 songs? Lose or break an MP3 player or hard drive and you lose 100 or more songs. ---
**Author:** ![Tastes\_of\_Chocolate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tastes_of_chocolate/32/3232_2.png) [@Tastes\_of\_Chocolate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tastes_of_Chocolate)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/38 "2009-11-13T22:59:25Z")
> [@Bookkeeper](#): > > I keep mine, despite ripping them to mp3s as soon as I buy them, for two reasons. 1. If I sell the CD, I also sell the right to personal use of the mp3, so my music collection would be illegal. 2. I want to have the original available in case of a computer data loss affecting the original and backup files or if I get an mp3 player with more storage space and want to re-rip the music at a better quality level. I do the same. As some point, some file format is going to replace the MP3. I’ll still have all my original disks, so I’ll be able to re-rip them all to the new format. That and I don’t have to worry about some site I buy digital music from losing all their documentation, leaving me unable to prove I paid for the music. ---
**Author:** ![interface2x](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c0e974/32.png) [@interface2x](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/interface2x)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2009, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/39 "2009-11-14T00:08:04Z")
> [@corkboard](#): > > Please tell me you back up your data. You do back up your data, right? Oh yeah, I do. But considering that I wouldn’t put it past DVDR’s to fail over time, plus external hard drives being designed to only last a few years … I want all my bases covered. ---
**Author:** ![Markxxx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5daacb/32.png) [@Markxxx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Markxxx)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2009, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390/40 "2009-11-14T03:45:55Z")
> [@Rhythmdvl](#): > > We’re about to digitize them. Can I ask for advice? > > How to make the transfer? We’d really rather not spend the hundred or so hours ripping ourselves, but are unsure how to weight the various services out there. Make two or three piles (one for MP3s, one for lossless, one for mixes) and make three transactions? Are there services that will handle the live recordings? Any recommendations as to who? Here’s what I’d do. First of all you can get hard drive space cheap. I just saw on [Buy.Com](http://Buy.Com) a 2TB external drive for around $150.00 it’s a great deal and cheap. This way you always rip your music to lossless. FLAC is the most common codec used but WavPack has better compression so if you have a lot of CDs I’d use WavPack. Monkey’s APE audio is good to for compression but isn’t open sources (well not fully) so it’s not as well supported as WavPack or FLAC. Use EAC (Exact Audio Copy) to rip your CDs. If you have CDs without flaws in them it only takes a few minutes to rip each CD. I had about 500 CDs and I ripped them all in a day basically. What I did was set EAC to reject any CD with an error. That way I got through them fast. EAC has an error recover mode, that takes a lot longer. So out of my 500 CDs about 450 were error free and ripped quickly. Then I ripped the last 50 using the error recovery which took awhile, but do-able. Now I have all my music on WavPack on my computer, on my backup external drive and the physical CDs as well. If you want to get really detailed about ripping CDs and want technical info go to [Hydrogenaudio](http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/) and check out their site and especially the forums. The nice thing about ripping all your CDs to lossless like FLAC, WavPack or APE is that you always then easily convert them to mp3 or mp4 or whatever lossy form you want in the future. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-has-ditched-their-entire-cd-collection/517390.md?page=1)