Can someone point me to a good FREE CD ripper to backup my music CDs. It needs to rip to wav or mp3 format, it does not matter which. I need one that can bypass most (if not all) copy protection.

Thanks

Exact Audio Copy (EAC) and CDex are two good freeware rippers. EAC will also burn audio CD's. Both are easy to find on the internet....

And a good , free Audio CD burner is Burrrn (www.burrrn.net)

CDex is my choice.

I'm using Exact Audio Copy (EAC) with LAME 3.97 Final now–

Overall, I like the ripper / encoder. Even though it’s no big deal, I do think the ripping is a little slow…but encoding is very fast!


One thing I’m not sure about: I’m getting a Zen Nano Plus 1GB for Christmas and I’m not sure how VBR mp3s will work on the player. I know some mp3 players work only with CBR mp3s. I can’t find any documentation that tells if the Zen Nano Plus will work okay with VBR or not.

About the CDex...I tried it a long time ago and did not like it much...maybe it's better now...maybe.

Ditto, it's the one I use the most (I have EAC on another machine).

Looks like the OP has found one that suits, though!

Arachne,

Does CDex work better for you? I was just wondering why that is your primary ripper. Does it detect and bypass more copy protections?

Thanks.

TBH, copy protection has never been an issue for me, so I can't answer that. I guess I use it because it's fairly fast and hassle-free to use.

Cool Cool

I'm a fan of constant bit rate.

Fast Fraunhoffer (like in Music Match 4.5 and later) at 160kbps sounds great.

Lame at 192kbps sounds great.

I use Music Match to rip all my stuff, though I also like AudioGrabber. Dunno about copy protection though. Guess nothing has popped up that prevented a rip yet, at least for me. But then again, I always hold my SHIFT key down when inserting an audio cd so nothing auto-runs.

BeardedKirklander,

I had been using dBpower AMP Music Converter to rip & encode. Then I got the music CD by the group Crossfade...dBpower AMP Music Converter can NOT see the .Cda files on the CD. Windows Explorer can NOT see the files either. WMP can see them now, but an upgrade or so ago it could not see the music files. Also, the holding down the SHIFT key trick does not work on that CD.

Anyway, Exact Audio Copy (EAC) with LAME 3.97 Final is fine as long as VBR files work with my Zen Nano Plus. If not I will still use Exact Audio Copy (EAC) as a ripper and then use dBpower AMP Music Converter to encode.

Later.

I never thought about using the Music Converter to rip and encode. I simply use it to batch convert files to the format I like. For instance, my audio book tapes. I'll record them to WAV, then edit / trim them. So say I have like 32 files (16 tapes, each with a side A and B), I then go into my file manager, select those 32 WAV files, right click, tell it to convert and it converts to what I like for spoken word - 32kbps, 22khz, 16bit mono. But it freaking takes FOREVER to do that. I'm really hoping they come out with a new version that is faster and supports dual core.

I have simple Samsung MP3 players that I mainly use for audio books. Just 1 gig per unit, and they use AA batteries. I don't know if they could handle VBR. I just stick with CBR for compatibility, even though VBR probably is more effective in terms of sound quality for space used.

It's fun to tinker, that is for sure.

That it is!!!

Update:
Yes, VBR works on a Zen Nano Plus.