Saving music from CD in MP3/WMA format

[laragh]

Bought the wife a new Panasonic CQ-C1321N MP3/WMA CD car radio for her birthday.

It has a front loading CD player and I understand that i can play MP3 format music on it if the music is saved in this format on a CD.

Am I right in saying I can transfer her CD collection (about 40 CD's) in MP3 format onto one CD-RW?

Do I need special software for this process(I think it's called ripping??)

Can you recommend software for the job (preferably free) and where I can download it?

Also what is WMA??

 

[efm]

I'm no expert but a couple of things to be aware of:

1. Check the media type the Car radio / player can read - there are a couple - CD+R / CD-R / CD+RW / CD-RW

2. Yes you do need special software, and it IS called ripping - there are many many free programs available - look at www.pcworld.com at the downloads section for reviews of some

3. WMA stands for Windows Media Audio (and also the World Medical Association) which is Microsoft's proprietary audio format - afaik it is not as widely used as mp3 and so for ease of compatibility with other players it might be best to rip the songs to mp3 - however, I think if you have Windows XP and / or the Windows Media Player it has a CD ripper built in, but only rips to WMA (I think!) - RealPlayer may have one as well but I'm not sure

efm

 

[CCOVICH]

I would recommend Musicmatch, that's what I use for ripping cds to MP3. The basic version is free. Windows Media Player might do the same thing, but I don't use it so I don't know. WMA=Windows Media Audio.

You can usually get around 200-300 songs on a single cd in MP3 format (maybe more/less depending on the quality). I think WMA is better quality and more compressed than MP3, but don't know too much about it.

 

[TarfHead]

Windows Media Player 9 can rip to both MP3 and WMA.

If you use Windows Media Player 9 to rip to WMA at 64 kps, you would fit twice as much on your CD , compared with ripping to MP3 at 128 kps - and no loss of quality.

 

[DrMoriarty]

.wma uses a more advanced compression algorithm. So yes, you should use .wma if you want to store more music at the same quality (see [broken link removed] test).

Most currently available mp3 players (including yours) will handle .wma files without a problem.

 

[MonsieurBond]

Windows Media Player 9 can rip to both MP3 and WMA.

If you use Windows Media Player 9 to rip to WMA at 64 kps, you would fit twice as much on your CD , compared with ripping to MP3 at 128 kps - and no loss of quality.

That should read "you would fit twice as much on your CD, with a noticeable loss of quality". You might not notice the quality so much on the move, but of course there is a loss of quality going from 128 kbps to 64. I would not recommend going below 128kbps if you plan to listen to your music on a good device and especially in the car!

 

[TarfHead]

.. but of course there is a loss of quality going from 128 kbps to 64 .

I disagree.

Can I suggest you use WMP9 to rip the same track to MP3 @ 128 kps and to WMA @ 64 kps ? Either I have cloth ears, or there is no appreciable difference in quality.

Using audio compression, whether MP3 or WMA, involves some loss of quality.

There is a significant difference between MP3 @ 64 kps and WMA @ 64 kps --> WMA is way better.

 

[dam099]

.wma uses a more advanced compression algorithm. So yes, you should use .wma if you want to store more music at the same quality (see [broken link removed] test).

Most currently available mp3 players (including yours) will handle .wma files without a problem.

I have to say that test does not to me seem to prove that 64K WMA is better than 128K MP3, which is what the tester seems to recommend following his tests.

The blind tests done seem to have been to compare WMA and MP3 at 64K, 96K and 128K for each codec and the results were that a 64K and 96K WMA was better than a 64K and 96K MP3 and that at 128K for each they could not tell.

This does not show that 64K WMA is necessarily better than 128K MP3 and given that at 128K WMA and MP3 were very close I can't imagine that a 64K WMA would sound as good as a 128K MP3 as that would also imply that there was no difference between a 64K WMA and a 128K WMA.

A more interesting blind test would have been to compare 64K and 96K WMA's against 128K MP3's and this is what would have been needed to support the testers conclusion.

At lower bitrates I would accept WMA is better but if you want to use a higher bitrate I think the greater compatibility of MP3 might be more suitable.

 

[laragh]

Thanks for all the advice!

I think I'll try the WMA format and see how it goes.

Am I right in saying I'll only be able to rip those CD's that don't have fancy copy protection in place (ie they only allow play on a PC and not copying)???

 

[dam099]

Thanks for all the advice!

I think I'll try the WMA format and see how it goes.

Am I right in saying I'll only be able to rip those CD's that don't have fancy copy protection in place (ie they only allow play on a PC and not copying)???

Yes but only newer CD's have copy protection so if you have a collection built up over the years most your CD's will be OK. Also many of the copy protection schemes are not foolproof, if a particular CD doesn't work use Google and try and see what scheme it uses then Google the scheme for workarounds. For example one of the older schemes can be bypassed by holding down the shift key when you insert the CD.

If you are going with WMA at 64K I would advise just ripping a few CD's to begin with and listening to the results to make sure you are satisfied with the results, at the end of the day it's your ears (and your wifes) that matter. If not satisfied try upping the bit rate in increments to 96K, 128K, 160K and 192K until you find one you like. At 128K and above compare MP3 as well.

Even with WMA at 64K I doubt you will get 40 CDs on one CD, I find with MP3's at 128K they are about 1MB a minute, I would hazard a guess that WMA at 64K would be 1MB for 2 minutes. At say an avaerage of 45min a CD that would still be about 900MB.