Ripping CDs to MP3 Using Asunder is Easy

I'll have to see how it compares to Grip.

I do wonder, however, why this article (from a full time Linux user of over 10 years) is pushing MP3 rather than OGG (yes, I know MP3 is "universal", but I would think a long time full time Linux user would have gone for the free option rather than the popular option ...).

She mentions FLAC for lossless, but doesn't even mention OGG in the article.

But as usual, maybe I'm just a bit over-sensitive. :P

I was thinking the same thing, techiem2. Support for Vorbis audio is a lot more widespread these days than people seem to realize, and there's very little reason to bother with mp3 any more unless you are stuck with only an iPod or Zune.

The main reason to use mp3's is exactly as you've indicated,... Using a player that only supports that format. I convert to OGGs when I can, but for ripping movies I use the audio tracks as mp3s because I have some working, legacy multi-media player devices.

For CDs I use SoundJuicer. Maybe Asunder is better, don't know, but SoundJuicer doesn't disappoint. I canusually rip a music CD with SoundJuicer in about 7 minutes or less.

i *need* music when I'm working. I received an ipod as a gift. Requires MP3. My backup music source is an 8GB micro SD card in my phone. Requires MP3.

I did start out using OGG format. It took a few years before I decided to go with a source that would work wherever I wanted music. Does your car stereo play discs filled with OGG files? Mine doesn't either, but it will play a disc of MP3 files.

I used to love Grip, but it suffers from extended bit-rot.

Linux and free software continues to grow and thrive, with or without me sticking to it 100%. Cheers.

-Kim the dude.

I'm sorry, but as much as I'd like to only use OGG, there's no players out there that support them any more. I still have an iriver H330 that supports them, but that thing is ancient, and to my knowledge, hardly any new audio players support them now, and certainly not iPods.

Moreover, lots of new cars these days have stereos that support either SD cards or USB sticks. But there again, no OGG, just MP3 (and of course WMA).

OGG is great if you're ripping music for use ONLY on your PC, and that's it. If you want to also play that music on any other kind of device, be it a portable player, a car stereo, or a Blu-Ray player, it better be in MP3 or WMA, unfortunately. It sucks, but it is what it is.

Android's music player can play Ogg Vorbis.

I rip to FLAC and then covert to whatever is needed. If you are going to encode in Ogg then you should be using the AoTuV modified version of the libs which fixes quality problems and improves encoding performance.

_gus3: And how is that helpful? I suppose that would allow you to replace your dedicated MP3 player with your phone, and probably accounts for the phenomenon of MP3 players going out of style, even though they've only been around for about 10 years, but I've never really liked the idea of having my music collection tied to my phone, which is in turn tied to an evil provider like AT&T or Verizon. Secondly, Android phones don't even work unless you pay $30/month extra for the data plan, so if you want a low phone bill, they're not an option. I don't have an Android phone, and that's exactly why: why should I pay $30/month for the privilege? The providers are charging too much, and it's even worse now that they're capping the data plans. For those of us who don't want to pay enormous sums of money to buy into the providers' restricted phones, Android isn't an option.

Anyway, Android phones aren't useful in cars anyway. The idea of playing your music from a handheld device, tethered by a cord, while driving your car is not only ridiculous, but downright dangerous and should be illegal. Plus, it looks ghetto, like the old days when people used portable CD players and cassette adaptors, instead of simply buying a car CD player.

Quoting:there's no players out there that support them any more

Cowon's players support ogg and explicitly list Linux support.

I have an old Cowon iAudio X5 and love it (though I don't use it much anymore).

As for Grip, yeah it could use an update, but it still works and works well for me. :)

Quoting: Secondly, Android phones don't even work unless you pay $30/month extra for the data plan, so if you want a low phone bill, they're not an option.

Cheap, Chinese, unlocked import ones do... Plus, they will work without any network at all as a wifi device, just like the tablets that are the stretched out version of them. And before you complain about supporting the Chinese economy by buying them,... where do you think an iPhone, or an HTC is made (Samsungs are made in Korea, but probably with parts made in China)?!?!

Quoting: The idea of playing your music from a handheld device, tethered by a cord, while driving your car is not only ridiculous, but downright dangerous and should be illegal.

Solved by a car bracket for your phone (many are universal), and an FM transmitter located in your center console box (if your phone doesn't have it built in already). Besides, we are probably no more than a year away from Android devices that will act as a Carputer, that will replace a stereo, on vehicles that use standard audio, anyway (as well as wirelessly link to your phone). There are already Meego devices like that in pre-production, if not already available.

Quoting: Plus, it looks ghetto, like the old days when people used portable CD players and cassette adaptors, instead of simply buying a car CD player.

As opposed to my Chrysler minivan (a.k.a. a robust box for safely hauling kids around), in which an mp3 player sitting in the dash's official ashtray drives a cassette adapter? I'd say it looks more 'kluge', but it works and I can afford it (two major points in today's economy), and the only driver attention it gets is to turn it on or skip a track; nothing dangerous there. Plus, Kid One and Kid Two can opt to offer up their own tunes in their own players when they tire of my collection, which is old-sock familiar to them as they grew up with it

which is old-sock familiar to them as they grew up with it

True...my 18 year old is going away to college in three weeks and i was helping her sort through stuff that we'd take up with her vs stuff I would store for her. Her CD collection is painfully organized as only a the mind of an engineer could organize it. In that collection?

Blackout - The Scorpions (she used to air guitar to No One Like You when she was 11)

The Eurythmics - Missionary Man

Uriah Heep (some of you probably are not old enough to remember them)

Deep Purple - Machine Head

Doobie Brothers - The Captain and Me

Manfred Mann - Nightingales and Bombers

All of that being mixed in with "current stuff" I've never heard or stuff I am glad I heard only once.

That stuff they're old-sock familiar with, and tired of now, will become precious memories to them down the road.

Well, some of it, at least.

@gus3: Oh, it's already there. Kid One, on hearing Be Bop Deluxe's "Live In The Air Age" begin (it starts with tuned noise through a phasor, nothing like the live concert that follows), asked me to "Turn it up." When I felt the mood to play one of my own mp3's, he commented as an approval, "Haven't heard that in awhile."

Kid Two is still in his identity-defending days and clings to a tight loop of his own preferences, but I figure acculturation is pernicious in how deep it works. Metallica's "Enter Sandman", Oingo Boingo's "Only A Lad", Suburban Lawns' "Flying Saucer Safari", the first movement of the Second Brandenburg, and even Mahavishnu's "Meetings of the Spirit" will always feel like home because they've all served as weekday wakeup music at times.

[typo]

> Uriah Heep (some of you probably are not old enough to remember them)

Demons and Wizards?

> Manfred Mann

Did you get her hooked on "The Mighty Quinn"?

@helios: Just think of all the dormmates who're going to be infected with "quality music", to the point where they won't settle for the half-digested regurgitations being served up by MAFIAA these days...

[add] Even Kid Two, defensive or not, perks up when the Moody Blues is playing.

If anyone remembers Procol Harum, Robin Trower is still writing and recording new stuff, and is still touring.

Robin Trower - Bridge of Sighs....I momentarily flashed to high school, smokin' in the boy's room and having hair.

And I went straight to Shine On Brightly.

Quoting: Well, my son... Life is like a beanstalk... isn't it?