EAC Help

[The Black Adder]

Hi all.

I was just wondering if any here use EAC (Exact Audio Copy) for ripping cd's. If so, do you use the function of removing tail-in/out silence's? Or is life just too short... lol

Any other options that you use would be good to hear. Right now I'm using the accuraterip in Secure and configured the drive etc.

I'm ripping to uncompressed WAV format too.

Thanks

[struth]

I use it all the time Joe, just as it comes. Use accurip as well and paid for the tagging info plus added another couple of free ones. Cost was minimal at £6 or so for lifetime on as many PCs as u own.well worth it. I rip flax exclusively now as I believe it is the best overall.
Only had 2 CDs I've had problems with and think it ends up better than the CD if that's possible.

Edit. Rip flax all the time:doh: damned tablet. Should be flac.

[tiguan]

I installed EAC based on this instructions and I am very happy with it.

http://filesharingtalk.com/threads/435208-Installing-configuring-and-ripping-with-Exact-Audio-Copy-%28EAC%29

[Clive197]

I use EAC and find it easy to use. I also find flac better as it includes the metadata which wav. doesn't

[The Black Adder]

Hi all.

Many thanks for the input. I've been through the tutorial but I'm getting a weird thing happen. When I press test and copy to compressed it's outputting compressed files with a .wav extension and not FLAC.

I've been looking on eac forum but can't find a command line that works. Can someone copy their command line for me if this isn't happening to you?

Thanks

[tiguan]

İ did everything explained below and mine works well.
Check again. Address of " flac.exe " may not correct.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v300/ca_aok/eac16.png
Set up this tab exactly as shown. You'll have to browse to the path where you have flac.exe, if you installed it with EAC it's in C:\Program Files (x86)\Exact Audio Copy\FLAC\flac.exe. If you installed it separately it's wherever you installed it. The bitrate and high/low quality have no effect on the rip.

The commandline parameters have changed in this version, so this will look new to most of you. The commandline recommended for optimal completeness is this:

-8 -V -T "ARTIST=%artist%" -T "TITLE=%title%" -T "ALBUM=%albumtitle%" -T "DATE=%year%" -T "TRACKNUMBER=%tracknr%" -T "GENRE=%genre%" -T "PERFORMER=%albuminterpret%" -T "COMPOSER=%composer%" %haslyrics%--tag-from-file=LYRICS="%lyricsfile%"%haslyrics% -T "ALBUMARTIST=%albumartist%" -T "DISCNUMBER=%cdnumber%" -T "TOTALDISCS=%totalcds%" -T "TOTALTRACKS=%numtracks%" -T "COMMENT=%comment%" %source% -o %dest%

It takes no extra effort on your part, just copy and paste that into the additional commandline options and you're done.

Note: the %comment% function is broken in version 1.0b2 (it returns the track CRC). Use something like -T "COMMENT=EAC V1.0 beta 2, Secure Mode, Test & Copy, AccurateRip, FLAC -8" instead.

Also, as of Beta 3 you may use the %tracknr1% variable instead of %tracknr% if you would like to have no leading zeroes in the track number field (like XLD does). tracknr1 will use, for example, '1' instead of '01'.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v300/ca_aok/eac17.png
Leave everything unchecked except the last option.

Congrats! EAC is now properly set up! You may wish to save your settings in a profile by hitting "New" at the bottom of the screen. However, unless you're changing your settings frequently there's no need, EAC will remember all of this on next launch regardless.

[The Black Adder]

Hi Yetkin.

Yup, done all of that... but it still puts .wav as the extension rather than .flac. The flac address is fine and works, the command line is copied in too.

I found someone on the eac forum with the same issue but the thread died with no outcome.

[tiguan]

Shall it be a version problem. Just in case. Deleting and re installing May solve.

[struth]

If your using win 8 it could be the problem. I have never managed to get eac to work on win 8 and have heard similar problems with others

[The Black Adder]

Thanks guys.

Ok, I've sorted it... no idea how but it's now outputting as .flac. All I did was apply and re-apply the options as far as I can tell. Must be a bug somewhere.

Yeah, Grant... Windows 8.1... I hate windows 8 and it wouldn't surprise me if it's some mad legacy routine running in the background fooking things up.

Ok...so I've now got some lovely rips but I'm getting pauses after each track through my Sony. My question now is, is that a fault of the playback unit or something to do with the ripper? I did the gap check thing (using Detection A as B seems to get stuck) and most are 00:00:00 with only a few with <millisecond. But even the tracks with zero gap still pause. So what gives, anyone know?

I've also ripped to uncompressed FLAC too... thought I'd try it. All it does is wrap a .flac around a .wav and gives you metadata. Seems fine.

[Stratmangler]

Ok...so I've now got some lovely rips but I'm getting pauses after each track through my Sony

Sony what?
Gizza a clue! :doh:

[The Black Adder]

lol.. it's a sony blueray player BDP S4100.

I'm just using it as the interface/streamer.

[struth]

Are you using Foobar as the player?

[Stratmangler]

Just had a brief glance at the spec- no mention of FLAC support anywhere.
It sounds as though it won't do gapless playback of FLACs - that it plays FLAC at all is a bonus.

PS - I did say brief glance - I'm on my way out and I haven't time to trawl through the manual.

[The Black Adder]

No idea what Foobar is, Grant... lol - Yup I'm new to this fangled lark.

Thanks, Chris. Yeah, it plays flac fine... but even with .wav it still pauses...

[Stratmangler]

So it doesn't do gapless playback.
That's a shame.
It's bloody irritating on albums where one track segues into another!

[The Black Adder]

Hi Chris.

This is indeed very annoying... lol - I thought by now gapless playback would be not even worth talking about but it seems to be a bug-bear.

So, is there anything that does do gapless streaming? Do you or anyone else know?

If not then I'm not going to carry on with this.

[Stratmangler]

Squeezeboxes have been able to do the gapless thing for as far back as I can remember, and LMS is an excellent way of organising a digital library.

A lot of other stuff out there used DLNA protocols, which because they're a collaborative effort fall short of the mark.
Can't comment on Sonos, because I've never played with any of their kit. I remember hearing something about them not doing it, but that might have changed by now. I think the Sonos stuff utilises DLNA, but I'm not certain of that.

There are a number of build your own streamer projects out on the 'net, and they seem to behave well.
Most of them seem to utilise a silent computer running a software media player, with some remote access from tablet features thrown in.

For computer playback you should be fine using Foobar/JRiver/WinAmp/insert software media player here.

[struth]

Yeh, I use either Foobar or Jriver and take it out of the laptop to a dac or the likes. Plenty low cost good ones like the sabre(its very small) which is only £40/50 . its damned good too. Foobar 2000 is free sso all you'd need is a standard cable. I'd think they'll do seamless no bother(gazjam will give you the low down). Jriver has a lot of extras and you can get a free 1 month trial once your set up and ready to go.

[The Black Adder]

I just wanted to avoid having a laptop in my system, to me it just seems overkill for what it's doing. The Sony is so close but no cigar and it only cost me £50 I think.

The Squeezebox touch is just too expensive and as mentioned earlier, it might have a hard time with large music collections which seems a bit rubbish to be honest.

I've just read that the Oppo doo-dads do gapless... That might be a better option for the future I suppose but need to do some more checking on that.

[struth]

I'm getting one of Gazjams servers as it'll be neater and better. Certainly the sound I am now getting is pretty close to vinyl now.

[Stratmangler]

I just wanted to avoid having a laptop in my system, to me it just seems overkill for what it's doing. The Sony is so close but no cigar and it only cost me £50 I think.

The Squeezebox touch is just too expensive and as mentioned earlier, it might have a hard time with large music collections which seems a bit rubbish to be honest.

I've just read that the Oppo doo-dads do gapless... That might be a better option for the future I suppose but need to do some more checking on that.

The Touch only struggles with large libraries when the library is hanging off the USB port and the Squeezebox Touch is running off its own embedded server.
And by large library you're talking something in excess of 1TB.
The Touch itself is a Linux running mini computer, but with puny processing capabilities, which is where things can come unstuck.

I have always used my Squeezeboxes with a separate machine doing server duties (used to be a PC, now it's a NAS), and as a result I have never encountered the problems that have beset others.
Because another machine is handling the file serving my setup is pretty well rock solid and dependable.

The one of the things I like most about my Squeezbox setup is that I can access my music library in a number of ways.
I can use the touch screen on the player itself.
I can use the supplied IR remote.
I can use my Smartphone with a control app.
I can use a web browser on any computer in the house.

The other thing is that it makes a bloody good transport, and responds well to a decent linear PSU.
It will also happily support a HiFace2 from its USB port and use that instead of the inbuilt SPDIF connection. I do this, and it improves the sound quality a small degree.

Still, if you insist on going clunky there's always the Oppo option :eyebrows:
And I'm not joking with that comment.
From what I've seen of streaming products by HiFi manufacturers the user interfacing is clunky and shite!

[The Black Adder]

Ah, thankd, Chris... 1TB?...! Well, lol... I think anything would struggle at that. Ok... that's ok then. :)

Seriously though I don't do clunky but it depends on what people mean by clunky. Personally I think Windows 8 is clunky opposed to even XP/7 (in interface terms) in terms to using it as a tool rather than something that looks pretty... lol I just think aesthetics have overtaken functionality in that respect.

Anyway, I digress. Once everything is on I can play music via the BDP with just 4 presses of my remote... not bad... well, not to me.

But it just doesn't cut it as a streamer now that I know it doesn't do gap less streaming... bugger!... lol

I'm not going any option at the moment, still researching it. But your right, audio companies are not good at this kind of functionality.

I found this too if anyone is interested: http://www.thewelltemperedcomputer.com/HW/DAP.htm

Geoff. I've not been following Gazjams server exploits so I think I need some more info on that....

[Stratmangler]

This is how I normally address the Squeezeboxes at home

http://i960.photobucket.com/albums/ae88/Stratmangler/LMSartistview_zpsb4e9bdc5.png (http://s960.photobucket.com/user/Stratmangler/media/LMSartistview_zpsb4e9bdc5.png.html)

It's a piece of cake to play with :)
FYI "A Valid Path" is an album by Alan Parsons, and Gilmour played on the first song, as did Schpongle. Because I added that information in the file tags it links up to the David Gilmour search.
There's also a link from the Alan Parsons album to David Gilmour.
It's quite a useful feature in my opinion - saves having to remember who did what with whom, although I'm not too bad at that either ;)

[The Black Adder]

It certainly looks easy to use, Chris. Thanks for that.

[skimminstones]

could just buy a squeezebox classic on ebay for 50-60 quid.

[Stratmangler]

could just buy a squeezebox classic on ebay for 50-60 quid.

Absolutely!
The downside is that you would have to run LMS on a computer or NAS.
The Classic is totally unable to run itself.
It also won't play file types above 24/48, but that may not be an issue.

[skimminstones]

Absolutely!
The downside is that you would have to run LMS on a computer or NAS.
The Classic is totally unable to run itself.
It also won't play file types above 24/48, but that may not be an issue.
i dont fully understand the filetypes/bitrates thing but i have some albums on mine that are 24bits 96khz and they play ok. Is that different then?

[Stratmangler]

i dont fully understand the filetypes/bitrates thing but i have some albums on mine that are 24bits 96khz and they play ok. Is that different then?

LMS resamples 24/96 material on the fly if the player cannot support it.
Which means that your 24/96 gets resampled on the fly to 24/48, and the Squeezebox Classic can then play the files.
It's not a problem if you run LMS on a computer which can handle the processing, but a lot of NAS boxes struggle with it.

[The Black Adder]

I'm just wondering if this is worth pursuing. Might have to stick with a clunky cd player... lol

Gapless audio is an absolute must for me (pink floyd fan, lol) so I need to have a think about the suggestions on this thread. I can't believe that most hardware that are capable of streaming cannot do it gapless. Is this a marketing tool to be exploited later?... seems a bit bonkers.

The Pioneer VSX AV units do gapless I've just found but can't tell if they can output LPCM. They have a configurable SPDIF/COAX in socket but can't find if that's for output or just to switch on/off. The i-Control looks cool though. Just not sure how intuitive it is.

[Stratmangler]

Yer clunky CD player is a lot less to get yer head around :eyebrows:

Just had a glance at the Pioneer stuff - they have an HTC app! Oh Lord, why am I not impressed? What's wrong with having a general Android app?
They've also an iPhone app.

I haven't got a clue whether it's got a decent user interface or not, but I'm not particularly impressed that there's no mention of accessing the unit from a web browser.

Anyway, wot you doing mentioning AV amps - I thought you wuz a valve and Tannoy man :scratch:

[The Black Adder]

lol.. I am but I just need a streamer that does gapless... Looks like ye olde laptop is the most promising...lol

You can access the Pioneers via a browser, I'm pretty sure I read that...

HTC app... yeeeeash.. no wonder they have now packed up with such things.