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Topic: About CDex 1.51 ripping speed... (Read 5007 times) previous topic - next topic
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About CDex 1.51 ripping speed...

Hi all,

Well I've using CDEx to rip since 2002 and always worked fine.
In the past I just used to rip a couple of songs of one CD, and ocasionally a complete one.
But things changed this Christmnas: I bought a 20 Gb MP3 player (a Creative Zen Touch) and I can't wait to store part of my big CD collection on it...   

So I dowloaded and reinstalled CDex 1.51, Nero's ASPI and Lame 3.90.3 following this CDex guide

I left the defaults options unchanged but the ripping method (I selected the standard one).
Concerning the encoder options, I am using the recommended "alt preset standard". VBR quality is set to "VBR 2" and Output samplerate is in "Auto" mode.

The quality of the MP3 files obtained is unquestionable, but my concern is the time that CDex needs to rip: it takes around 8 minutes to rip a 57 minutes CD...  (around 37-40 seconds to rip a 4.25 min. song)...  are not those timings a bit higher than expected? (I have ripped severals CD's and the timings are similar).

My CPU is an AMD Athlon 2700XP, 1 GB RAM and a Western Digital 80Gb HDD, and the drive used in the ripping process is a DVD ROM Toshiba SD-M1712 installed as Slave in the Second IDE (DVD writer is installed as master in this IDE)... I did not installed the ASPI drivers because I understand that Windows XP SP2 does not need it (besides, Nero’s ASPI are correctly installed)...

So the questions are:

. Are the above timings aceptables?
. If not, is there anything I can do to improve the ripping speed leaving uncheanged the encode settings? (I would not like to sacrifice sound quality for some xtra speed).

Thanks all in advance for your help.

Cheers.

PS.: sorry for my poor english... 

About CDex 1.51 ripping speed...

Reply #1 –
Quote
Hi all,

Well I've using CDEx to rip since 2002 and always worked fine.
In the past I just used to rip a couple of songs of one CD, and ocasionally a complete one.
But things changed this Christmnas: I bought a 20 Gb MP3 player (a Creative Zen Touch) and I can't wait to store part of my big CD collection on it...   

So I dowloaded and reinstalled CDex 1.51, Nero's ASPI and Lame 3.90.3 following this CDex guide

I left the defaults options unchanged but the ripping method (I selected the standard one).
Concerning the encoder options, I am using the recommended "alt preset standard". VBR quality is set to "VBR 2" and Output samplerate is in "Auto" mode.

The quality of the MP3 files obtained is unquestionable, but my concern is the time that CDex needs to rip: it takes around 8 minutes to rip a 57 minutes CD...   (around 37-40 seconds to rip a 4.25 min. song)...  are not those timings a bit higher than expected? (I have ripped severals CD's and the timings are similar).

My CPU is an AMD Athlon 2700XP, 1 GB RAM and a Western Digital 80Gb HDD, and the drive used in the ripping process is a DVD ROM Toshiba SD-M1712 installed as Slave in the Second IDE (DVD writer is installed as master in this IDE)... I did not installed the ASPI drivers because I understand that Windows XP SP2 does not need it (besides, Nero’s ASPI are correctly installed)...

So the questions are:

. Are the above timings aceptables?
. If not, is there anything I can do to improve the ripping speed leaving uncheanged the encode settings? (I would not like to sacrifice sound quality for some xtra speed).

Thanks all in advance for your help.

Cheers.

PS.: sorry for my poor english... 
[{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Hi and welcome to HA.org! 


I read your post and I speak for myself:
I think this speed is ok and you cannot make it faster without any quality loss.

(I would probably recommend [a href="http://exactaudiocopy.org/]EAC[/url]
but if you think CDex is ok - it's ok and good enough for your purposes.)
portable: 128 kbps cbr AAC
local: -7 FLAC

About CDex 1.51 ripping speed...

Reply #2 –
I'd use LAME 3.96.1 anyway...it will also speed up encoding speed tremendously and will give you lower bitrates @ --preset standard
--alt-presets are there for a reason! These other switches DO NOT work better than it, trust me on this.
LAME + Joint Stereo doesn't destroy 'Stereo'

About CDex 1.51 ripping speed...

Reply #3 –
Hi again,

Darky, thanks for the suggestion about the EAC (I did not know that it rips CD's to MP3).
Jojo, I am using LAME 3.90.3 because all the people is saying that for the moment is best version... anyway I could try the vers. you mean just to check the timings...

In any case, I can say that ripping a 57 min CD in 8-9 min is not so bad is not it?

Thanks all again.

About CDex 1.51 ripping speed...

Reply #4 –
Quote
Jojo, I am using LAME 3.90.3 because all the people is saying that for the moment is best version...
[{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

well, that's not true (i.e. I don't)...I'd say most people recommend LAME 3.96.1 by now (espcially when it comes to -V2 aka --preset standard).

I suggest you to read this post from the FAQ: [a href="http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=30116&view=findpost&p=260399]http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....ndpost&p=260399[/url]
that pretty much summarizes everything in easy terms...
--alt-presets are there for a reason! These other switches DO NOT work better than it, trust me on this.
LAME + Joint Stereo doesn't destroy 'Stereo'

About CDex 1.51 ripping speed...

Reply #5 –
Quote
(around 37-40 seconds to rip a 4.25 min. song)... are not those timings a bit higher than expected?


Test the same track ripping directly to a wav file to see if the bottleneck is the encoder or the ripping process itself. Some of my CD's wont rip faster than 8x (about what you seem to be getting) though others will rip faster.

About CDex 1.51 ripping speed...

Reply #6 –
Hi all,

I do not wanna be a pain, but there is something that I would like to clarify:

Jojo, I read in fact the post you mean... and if I finally chose the ver. 3.90.3 is because I could read the following:

"Thus 3.90.3 --alt-preset standard is considered to be better than 3.96.1 -V 2 (--preset standard) but 3.96.1 -V 5 (approximatly 128kb/s) is better then 3.90.3 --alt-preset 128"

So, I understand (pls let me know if I am wrong) that 3.96.1 is only better than 3.90.3 if you are to encoding @ 128 kb/s, but if you wish to encode with higher bitrates, the 3.90.3 should be the one to consider.

Ok I am really newbie in those matters, but I always thought that, although it is accepted that 128 Kb/s has a good quality/size ratio, a higher bitrate (lets say 192 kb/s) is closer to reach a CD quality audio.
In fact, the default settings for the 3.90.3 vers. encodes with a min bitrate of 128 and a max. of 320...

To sum up, my doubts are:

1) Is it really worth to encode at 128 kb/s if I would like to reach a reasonable quality of sound (if the answer is YES, I

understand that I should change to LAME vers. 3.96.1 because it has more quality at this bitrate, and besides, it is faster

encoding).

2) Is 128 Kb/s (or 3.90.3 --alt-preset 128) enough (in terms of good sound quality)?, or should I keep using the default

settings?, that is: alt-preset standard; bitrate min: 128, bitrate max: 320; VBR quality: VBR 2.
In other words: if I would like to encode with higher bitrates that 128, is still LAME 3.90.3 the best option, and are the above settings the most reliable?.

What about change to alt-preset fast standard?.

I just want to make clear that the order of my prerences are: quality, speed, size of the file...

I guess that 99% of you guys are sick to death of having to anwser stupid questions like these, but believe me, I have read many many post in that forum, and I am afraid that I could not find the answers... 

I really thank you the patience and the time you dedicate me...

Thanks thanks thanks 

Regards,

Pepe.
 

About CDex 1.51 ripping speed...

Reply #7 –
I think most people here prefer LAME 3.96.1 over LAME 3.90.1 from what I've read in the forums...

I suggest you to use LAME 3.96.1. I use it as well and I encode in --preset standard. It's faster, much lower bitrate @ --preset standard + gives you all the other advantages for low bitrates and access to more presets...

--preset standard targets @ CD-Quality...so if you are fine with a bitrate of ~196kbps choose LAME 3.96.1 + --preset standard. You can also try to compare LAME 3.90.3 with LAME 3.96.1 @ --alt preset standard...I doubt you'll hear any difference (blind tests only!).

Quote
2) Is 128 Kb/s (or 3.90.3 --alt-preset 128) enough (in terms of good sound quality)?, or should I keep using the default settings?

again, if you can afford ~196kbps use LAME 3.96.1 + --preset standard. Otherwise, perform a blind test...and see if you can tell the difference to the original...

the best setting for 128kbps is: LAME 3.96.1 and -V5 --athaa-sensitivity 1. However, only use 128kbps if space is such an issue for you that you can not afford --preset standard...

Quote
What about change to alt-preset fast standard

I wouldn't use it...it's a bit faster but rather bloats files or gives you less quality...IMO LAME 3.96.1 @ --preset standard is pretty fast

Also, read the FAQ or search the forum...
--alt-presets are there for a reason! These other switches DO NOT work better than it, trust me on this.
LAME + Joint Stereo doesn't destroy 'Stereo'