How to copy cds to an external hard drive

caleyles

I have many many cds collected over many years and would like to save them all to an external hard drive.I would be grateful to anyone who could help me find an easy/cheap and relatively idiot proof way to do this. I hoped there would be some freeware option that could be set up so that I would enter the disc into the pc and it would then copy it to the hard drive with a way of labelling the disc name etc so that when I open up the hard drive I would see the disc name etc and then either myself or OH could play them on itunes etc and also allow us to gain extra space as we could then store the cds away - I am sure this must be relatively easy but please go easy on us - thanks in anticipation :question:

googler

If all you want to do with them is play them from iTunes, then import them into iTunes...... no?

closed

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/knowledgecenter/howto/rip_how_to.aspx

caleyles

googler wrote: »

If all you want to do with them is play them from iTunes, then import them into iTunes...... no?[/QUOT
Sorry I maybe wasn't clear enough - we have a network hard drive so I wanted to save it straight to that therefore myself and OH could play them from either pc or laptop and any of the kids (unlikely with our music) could play them as well - if we did it with itunes or media player we would have to copy every disc into each pc/laptop and with years of cds it would take forever therefore it would be copy once then we could all listen whenever - I hope that is a bit clearer
Thanks:beer:

zorrofox

Hi.

There are many free programs that will do exactly as you want but they all need some degree of input from yourself. They are generically called CD Rippers. All will allow you to rip to mp3 (lossy) and some will also allow ripping to FLAC (lossless). If you choose to rip to mp3 be aware that you will lose some quality, although whether you will actually hear this loss depends on your ears and your playback equipment. Also, you might not care if you lose some fidelity. I use Exact Audio Copy as it allows me to rip to FLAC format because I want the very best sound I can get. The downside is that FLAC files are a lot bigger than mp3 files and therefore take up more space on your hard drive. Again, if this isn't a problem (large hard drives are getting cheaper all the time) then go for FLAC. For example I have around 62,000 tracks mostly in FLAC format and it takes up nearly 1TB of space. This is also backed-up to another drive because if my hard drive died then I might as well too, lol. Another thing to be aware of is that most mp3 players [sic] are exactly that. Most can't handle FLAC but some do, Cowon products to name just one manufacturer.

Here's a link to EAC - http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/

There's lots of tips on that site to get you started.

I could talk forever on this particular topic so feel free to ask any questions you like.

Good luck.

* edit * I didn't see the bit about iTunes. Does it have to be iTunes? That way limits you quite a lot. You could always by a Logitech Squeezebox which works really well as a media server although I have no personal experience of it.

spud17

+1 for closeds advice, cheapest and it leaves them in a cross platform format, no awkward i-tunes stuff.

If you had to, you could then import/convert to i-tunes library.

But do check the bitrate you are ripping at, higher quality is slower, remember mp3s are generally 192kbps, I'd take that as a minimum.

googler

Use EAC as per prev post. However, for hundreds of CDs, this will be time-consuming......

EAC will, for most commercial CDs, 'tag' tracks with Artist, Album, etc. If you rip the CDs to mp3 format, iTunes will be able to access them and import them into each library without using space on the relevant PC, but - you'll have to, once you've started this process, keep the files in the same place - or else iTunes will 'lose' them and you'll need to import them again.

The folder structure on the drive can be whatever you want, as iTunes will key on the tags rather than the folder structure when importing.

caleyles

Thanks zorro this looks exactly the kind of thing I need - would it be a case of downloading the software then when inserting a disc does it ask where to copy and then I could choose the hard drive location?

amcluesent

> does it ask where to copy and then I could choose the hard drive location?<

You set-up Exact Audio Copy once, and define the main folder for music etc. For 99% of pop/rock CD, it'll pull the info on band/album off the internet, then automatically create sub-folders for the band and place the ripped tracks there.

caleyles

Think i've got the jist of it now - was hoping to do it over the winter months - a few discs an evening kind of thing and I kinda knew it would take a while.I will download the EAC prog and give it a try to see how it works - thanks all for the advice and I will write back once I've tried

amcluesent

If you get bamboozled by EAC, dbPowerAmp is reportedly a lot easier to use, but costs a few £