[fridays]

I was talking with Amarra support last night he suggested just using iTunes for ripping and not bother using XLD as he felt there was no difference in sound quality
Anybody disagree/agree

Bruce

[timind]

I disagree.
For about a year I was using itunes ripping cds to AIFF with error correction on. I was pretty happy with the results and only occasionally noticed a drop out here or there but thought the sound quality was fine. This was the case until I listened to the ripped Roger Waters' Amused To Death. In case you aren't aware, Amused To Death uses the Qsound which adds massive spatial information. Well with standard itunes I noticed much less of the Qsound effect. I popped in the cd and listened to the cd, sure enough, there was the dog barking behind me.
I reripped the cd with XLD and guess what, the Qsound effects were back. After careful level matching I compared the cd to the ripped version. To my ear, the two were indistinguishable. I still have the standard itunes ripped version on the hard drive if you'd care to check it out.
Unfortunately, I have 500 or so cds that need to be re ripped.

[Vincent Kars]

I agree for 98%

By design bit perfect reading of an audio CD (Redbook) is not guaranteed.
As a consequence, if the drive encounters an severe read error, it will interpolate (or mute).

Most todays ripping software does a decent job when set to secure mode.
It is possible that some dedicated ripping software does a better job by doing more extensive re-reading.
The ones supporting AccurateRip will simple tell you if your rip is bit perfect or not.
But even this is not 100% bullet prove as it is a statistical criteria (as bit perfect reading is not guaranteed, we never know for sure)

If you Google a little or follow this link http://designwsound.com/dwsblog/hifi-computer-faq/cas-5-cd-ripping-for-mac-itunes/ you will find all kind of tests.
In general a bit-wise comparison is done between the results of various rippers and in general the result is zero difference.
This doesn’t rule out that in case of damaged CDs, some ripping software can do a better job.
Likewise some optical drives are more accurate than others.
http://forum.dbpoweramp.com/showthread.php?25782-CD-DVD-Drive-Accuracy-List-2012

Most of the time the rips will be bit identical.
If they are not this will be in specific area’s (scratches)
If the idea that your rip might possibly not be bit perfect really bothers you, use a ripper supporting Accurate Rip

[timind]

Thanks VK, that information makes me much less inclined to re-rip all my cds. I think I'll only do it when I come across a bad copy, and there are some. I will continue using XLD when ripping new cds as it does provide AccurateRip data when finished.

[scb]

XLD is the most accurate ripper on the Mac that I've come across