[juggernaut850]

Hello everyone out in there cyberspace......

I had to replace my hard drive on my mac and re install all programs including Itunes (my music, saved as wav files, was on an external HD).  This meant I lost all tagging (genra, etc) for the music collection and as such I have decided to start over with collection and rip to FLAC to ultimately feed my SB Touch.

So.... How on earth do I make FLAC work with Itunes and my SB system (including tagging, art work, etc)???

Recommendations on best FLAC ripper? Settings etc? How are you guys (and gals) handling your online music collection?

Thank you in advance....

 

[Construct]

Hello everyone out in there cyberspace......

I had to replace my hard drive on my mac and re install all programs including Itunes (my music, saved as wav files, was on an external HD).  This meant I lost all tagging (genra, etc) for the music collection and as such I have decided to start over with collection and rip to FLAC to ultimately feed my SB Touch.

So.... How on earth do I make FLAC work with Itunes and my SB system (including tagging, art work, etc)???

Recommendations on best FLAC ripper? Settings etc? How are you guys (and gals) handling your online music collection?

Thank you in advance....

 

Best flac ripper= exact audio copy (EAC)Decent flac ripper:  winamp pro  but it's $19.99.
There should be conversion tools available.  Since you have a mac---why not use either AIFF or apple lossless?  They both work as well as flac, and all the song data comes with it when itunes rips it. 

[bunnyma357]

I use Max to Rip FLAC's on the Mac, and find it to be good. Many think the sound quality of Play also from sbooth is better than iTunes, although it is a little more cumbersome. They also have a program called Tag which can be used to Tag files that have already been ripped.

http://sbooth.org/Max/

To play FLAC's in iTunes you can install Fluke which adds FLAC support.

http://code.google.com/p/flukeformac/

Jim C

[avta]

I prefer XLD as a ripper (http://tmkk.hp.infoseek.co.jp/xld/index_e.html ) Since you will be using the Software that the Touch uses you will not have to do anything special  i.e. you won't use iTunes to run the Touch.  Be sure you use SqueezeboxServer 7.5.1 (http://downloads.slimdevices.com/nightly/ ) as it corrected some problems in an earlier version. There is an excellent forum you should follow if you don't already do so. (http://forums.slimdevices.com ) I think you will find lots of answers to your questions. Good luck and keep us posted.

[stereocilia]

Best flac ripper= exact audio copy (EAC)Decent flac ripper:  winamp pro  but it's $19.99.
There should be conversion tools available.  Since you have a mac---why not use either AIFF or apple lossless?  They both work as well as flac, and all the song data comes with it when itunes rips it.

When using Apple Lossless with the SB, I found that the (admittedly seldom-used) fast-forward and rewind functions were disabled.  I'm not sure about the touch with new software so maybe that's changed.

[Construct]

When using Apple Lossless with the SB, I found that the (admittedly seldom-used) fast-forward and rewind functions were disabled.  I'm not sure about the touch with new software so maybe that's changed.

Interesting...I will check that out.  My ipod classic (ye olde 6gb)  is running rockbox and FLAC files. 

[Crimson]

If your original rips were WAV files (uncompressed lossless), why not rip to AIFF (another uncompressed lossless format) which will retain all tag info in case of a catastrophic failure?

[doctorcilantro]

If your original rips were WAV files (uncompressed lossless), why not rip to AIFF (another uncompressed lossless format) which will retain all tag info in case of a catastrophic failure?

Metadata was not embedded to file tags? What ripper did you use originally? Are you to start fresh w/ FLAC, and you used another file type before; I wasn't clear on that. Mp3 tag, DBpowerAmp, JRMC, etc can tell if the metadata is indeed there or not.

[Vincent Kars]

The problem with WAV is that it can be tagged but there is no standard.
Some applications solve this by writing ID3 tags (the MP3 standard) in a info chunk
Others only use the few tags, other simply don’t tag at all.
That is the paradox of WAV, support for playback is universal, support for tagging is a mess.

http://thewelltemperedcomputer.com/KB/WAV_KB.htm

[richidoo]

Welcome to AudioCircle Juggernaut!!!
 

I like dbpoweramp for ripping and converting. Don't know if it's available for Mac... You can rip to Apple Lossless with a free codec from them.

You can't use iTunes to control Squeezebox. But I think Squeezebox server can play tunes from iTunes database. Is there an Apple Squeezebox Server now? Apple lossless is just as good as flac and will play in an ipod. flac won't play on apple products without a software plugin or workaround.

As for flac settings, the default is 5 which is a compromise between compression speed and final file size. You can change the setting for less space or faster compression, but it doesn't affect the sound at all. I stick with 5. There are no other flac settings. But there are a lot of settings on the various rip programs. Read the help file to get to know what's going on before you rip too much with a wrong setting.

I recommend that you embed album art in the tracks. It makes them a little larger, but you always have the cover art no matter what happens. Space is cheap now.

I like to organize my library with separate folders for genre artist album, although SB and portable players don't require this. Easier to find a track manually if you need it.

Get an external drive for the music collection, or as a backup. It's nice to be able to carry your collection to friends' house.

Sorry about the crash. Should got a PC... haha  j/k
Again, welcome!!
Rich