GeekTime: dbPoweramp

Now that I have an iPhone, I've been on the lookout for a good tool for ripping CDs. Being a geek about some things, I want control over settings, including where music goes on my hard drive. iTunes does some things well, but its approach to music storage isn't what I want. So, I went looking. And I found the dbPoweramp suite.

A number of tools come with the suite, including an excellent conversion tool and a pretty good player. The centerpiece, though, is the CD Ripper software, with its "wisdom of the crowd" approach to both ripping and to metadata.

Here's a pic of the interface:

It's pretty straightforward -- I mean, there's a big button at the top labeled "Rip." Under that simplicity, however, are some pretty neat features:

• It pulls metadata from four different metadata providers simultaneously, in a process DB calls "PerfectMeta." It then compares the four streams using its own internal rules to ensure that the metadata is as clean as possible. You can still edit it yourself, if you like, and add your own classifications as well.
• It compares the rips it does with AccurateRip, an online database of CRCs from other persons ripping the same track. Essentially, if the AR database agrees with the rip of your track, DB assumes it's a good rip. If not, it lets you know and tries to make it match. (Technical details here.)
• It also compares frames of a rip with the AR database, and uses that comparison to recover errors. I've had CDs that other rippers couldn't complete that DB was able to piece together, using the AccurateRip database.
• If you choose UltraSecure ripping, it will rip each track three times, then begin the comparison process. As it does, it re-rips any frames that had errors. It takes longer, but by the time it's done you KNOW you have the best rip possible.
• You can adjust the quality of the rip in a number of ways, allowing you to decide just how much disk space you want to use for a given CD or track.
• You can change the naming pattern for the rips almost infinitely.
• The list of enclosed or available encoders is impressive, and they seem to work flawlessly.
• DB will encode one track while ripping the next, thus cutting down on rip time.
• If you have multiple CPUs, it will utilize them in parallel, thus further speeding up rips.

All in all, this is one of the best media software investments I've ever made. The documentation is sometimes a little arcane, and whoever writes it needs to learn punctuation and grammar -- but the software itself is great!

If you want CD ripping done right, get dbPoweramp CD Ripper.