Switching from EAC to dbPowerAmp?

Discussion in 'Audio Hardware' started by hvbias, Jul 29, 2017.

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  1. hvbias

    hvbias Midrange magic Thread Starter

    Location:
    Northeast
    I used dbPowerAmp many, many years ago and at the time I didn't find it that different from EAC, plus EAC had well established settings for secure mode ripping, so I just continued to use it.

    I now have over 500 CD backlog primarily from classical box sets. It's got to the point where if I want to listen to a disc I'll just do a quick rip in EAC with no test and copy, listen to the disc then delete it because properly tagging is starting to become a daunting task. EAC's default tagging has also made a bit of a mess of my last.fm page.

    I'm wondering if there are any classical listeners that could offer advice on how dbPowerAmp is with tagging? In my opinion EAC is not very good at this, I currently have it setup to use FreeDB, and the other non-paid databases it comes with.
     
  2. Bubbamike

    Bubbamike Forum Resident

    With the paid version, I can't say for the free one, you have 3 or 4 sources for tags and can edit as you like. So it is excellent for tagging.
     
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  3. Time Is On My Side

    Time Is On My Side Forum Resident

    Location:
    Madison, WI
    Another option I found useful is do two rips - one with iTunes and one with EAC. Then take the iTunes files and copy the tags into the EAC files, delete the iTunes files. So you get good rip plus iTunes' tagging.
     
  4. Ham Sandwich

    Ham Sandwich Senior Member

    Location:
    Sherwood, OR, USA
    If you enable the CUETools DB Plugin in EAC you will get access to MusicBrainz metadata when ripping a CD in EAC.

    The CUETools DB Plugin comes with the latest version of EAC but may not be enabled. Go to EAC >> EAC Options... >> Audio Plugins tab and enable the CUETools plugin. Then select CUETools for the metadata source and you should see some options for MusicBrianz in the metadata options. MusicBrainze does pretty well for classical music tagging. Here's info on the CUETools DB Plugin: CTDB EAC Plugin - CUETools wiki

    Alternatively you could use CUERipper which is included in the CUETools program.

    Or use dBpoweramp.

    There is no need to do test and copy if the CD is verified as accurately ripped by either AccurateRip or CTDB (CUETools DB). The only time you need to do a test and copy is if the disc isn't in AccurateRip or CTDB. A good portion of classical CDs are in AccurateRip or CTDB. But there are still many that are missing. Especially for new releases. More classical music listeners who are ripping CDs need to submit their rips to AccurateRip or CTDB. It seems that many are ripping but not submitting.
     
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  5. hvbias

    hvbias Midrange magic Thread Starter

    Location:
    Northeast
    I have the CueTools plugin enabled with EAC, I actually used it to repair one scratched disc's rip; it's an amazing plugin!

    T&C is just the default I select for every disc, I don't think EAC would tell me before hand if a disc was in AR or CTDB? I would only see it afterwards in the log file. I have it setup to submit all my results to AR every 30 days, not sure if it is doing it with CTDB.

    It's the PerfectMeta plugin that had me intrigued with dbpoweramp, though that plugin looks like it accesses the same databases as EAC. I think I need to give it a try and see how it goes, from looking at screenshots it looks like dbpoweramp will be faster when renaming/fixing tagging where there are multiple performances on a single disc. One of the issues is some of these box sets are from the last year or two and the databases will have information for some discs (some of them would have been released individually) but won't know others.
     
  6. Ham Sandwich

    Ham Sandwich Senior Member

    Location:
    Sherwood, OR, USA
    EAC will display an AccurateRip icon in the bottom right of the EAC window if a CD is in AccurateRip. Insert a CD and if it is in AccurateRip that icon will show up. So you can know if a CD is in AccurateRip before ripping it. Unfortunately, I'm on a laptop right now that doesn't have a CD drive so I can't take a screenshot of EAC showing that icon.

    If a CD is in AccurateRip or CTDB just do a regular rip without the test and copy. Test and copy just takes more time that isn't necessary.
     
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  7. Ham Sandwich

    Ham Sandwich Senior Member

    Location:
    Sherwood, OR, USA
    The PerfectMeta feature of dBpoweramp is nice. The PerfectMeta metadata window shows the metadata from multiple databases all side by side. You can see all of the relevant data and select which source(s) give you the best data for that disc. dBpoweramp has a trial period. You can try it with your classical CDs to see if it works for you. dBpoweramp does take some custom setup options to get it to actually work the way I want it to. It's not quite install and go.

    I liked dBpoweramp a lot better when it had AllMusic as a data source. With AllMusic gone the classical tagging isn't as good as it was before. Especially with box sets. Bummer.
     
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  8. hvbias

    hvbias Midrange magic Thread Starter

    Location:
    Northeast
    I've installed it, it looks like I just need to select secure mode and I am good to go? My drive doesn't have C2 detection so I don't think there is anything else that I need to mess with.

    Even selecting secure mode, I was very surprised at how quickly it rips CDs. I haven't tried any classical yet, just tested it with some fairly popular rock albums from the 90s that I used for EAC to detect the drive's offset. dbpoweramp was ripping these discs within 2-3 minutes in secure mode. In EAC these discs would take ~ 20 minutes in secure with test and copy (these discs are very clean, virtually no scratches). So far the only thing I don't like is it doesn't automatically create a log file, I have to copy and paste it into a text document.
     
  9. hvbias

    hvbias Midrange magic Thread Starter

    Location:
    Northeast
    I don't think I'll ever be completely satisfied with classical tagging and that is alright, I'll just have to fix them for the way I like it done. I like that dbpoweramp presents it all in a column view and this has so far made it faster to fix tags compared to EAC.

    This is from the Rostropovich Complete DG Recordings, there are still a handful of mistakes from the freedb entry.

    [​IMG]
     
  10. hvbias

    hvbias Midrange magic Thread Starter

    Location:
    Northeast
    dBpoweramp ripped a CD that EAC could not rip accurately on the last track on either of my drives (one pretty good Plextor, another no name laptop drive); given the unimpeachable reputation of EAC's ripping engine I didn't think there would be any point in trying. dBpoweramp was able to rip everything, including the problematic last track with AccurateRip 7 confidence (spoon says CRCv2 is superior so I am going with AR 7). With my old EAC rip I had to use CueTools to repair the last track.

    The relevant portion of the EAC log

    Code:
    Track 10
    
         Filename C:\Music\Rip Temp\10 - Brilliant Corners.wav
    
         Pre-gap length  0:00:02.74
    
         Suspicious position 0:07:06
    
         Peak level 100.0 %
         Extraction speed 3.5 X
         Track quality 99.8 %
         Test CRC E283CF43
         Copy CRC 2E826AA6
         Cannot be verified as accurate (confidence 7)  [ADA7D2A3], AccurateRip returned [2584DD4C]  (AR v2)
         Copy finished
    
    
     9 track(s) accurately ripped
     1 track(s) could not be verified as accurate
    
    Some tracks could not be verified as accurate
    
    There were errors
    
    dBpoweramp log:

    Code:
    Information ripping to FLAC, 'Track 10' to 'C:\Music\Rip Temp db\Bill Holman\Brilliant Corners; The Music of Thelonious Monk\10 Bill Holman - Brilliant Corners.flac'
       Track 10:  Ripped LBA 271305 to 311077 (8:50) in 1:27. Filename: C:\Music\Rip Temp db\Bill Holman\Brilliant Corners; The Music of Thelonious Monk\10 Bill Holman - Brilliant Corners._
         AccurateRip: Accurate (confidence 7)     [Pass 1 & 2, Re-Rip 3 Frames]
         CRC32: 625E7DBC     AccurateRip CRC: 2584DD4C (CRCv2)     [DiscID: 010-0019301c-00cade13-9310330a-10]
         AccurateRip Verified Confidence 7 [CRCv2 2584dd4c]
         AccurateRip Verified Confidence 4 [CRCv1 c73a10be]
    
    My short review:
    Overall I'm very pleased with dBpoweramp. The tagging window I brought up in a previous reply has made it much faster to correct classical tags, I don't need to lift my hands from the keyboard with tab. IMHO from the 50 or so classical discs I've ripped since starting this thread GD3 database is superior to MusicBrainz. The time saved over EAC is also significant though it's not such a big deal unless I want to listen to a disc immediately. The majority of the discs I've ripped have so far been AR 2-4 since it seems like many of them aren't in the AR database, even AR2 is good enough for me. Going forward I am just going to use EAC for problematic discs.
     
  11. Walter H

    Walter H Santa's Helper

    Location:
    New Hampshire, USA
    I do recommend enabling the Track Technical field so you'll know if a disc uses pre-emphasis.
     
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  12. Lownote30

    Lownote30 Bass Clef Addict

    Location:
    Nashville, TN, USA
    This will change sooner than later. Unlike pop music, classical hasn't had a metadata standard set yet. Freedb is/was user submitted metadata, so it's bound to be flawed.
     
  13. Tartifless

    Tartifless Forum Resident

    Location:
    France
    Let me understand, you mean that to listen tp a disc you rip it, listen to the files and then erase the files ?
    Why not putting it directly in a cd player ?
     
  14. hvbias

    hvbias Midrange magic Thread Starter

    Location:
    Northeast
    In the past I deleted the files because I was doing insecure rips in EAC just to save time, dBpoweramp now does a secure rip in the same time as a burst rip in EAC. In my system I have a high end external DAC that is connected to a fanless PC.

    I haven't used a CD player in well over 10 years... I think I made the permanent switch to external DACs around the time the Bel Canto DAC2 came out which was 2003/2004.
     
  15. Tartifless

    Tartifless Forum Resident

    Location:
    France
    Ok great.
    I also use an external dac with my cd player.
     
  16. GreenDrazi

    GreenDrazi Truth is beauty

    Location:
    Atlanta, GA
    You can change the settings in dbpoweramp to create a log file for each rip and save it to the rip folder. Sorry, I don't have the time at the moment to give you a step by step on how to find it, but it's there. And I believe that it's under the same settings tab as the secure ripping settings.
     
  17. harby

    harby Forum Resident

    Location:
    Portland, OR, USA
    MusicBrainz Picard is an excellent audio-signature tool for identifying, tagging, or re-tagging your library.

    EAC works well, I don't see any reason to pay more for similar functionality.

    TagAndRename is a good paid tool for mass-retags or library file renaming from tags. For the more advanced user, Ant Renamer is a general purpose file renamer.
     
  18. hvbias

    hvbias Midrange magic Thread Starter

    Location:
    Northeast
    I found it under secure rip settings. It's nice that this log includes more information.

    Regarding ultra secure mode, do I have this right- if my drive doesn't support C2 and it is disabled, ultra secure does two burst pass rips. If the CRC match AccurateRip it is done. If the CRC doesn't match it attempts to rip again except not in burst mode? I've noticed no difference in how long it takes to rip CDs in ultra secure, so I might as well leave it enabled.

    Thanks. I am thinking about starting another thread for suggestions on tag editors since I have thousands of rips that were not tagged as meticulously as what I'm doing now.

    Has anyone used PerfectTunes?
     
  19. c-eling

    c-eling They're made of light,We never would have guessed

    TOC only. Plus for those un-labeled HDCD discs :)
     
  20. Tartifless

    Tartifless Forum Resident

    Location:
    France
    I also like musicbrainz picard, it even has the music detection thing whenever you have a file named "track 1" in a directory named "album 1".

    But unfortunately i don't think the classical database is as up to date as the pop/rock database...
     
  21. Time Is On My Side

    Time Is On My Side Forum Resident

    Location:
    Madison, WI
    I just use all three. dBpoweramp is my favored one but when it has trouble on a disc, I try running it through EAC or CUETools.
     
  22. bubba-ho-tep

    bubba-ho-tep Resident Ne'er-Do-Well

    Location:
    San Tan Valley, AZ
    Same here. dBpoweramp is my general go-to when ripping CDs but sometimes it absolutely refuses to complete ripping a disc. It doesn't matter what drive I try. When dBpoweramp decides that it isn't ripping a given track, it absolutely will not.

    In these cases, EAC is my preferred backup. It rarely fails.
     
  23. HDOM

    HDOM Well-Known Member

    Dbpoweramp is so easy to use, they have a page, that explain how to make secure ripping:D
     
  24. Carl Swanson

    Carl Swanson Senior Member

    I use a stand-alone tagging program; seems easier, but I really haven't spent much time trying to use the dbPoweramp tagging options.

    I highlight all tracks to fix common items, add cat. #, artwork, etc, then go track by track to fix titles.

    Classical recordings are a beach to tag.
     
    hvbias likes this.
  25. luckybaer

    luckybaer Thinks The Devil actually beat Johnny

    Location:
    Missouri
    I just purchased dbPowerAmp and PerfectTunes. I haven't used either much yet. I tried the tag functionality on PerfectTunes - it uses 4 different tag sources (I can't remember all 4, but one was Discogs). Pretty easy to use. Choose the tag from the 4 presented, or make your own. I also used the album art repair function. My file names usually include the catalog number or barcode of the album, so it didn't like that much. I'll need to fiddle around with it some more, but most of my album art consists of CD booklets I've scanned myself, so I'm not too worried.
     
    hvbias likes this.
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