Richard & Linda Thompson-Hard Luck Stories:Playing/Ripping Problems or Not?

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by GubGub, Sep 14, 2020.

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  1. CharlieClown

    CharlieClown Forum Resident

    Location:
    UK
    My initial experience is below; both playing and ripping issues.

    I've now bought a new external CD/DVD drive for my MacBook Pro (this might seem an extreme way to find a solution but I was going to buy one anyway) and I've now been able to successfully rip all 8 discs using XLD in Secure mode.

    As others have reported, there was some noise/grinding during the process and all but one of the discs reported between 1 and 11 retry attempts with half also reporting some jitter but all are reporting 'no errors' at the end of the process. I can share the logs if helps anyone?

    Proof will be in the listening but it gives me some confidence on holding out for a while for a solution rather than rushing back to Amazon for a replacement. I may even re-rip later once/if the AccurateRip database is updated with other submissions so I can compare to gain more confidence.

     
  2. dockofthebay

    dockofthebay Forum Resident

    Location:
    UK
    I tried that just about 2 months ago.

    Got the Police boxset for £9.99. Was very pleased.

    Then I opened it and found there was a duplicate disk - I had two copies of Outlandos d'Amour and no copies of Reggatta de Blanc.

    When I went on Amazon, surprise surprise - "Currently Unavailable".

    When I spoke with Amazon, they said other customers had complained about the same issue, so they had to take it off sale. I said I'd rather wait for my replacement copy to get it at the same price, but they wouldn't let me. I was very insistent, but I really had no choice. Refund given.*

    So it doesn't always work like you suggest. I'm not saying it shouldn't, I'm saying it doesn't. Give it a go and let me know how you get on asking Amazon to post a replacement in a few months once all this is resolved.

    (*In a happy ending to The Police story, I got a copy for £5 in HMV's sale.)
     
    Uncle Miles likes this.
  3. Dennis Metz

    Dennis Metz Born In A Motor City south of Detroit

    Location:
    Fonthill, Ontario
    Mine arrived today. Disc 1 played perfectly :cheers:
     
    Juggsnelson likes this.
  4. onlyconnect

    onlyconnect The prose and the passion

    Location:
    Winchester, UK
    Mine have all ripped successfully after a bit of effort. Observations:

    - Using secure mode in DBPowerAmp and restricting the ripping speed helped a lot
    - I have three drives I can use. There is a clear ranking 1 - 2- 3 in terms of which copes best with these CDs. I don't think I would have succeeded with the "worst" one. All the drives are fine in normal circumstances.
    - EAC is great for the most difficult tracks. With disk 4 track 14 it ripped with 3 sync errors, and in EAC it is easy to play back the exact spots where the errors occurred and verify that there is nothing audibly wrong.

    Tim
     
  5. GubGub

    GubGub Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    Sussex
    I have just taken a close look at the discs for the first time, starting with disc 4. Goodness me, it is totally trashed! :eek: It looks as though it has been used as frisbee by a Dickensian urchin fresh from a coalmine. Smothered in dirty fingerprints and all sorts of scratches with two strange parallel lines that run from the centre to the rim. I have given it a clean as best I can to remove the worst of the dirt and fingerprints but it still doesn't play.

    How on earth has all this happened? I have never seen anything like it on a brand new CD.
     
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  6. Dennis Metz

    Dennis Metz Born In A Motor City south of Detroit

    Location:
    Fonthill, Ontario
    Very odd. Mine are all visually perfect
     
  7. GubGub

    GubGub Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    Sussex
    Sorry to double post but I have an emerging theory. All of my discs have got smudgy marks at the quarter past and quarter to areas where they have been packed into the sleeves. I cannot remove these smudges. I am beginning to wonder whether there is something in the ink or packaging that has penetrated the playing surface and is causing these errors. Just a theory.
     
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  8. nlgbbbblth

    nlgbbbblth Senior Member

    Location:
    Ireland
    Hmmm. My order hasn't shipped from Amazon UK yet so very tempted to cancel
     
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  9. moomoomoomoo

    moomoomoomoo WhoNeedsRealityWhenThere'sMoreSleepToLookForwardTo

    Czechoslovakia may not have the best QC?
     
    Galaga King likes this.
  10. moomoomoomoo

    moomoomoomoo WhoNeedsRealityWhenThere'sMoreSleepToLookForwardTo

    Andy, any chance of pushing for a 96/24 digital release under the circumstances?
     
  11. formbypc

    formbypc Forum Resident

    How do you do this?
     
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  12. Wugged

    Wugged Forum Resident

    Location:
    Warsaw, Poland
    No, probably not. Maybe because it hasn't existed for the last 27 years.............. :rolleyes:

    :shrug:
     
  13. moomoomoomoo

    moomoomoomoo WhoNeedsRealityWhenThere'sMoreSleepToLookForwardTo

    Several posters have stated that's the country of manufacture stated on the cd's. I haven't seen a physical box.
     
  14. noname74

    noname74 Allegedly Canadian

    Location:
    .
    No they didn’t. They said Czech Republic.
     
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  15. moomoomoomoo

    moomoomoomoo WhoNeedsRealityWhenThere'sMoreSleepToLookForwardTo

    Um....................................... isn't that basically the same thing? o_O
     
    Galaga King likes this.
  16. noname74

    noname74 Allegedly Canadian

    Location:
    .
    No...not really.
     
  17. Galaga King

    Galaga King "Drive where the cops ain't"

    I ordered the Tom Petty An American Treasure set from Amazon UK a while back. One of the discs was defective. Amazon UK refunded me and told me to keep the box set. *shrug*
     
  18. Just finished the first four discs played on my OPPO 205. All are perfect and play without a glitch.

    My Disc 2 looks like it's been kicked around a school playground for a week though. The other three have slight scuff marks. I'm grateful for my OPPO.

    Tomorrow I'll check the second half of the box. Fingers crossed!
     
    Flaming Torch likes this.
  19. moomoomoomoo

    moomoomoomoo WhoNeedsRealityWhenThere'sMoreSleepToLookForwardTo

    Cool. I haven't had quality CS from Amazon.UK in a long time. USA is going downhill in my experience also.
     
  20. moomoomoomoo

    moomoomoomoo WhoNeedsRealityWhenThere'sMoreSleepToLookForwardTo

    I so wish I would have had the $1250 to buy once of the last 205's. Sadly, I do have it today; but the price is silly high on the collector's market. Still happy with my 95. I would like the gapless playback of the 205; + the ability to play raw dsd & my understanding is the audio section sounds better than my already excellent 95.
     
    SteveM likes this.
  21. Not to derail this thread but yes, I think you'd be surprised by the 205. It's a significant leap above the already good 105 in audio terms alone, which in itself, was already noticeably better than the 95.

    Maybe you'll get lucky on the used market?
     
    Last edited: Sep 15, 2020
  22. Kristofa

    Kristofa Enthusiast of small convenient sound carrier units

    Location:
    usa
    Czech Republic. Czechoslovakia broke up after the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
     
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  23. I have an Oppo 205 too. Fantastic machine. Seems these discs are working ok on them. Ill try on it first when my set arrives then downstairs on my Rotel which occasionally has issues with a few discs. Then the Mac burner
     
    SteveM likes this.
  24. moomoomoomoo

    moomoomoomoo WhoNeedsRealityWhenThere'sMoreSleepToLookForwardTo

    Validates my earlier statement: some players have better error correction than others. All cd's have errors. Any player will deal with minor errors. It sounds like this set is really foobarred; & only a really good transport will be able to play all.
     
    Mazzy likes this.
  25. Runicen

    Runicen Forum Resident

    Years ago, I remember reading about an anti-piracy measure employed on new release CDs. This was separate from the copy protection software. I may be butchering my terminology - maybe someone else here can fill me in if I'm only partially remembering this.

    The technique involved pushing the error correction mechanism built into how data is encoded in the data surface. The stock redbook audio standard had pretty robust means of recovering from read errors. This technique apparently threw in a lot of junk data to make it harder for a PC optical drive (presumably at the time as I doubt current drives are AS susceptible to it) to rip a clean MP3 from a given disc. I never heard of the practice being discontinued, but reporting on it went away. My assumption was always that it got junked like the "Copy Protection" logos that were around for all of a year or two before being rubbished.

    Given that other sets I've encountered issues similar to these on were in the same cardboard disc slot "folio" packaging and this packaging seemed by default to cause scuffs and scratches, but not severe enough to obviously prevent a disc from playing, this old copy protection scheme came to mind.

    Granted, this requires that I'm remembering the whole thing right and that it has anything to do with what's going on here, but...
     
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