What is the point of CD rips?

[axellieb]

this entire thread is basicallly...

"I didnt do backups and so thru 100% fault of my own, I lost a whole bunch of data that I could get back but it requires a lot of arduous manual labor"

that's it

:-/

Uh no, that's not at all what this thread is about. Your comment is obnoxious and adds no value to this discussion.

 

[Jimbob54]

Lost my entire rip collection a few weeks back. Not an enormous collection but probably about 200 CDs. The SD card they were stored on couldn't be rescued and I had no back-up.

Yeah.

Have been playing around with Tidal since then and so far, it seems to suit me just fine. Albums that I can't find on there are very few. Maybe 5% of my collection.

So, my question is: is there even a point in re-ripping my collection that I'm missing? I can't think of one. I mean apart from the few CDs I can't find on Tidal. And indeed, what is even the point of buying CDs at this point, again apart from the rare cases that aren't on Tidal and the like?

I ripped my larger collection to FLAC a few years ago before I got into streaming and disposed of the bulk of the CDs With hindsight I might not have bothered with the ripping of everything but one never knows when a few artists/ labels might disappear from some/ all streaming services (Neil Young being a high profile fairly recent case). I very rarely feel the need to play the rips of the few CDs (your 5% sounds about right, maybe even less for me) that never made it to streaming but have included MP3 versions in playlists on my phone so I can easily access should I feel the need.

I doubt I will ever buy physical CDs ever again (probably been 2 years since bought the last one) as even if an album isnt on streaming, I will likely buy a digital download if available.

I far prefer CD quality streaming as a way of accessing my music and discovering new than either playing CDs or rips on a PC. So convenient and also so much more efficient to access new music too. Suspect we are in something of a golden age tbh.

 

[OldHvyMec]

OP asked should he/she re-rip all the CD's...

If he/she owned the originals they can archive from what they have. You rip a CD not the other way around. You clone or copy a hard drive.
What does RIPPED mean? Ripped off is a lot better term in 90% of the music. Kids ripped off via MP3s and good ol Napster until, he (Mr.
Napster got the crap sued out of him). A legal RIP is gathering your favorite tunes from your personal collection of originals and putting
them to a CDR disk. I don't use illegal recording under any circumstance. I didn't sneak into concerts either, a drive-in picture, maybe.

I'm glad to hear you're the 10%

 

[mhardy6647]

this entire thread is basicallly...

"I didnt do backups and so thru 100% fault of my own, I lost a whole bunch of data that I could get back but it requires a lot of arduous manual labor"

that's it

:-/

That still leaves a very valid question - "Given that, will I personally be better off to pay someone else to take care of the stuff I don't want to do?"

No judgement from me! Some people pay other people to mow their lawns because they (i.e., the "some people") decide their time is worth more to them doing something else or they dislike doing it enough to pay for the convenience of not having to spend an hour or two cutting grass.

There is room for both kinds of people (sweat equity vs. pay-for-service) in society (so far...).

 

[PuX]

streaming often does not have the right release for you (replaced with a remaster or other similar cases).
and sometimes it does not have what I want at all - due to copyright, sampling etc. or just the artist did not bother to upload a more obscure release.

so if you have something and want to continue having access to it, use backup - NAS, cloud etc.

 

[mhardy6647]

Actually, I'll even take the liberty to extend my already strained metaphor even further.
I see streaming as roughly equivalent to a grocery store (or, even more aptly, shopping for groceries online). There is some incremental cost in the convenience, there's mammoth inventory, and - to some extent - you get what you get.

There's an alternative - grow your own food. Many limitations, but some (arguably) real and some perceived added value compared to buying the fixings for tonight's dinner with a couple of clicks online.

I mean, realistically, some hybrid of the two is most practical.
We do like to grow our own as much as possible. Of course, we also go to the store, but I am loath to let someone else pick out the precise vegetables, fruits, or meats I want to buy.

 

[boxerfan88]

Some CD masters from the past do sound better than what’s available in the streaming service library (typically contains newer remastered stuff).

Maybe just re-rip those CDs that you think sound better, and rely on streaming library for the rest of the content that sounds okay to your ears.

 

[JonK99]

I have about 400 CDs ripped to ALAC on my NAS, with a backup at home and another in the cloud, as well as all the original CDs in boxes in the basement. I remember ripping the entire collection over the course of a few months where I kept stacks of CDs next to my computer and would throw in a disk whenever I had a spare moment. This was before Spotify and I had a spare laptop set up as a "media computer" with iTunes permanently connected to my receiver via an optical cable. Fast forward to today: the ripped titles are largely ignored and I just stream from Apple Music on my phone even if I have a ripped copy -- it's just easier to have a single place to go for both things I own and things I don't own. So, if I lost all the data I would probably just go back and rip the small handful of things that aren't available to stream and that I still care about -- which is probably about ten CDs or so.

 

[vicenzo_del_paris]

I do agree. If the entire Internet were to be shut down forever in the near future, I would not be surprised, but I am prepared for it.

In case of entire internet shutdown, when thinking about potential causes, I think personal CD collections would be the least of our worries

 

[mhardy6647]

Some CD masters from the past do sound better than what’s available in the streaming service library (typically contains newer remastered stuff).

Nothing gets my old man yells at cloud juices flowing like reading statements like that and realizing (ahem, feeling) that this is simply accepted as a given.
High resolution junk. That's what progress has brought us.

OK, gonna go yell at some young whippersnappers -- I am sure I can find some someplace!

 

[sergeauckland]

I ripped my entire CD collection (just over 2000), which I have backed up locally and a second backup I keep off-site. I also have some 300 albums in my Spotify library, which I use for albums I might want to play once or twice, but not anything I would be upset by if they went away. Anything on Spotify I would be upset about losing, I buy the CD and rip that.

I don't like the way Spotify or any other streaming company tags their albums, I much prefer my own system, so another reason to rip my own CDs rather than use theirs.
Mastering is a further reason to rip my own CDs, as I have original CDs going back to 1984, so before any remastering. With very few exceptions, I've found remastering universally worse than the original, so even with any CDs I buy, I prefer to buy a used but original mastered CD than a later remastered.

As much of my music playing is classical, all streaming companies make a pig's ear of cataloguing those albums.

I also have several hundred LPs, and haven't ripped those as to me the whole point of owning LPs is to play the LP itself. When I've wanted a digital copy of an LP, I've bought the CD, again original rather than remastered.

Although I still have a CD player in my main system, that gets used far more for when a friend comes round with a few CDs for an evening of tunes than actually playing my CDs, which just get ripped then stored.

S.

 

[Curvature]

I would say about half or more of my collection can't be found on streaming services. Combination of vinyl and CDs and digital releases. Fair amount of unreleased music, too. The available proportion has been increasing over the last 15 years, although I don't expect to ever fully rely on these companies to hold and catalogue everything I like for me.

I like curating and spending time on my collection. A lot of memories are bound to obscure things outside of the music itself, like my decision to organize using particular method, or how hard I had to look for a specific piece.

 

[mhardy6647]

In case of entire internet shutdown, when thinking about potential causes, I think personal CD collections would be the least of ours worries

Of course! That's why we have LP records!
Battery operated players too.

 

[Ze Frog]

I have CD's just because I prefer it over streaming personally. The CD's mean I have no fear of content being removed and the like, plus physical media is just part of the Hi-fi experience in my mind.

 

[rdenney]

Ripping a CD and then selling it on (or giving it away) for the next person to rip or even listen to it is a violation of copyright law. Yet I’ve read on this forum people who brag that they did just that.

But the physical CD is much more than just a piece of plastic. It is a permanent, irrevocable license to listen to the music on the CD as long as one sustains the technology to do so.

Rips are convenience copies for the owner of the CD to use in situations where the ability to play the CD is unavailable, such as one’s car, on an airplane, or in a hotel room. The original is not the rip, but the CD.

So, losing one’s collection of rips should at worst require that they rip the CD again. If they sold or gave away the CD, they no longer have the license to listen to it.

But the rip is also a valid backup in case the CD becomes unreadable, in which case one enjoys the same permanent and irrevocable license to listen to the rip as long as one possesses the physical CD.

Streaming services are also licenses to listen to music, but they are neither permanent nor irrevocable. The limit of the streaming company’s liability is the subscription fee.

Electronic downloads of music bought, which is a different thing than a streaming service, should be burned on a CD and kept with the receipt. That is the permanent license. Otherwise, one is at the mercy of the service provider.

My rips are stored on my phone, on the computer I used to rip them, and on various thumb drives for use in vehicles. The originals are still on the shelf. Streaming is no replacement for that.

Rick “not shaking a fist at the clouds” Denney

 

[Dialectic]

Multiple backups is a good idea .. I have my ~75k tracks backed up on several disks stored off-site, and in the cloud as well.

My main reason for keeping the ripped CDs is that I have full control over which mastering I'm listening to. A lot of the older stuff (>20 years) has been remastered dozens of times, making it sound worse for every remaster. Classical music is also kind of a nightmare on streaming services, especially finding the right recording when there are hundreds of Beethovens 5th symphony out there, not to mention that many of the records I like can't be found on streaming.

If you listen to classical music even semi-seriously, you have to rip it yourself.

I have ~15,000 ripped CDs/SACDs. Used Tidal for several years but gave it up, as it encourages me to listen to worse music than I'd listen to otherwise.

 

[Bleib]

I keep a copy of my CD rips, all wave files are on two harddrives. The other harddrive is mostly not connected at all in case lightning kills the electronics

 

[Lupin]

I still rip all my CDs, why? Offline availability.
At home i have good fast and stable internet so I pretty much stream everything. But I also travel for work regularly. Often to areas with bad or no internet reception at all. In those cases it is still nice to have my music offline available to me.

 

[TonyJZX]

here's a central conceit

if you ask someone to mow the lawn like i do, then I'm paying for someone to do a task that i would find onerous but he would do it a level that would be better than i could do AND maybe he has equipment that i dont own, nor do i feel like buying

now if the various services on the web do a great job of catering to your tastes AND you have constant access to internet then you're good to go

what i have found is the various services out there DO NOT cater to my tastes.... nor am i in a situation where i can access these services freely

in a past job i had workmate asking if i could access web video and streaming services inside say... a military base where public 4g 5g access cannot be tested... and so.... get used to one bar reception and falling back to voice lte

and so my response to that is to buy a phone with 256gb and then load a 256gb sd card on it

what the military doesnt know cant hurt them (right? right?)

 

[Roland68]

That still leaves a very valid question - "Given that, will I personally be better off to pay someone else to take care of the stuff I don't want to do?"

No judgement from me! Some people pay other people to mow their lawns because they (i.e., the "some people") decide their time is worth more to them doing something else or they dislike doing it enough to pay for the convenience of not having to spend an hour or two cutting grass.

There is room for both kinds of people (sweat equity vs. pay-for-service) in society (so far...).

But I can tell you very precisely that such a service, if it is supposed to be reliable, is far too expensive for private things and people with normal incomes.
Just take a look at normal cloud storage services and which ones also compensate you if data loss occurs.