Ripping CDs to MP3 - too slow?

[dcbell]

Having problems (too slow) ripping CDs to MP3 (at 192 kbps, VBR). I'm using EAC v0.94beta2 to make the uncompressed rip and then EAC uses LAME v1.3 (or the latest version, not sure of version number) to compress the files to MP3 format. The initial rip to the uncompressed format takes about 40s for an average single 3+minute track, but then the LAME compressing takes ages. The track speed in the EAC window is given as 4.4X (and hence the 40s for a 3min track) but the overall progress speed is at 0.1X (which presumably means a 60 min Cd will take 600 mins - i may as well commit some major crimes, get a life stretch and spend my time ripping my CD collection at this speed). I'm using an IBM A21p Thinkpad laptop with Pentium III/850 MHz processor, 256MB RAM, an IBM 4X/4X/20X-8X CD-RW with Windows 2000 Pro. By today's standards (2+ years old, now) it's slow, but still no slouch. I've ripped an entire CD on another slower computer using RealPlayerOne, which i presume won't be as good quality, in about 10-15 mins at 192kbps.

One thing I noticed is that in the pop-up window that defines speeds/times/bit-rates/etc in LAME, there appears to be encoding at all the bit-rates up to 320, despite me setting up EAC to 192 (which presumably cross-talks with LAME to set this bit-rate level) and aslo file sizes seem large (a 3min uncompressed file is approx 40MB, and the LAME compressed file goes down to approx 4MB - is that OK?) .

Any advice? Cheers.

[kamj12]

have you used RIGHTCLICK before?

http://download.com.com/3000-2140-10104982.html?tag=lst-0-1

[LagunaSol]

...although .1x doesn't sound right. On my dual G4 867 I get about 1.5-1.8x encoding speed in LAME, compared to about 16-18x encoding speed using the default encoder in iTunes (the quality of which I was not happy with).

The new AAC format encodes much faster - around 12x on my machine, and sounds as good as LAME per my tests (actually better than LAME at equivalent bitrates). I'll probably re-rip everything to AAC once the dust settles. When iTunes for Windows comes out later this year, you may want to look at the same option. If you have a lot of CDs, ripping to LAME is a long, long process at 1.8x; at .1x speed I wouldn't even bother. By the time you finish, the technology will be here to pump 3-D hi-def music directly into your brain. ;)

[dcbell]

Originally posted by kamj12
have you used RIGHTCLICK before?

http://download.com.com/3000-2140-10104982.html?tag=lst-0-1

No never tried RIGHTCLICK but from the link it seems like you need to have the file ripped in MP3 or wav first. So would you need to rip from CD into wav using EAC, and then EAC would use RIGHTCLICK as the external encoder to compress the uncompressed wav into MP3? Or does RIGHTCLICK rip straight to MP3 from CD?

Ultimatley, as LagunaSol suggested, I think I may just do a quick messy rip to MP3 now (maybe using RealPlayerOne - it's set up on my computer at work and seems to work pretty fast - anyone had any problems?) in the knowledge that i'll re-rip to better quality AAC when it becomes an easier option in Windows (with itunes for Windows?) in the next few months.

[dcbell]

Apologies, in my rush I forgot to thank you both for your sound advice.
Thanks, the help in these early daunting days is really appreciated.