EAC & LAME

[Guest Deeswift]

 

.:. EAC & LAME .:.

______________

 

 

 

Exact Audio Copy

 

Developer: Andre Wiethoff

Website Exact Audio Copy

EAC v0.95 prebeta 5 (1.67 mb) DOWNLOAD

 

 

EAC (Exact Audio Copy) was created by Andre Wiethoff, a student of computer science and mathematics in Dortmund, Germany. Andre has worked for Pinnacle (Instant CD/DVD) on video programming and general additions for Instant CD/DVD.

 

From the EAC site:

 

"I wrote this software because I am fed up with other audio grabbers. I always had to listen to every grabbed wave because other audio grabbers only do jitter correction while CD-ROM drives reading scratched CDs often produce distortions. Listening to every wave is a waste of time. So in March I decided to write my own audio grabber, mainly for my friends and my personal use. That said, if you don't like this software - don't use it! I don't want to make any profit from it. I just want to use (and share) the best grabber ever programmed (in my eyes this is the most exact grabber). Most important for me is getting feedback from users, but more about that later."

 

EAC is considered the king of CD ripping software, and rightly so! This software is easy to use and set up, there is a configuration wizard available in the options menu, but if you require more info, see here:

 

EAC / LAME SETUP GUIDE

 

Drive Offset Databases:

 

Set up your drive correctly!

Eac.Audio's Offset base

Coaster Factory's User Reported Drive Features Database

 

________________________________________________________________________________

 

LAME

 

Developer: Mike Cheng / The LAME Project

Website: The LAME Project

EasyLame v1.4 (657 kb) DOWNLOAD

 

 

EasyLAME combines the RazorLAME Front-end and LAME v3.90.3 Modified. This is the easiest way to get started using LAME and producing high quality mp3 files. Not sure which preset to use? Always use VBR mode, either "standard" or "extreme". When it comes to switches, LAME can be very confusing if you start messing with command lines, this is why it's best to stick to the presets:

 

--abr <bitrate>

-b <bitrate>

--decode

-f (fast-mode)

-h (high-quality)

-m m (mono-mode)

-a (downmix to mono)

-v <vbr-quality>

-B (max VBR/ABR bitrate)

--allshort (use short blocks only)

--athlower (lower the ATH)

--athonly (ATH only)

--athshort (ATH only for short blocks)

--athtype (select ATH type)

--bitwidth (input bit width)

-c (copyright)

--cbr (enforce use of constant bitrate)

--clipdetect (clipping detection)

--comp (choose compression ratio)

--cwlimit (tonality limit)

-d (block type control)

--disptime (time between display updates)

-e (de-emphasis (n, 5, c))

-F (strictly enforce the -b option)

--freeformat (free format bitstream)

--highpass (highpass filtering frequency in kHz)

--highpass-width (width of highpass filtering in kHz)

-k (full bandwidth)

--lowpass (lowpass filtering frequency in kHz)

--lowpass-width (width of lowpass filtering in kHz)

-m (stereo mode)

--mp1input (MPEG Layer I input file)

--mp2input (MPEG Layer II input file)

--mp3input (MPEG Layer III input file)

--noath (disable ATH)

--noasm (disable assembly optimizations (mmx/3dnow/sse))

--nohist (disable histogram display)

--noreplaygain (disable ReplayGain analysis)

--nores (disable bit reservoir)

--noshort (disable short blocks frames)

--notemp (disable temporal masking)

-o (non-original)

-p (error protection)

--preset <preset-name>

--priority (OS/2 process priority control)

-q (algorithm quality selection)

--quiet (silent operation)

-r (input file is raw pcm)

--replaygain-accurate (compute ReplayGain more accurately and find the peak sample)

--replaygain-fast (compute ReplayGain fast but slightly inaccurately (default))

--resample (output sampling frequency in kHz (encoding only))

-s (sampling frequency in kHz)

-S (silent operation)

--scale (scale input)

--scale-l (scale input channel 0 (left))

--scale-r (scale input channel 1 (right))

--short (use short blocks)

--silent (silent operation)

--strictly-enforce-ISO strict ISO compliance

-t (disable INFO/WAV header)

--vbr-new (new VBR mode)

--vbr-old (older VBR mode)

--verbose (verbosity)

-x (swapbytes)

-X (change quality measure)

 

Don't bother. You won't get better quality results than the presets no matter how much you mess with those!

 

 

A BRIEF HISTORY OF LAME

 

 

 

Following the great history of GNU naming, LAME originally stood for LAME Ain't an Mp3 Encoder. LAME started life as a GPL'd patch against the dist10 ISO demonstration source, and thus was incapable of producing an mp3 stream or even being compiled by itself. But in May 2000, the last remnants of the ISO source code were replaced, and now LAME is the source code for a fully LGPL'd MP3 encoder, with speed and quality to rival all commercial competitors.

 

LAME is an educational tool to be used for learning about MP3 encoding. The goal of the LAME project is to use the open source model to improve the psycho acoustics, noise shaping and speed of MP3. LAME is not for everyone - it is distributed as source code only and requires the ability to use a C compiler. However, many popular ripping and encoding programs include the LAME encoding engine, see: Software which uses LAME.

 

Using the LAME encoding engine (or other mp3 encoding technology) in your software may require a patent license in some countries.

 

LAME features :

 

* Many improvements in quality in speed over ISO reference software. See history.

* MPEG1,2 and 2.5 layer III encoding.

* CBR (constant bitrate) and two types of variable bitrate, VBR and ABR.

* Encoding engine can be compiled as a shared library (Linux/UNIX), DLL or ACM codec (Windows)

* free format encoding and decoding

* GPSYCHO: a GPL'd psycho acoustic and noise shaping model.

* Powerfull and easy to use presets

* Quality is comparable to FhG encoding engines and substantially better than most other encoders.

* Fast! Encodes faster than real time on a PII 266 at highest quality mode.

* MP3x: a GTK/X-Window MP3 frame analyzer for both .mp3 and unencoded audio files.

 

Information about LAME:

 

* Software which uses LAME

* MP3 Related Links

* Who is The LAME Project

* History/ChangeLog

* Rationale, by Mike Cheng, Sept. 1998

* TooLAME (layer II encoding)

 

 

CONDENSED

 

 

Lame development started around mid-1998. Mike Cheng started it as a patch against the 8hz-MP3 encoder sources. After some quality concerns raised by others, he decided to start from scratch based on the dist10 sources. That branch (a patch against the reference sources) became Lame 2.0, and only on Lame 3.81 they got rid of all dist10 code, making Lame no more only a patch.

 

The project quickly became a team effort. Mike Cheng eventually left leadership and started working on tooLame, an MP2 encoder. Mark Taylor became leader and released version 3.0 featuring gpsycho, a new psychoacoustic model developed by him.

 

Nowadays Lame is considered the best MP3 encoder at high bitrates and at VBR, mostly thanks to the dedicated work of talented developers like Takehiro Tominaga, Naoki Shibata, Darin Morrison, Gabriel Bouvigne, Robert Hegemann, etc. And development is still going on...

 

 

-- thanks to Roberto Amorim for providing useful information --

[Steve]

For some reason EAC just will not work for me. It recognises the disc and the tracks on the disc, but when I try and rip them I get some weird error that I couldn't fix.

[Guest Deeswift]

What's the error? Do you have IMAPI service running? And you installed an ASPI layer?

[Steve]

I can't remember mate. I removed it in the end. I had IMAPI running and an ASPI layer. I tried loads of recommendations from various forums but it just wouldn't have it. I just rip files to wavs using Nero and encode to mp3 with LAME now.

[Guest Deeswift]

No major loss then.

[Guest Deeswift]

I'm late on this one... I discovered recently that copying the WNASPI32.DLL from the Nero folder to the EAC folder enables EAC to work on XP SP2. I had a problem with EAC not recognising my Sony drive for a while. I even dual booted with SP1 on another partition to enable me to rip CD's but copying that file sorted it. I have no idea why EAC won't work for you Sigma but maybe this is worth a try?

[Steve]

Thanks mate. I'll give it a bash.

[Huw]

i D/Led both of these earlier and it seems to be working ok (i haven't really fiddled with anything, just used the default settings). only trouble is, it takes ages. is there any way to speed up the extraction and compression??

[Sideshow]

if i understand it i think it takes as long as the song lasts

it is recording real time

just like if you played it in winamp and recorded in cool edit or whatever

[Steve]

If you wanna just rip a few tracks for your mp3 player then use Nero. It's loads quicker than other methods and it uses a version of LAME to encode files. It won't give you quite as good a sound as the EAC method, but you won't notice through a set of headphones.

[Guest Deeswift]

The encoding isn't in real time, it's faster, but still fairly slow. I think it's slow to ensure accurate results, rather than sacrificing quality for speed. The LAME version you are using is 3.90.3 modified, and later versions are quite a bit faster. The reason 3.90.3 modified is used and most often recommended is because the presets are so highly tuned for it. Later versions weren't as tested or tuned, but they are still fine to use. If you want the best results, use 3.90.3 modified, but if you want better speed use something like 3.96.1 from here:

 

http://www.rarewares.org/mp3.html

[Mixologist]

Well i have both programs now and i must say i'm really happy with both of them only probelm is, dee's versiosn wan't working for meo ne night, so nbow i have a dutch language one and i have absolutley no idea what it says ot what i installed when i did, hopefully no adware...

[Guest Deeswift]

LOL.

 

OK, I made this easy for you. Download this zip file:

 

http://www.digitalvertigo.co.uk/dv/dvkb/Ni...me.v3.96.1m.zip

 

It's a custom version of I just made, so encoding should be faster.

 

Extract the contents of the downloaded zip. Place the folder in C:\Program Files\ or wherever you want. Enter the folder, create a shortcut on your desktop by right-clicking the RazorLame.exe and selecting "Send To Desktop".

 

Double click the new shortcut to open RazorLame.

Click the "LAME" button to configure quality settings.

Click "Load Options", "Presets", "VBR".

Choose either Extreme or Standard. Click OK, and that's it.

Drop a WAV file into the RazorLame window and start encoding.

[Guest Deeswift]

If you want more presets, btw, I will make them. These are the only two you should need really.

[Mixologist]

sweet deal, thanks a lot dee. Also I love how all the other programs like cool edit pro, know that lame's installed so i can save as mp3's now and i didn't have to do anything. amazing.

[Guest Deeswift]

Good point, that's a definate bonus Mixo.

[Huw]

coolio, i'll see if any of the other versions are quicker. it could be worse i guess...

[Guest Deeswift]

OK. Get back to me and let me know if it works OK. I tried encoding a single mp3 using the modded version and found it very fast.

[Guest Deeswift]

Added (to top post) links to HydrogenAudio's and The Coaster Factory's offset databases to correctly set up CD / DVD drives in EAC.

[djxander]

EAC is quite a pain in the ass from my luck with it. I'm trying to get it to load my track titles, but it doesn't really do that for shit. I think i'm gonna go back to encoding in iTunes @ 196 heh. I did get easy lame which seems far less BSy than EAC - maybe i'm not getting something

[Guest Deeswift]

EAC is simple, it has wizards to help you set it up. I can't see anything complex about it.

 

GUIDE

 

Although it's old, it's almost accurate still.

[Guest Deeswift]

Just bumping this cause there's a new version of EAC available.

 

http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/

 

What’s new in version 0.95 beta 1

===========================

 

Wave editor and native interface stability improved

Many bug fixes (E.g. extraction engine crashes, CDDB problems, compression queue)

Added interface for CDRDAO for CD writing

Inserting all tracknames from Clipboard using Ctrl+Shift+V

[TopherEightyFive]

alright. so i dl'd eac. now i need a lame encoding program. that link for easylame and ninjalame are down. can anyone help me out?

[Steve]

If you want to rip and encode all in one go, then read this thread: -

 

http://www.digitalvertigo.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=6629

 

If you want to use EAC to rip and another program to encode, then read about winLAME in this thread: -

 

http://www.digitalvertigo.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=4288

 

In the second thread there are also links to LAME version 3.90.3 for winLAME which is considered by some people to be the best version. winLAME by default uses version 3.96.1. I can't really tell the difference to be honest.

[TopherEightyFive]

thanks steve.