MP3's

[Slime101]

Morning all!!

I'm a bit of a noob to MP3's - kinda ignored them until now as i have no real desire to rip them off the net, and if i buy music itll be on CD to play on a decent hi-fi seperates setup i have :)

However my phone has an MP3 player, and i have a long train journey to look forward too so i thought i would put some on it to keep me entertained but have a few questions:

1) What prog (free if poss) should i use to "rip" my CD's to MP3's to put on my phone?

2) What bitrate shall i use?

3) Is it best to use a constant or a variable bitrate?

4) Anything else i should know? :p

Thankyou.

[Madoobri]

Windows Media Player allows you to rip from CD ... but I use a freebie called CDBurner XP Pro ... http://www.cdburnerxp.se/ I also occasionally use Nero.

Don`t know about the bitrate stuff as that was all setup already by default I think & seems to work fine :)

[TheGurkha]

I use Zlurp, which is a little bit Mickey Mouse to be honest, but it does the job without to many bells and whistles, which is what I wanted. It does a web-lookup for the filenames as well, which is nice. It's free too.

http://www.zlurp.com/

I use 128 bit rate sampling, which is more or less 'standard' for mp3's and sounds fine, either through the Creative Labs speakers connected to the PC and through my iPod.

Obviously the biggest impact to you is going to be the size of the file that is created at the different sampling rates. Depends on how much memory your phone has.

[...]

Your phone can play Mp3's and the sound quality is quite good BUT it will not have a lot of memory, probably around 20mb max. Given that a CD quality MP3 track is going to be around 4-5mb it only hold 3 -4 songs, less if you have a lot of images stored on the phone as well.

A constant bitrate sets the file size to a maximum and is usually defaulted to CD quality or less. With variable bitrate you can either increase the hifi quality and thus the file size or set it to a small file size and poorer quality sound.
Whatever you use you will need an MP3 ripper - the software that converts the CD track to an MP3. There are hundreds to choose from. Your operating system will have one installed by default or if you prefer something more esoteric go to www.cnet.com/downloads (http://www.cnet.com/downloads) and search using MP3.

If its a long train journey - I would just hum and look out the window:rolleyes:

[TheGurkha]

If its a long train journey - I would just hum and look out the window lol - or take a harmonica. Portable, solid state, no need for batteries, unlimited musical capacity :D

[Slime101]

I've got a 256mb MMC card in my phone for the MP3 and extra photo memory bit :)

I used ultimate encoder last night, seemed to do the job but its only a trial as its the latest 2004 version, but i think i might have overdone the bitrate and set it waaay higher than needed, but i have got 3 albums on there so itll do for now.

Next time i think i will use a lower bitrate of 128 or so, as reccomended above rather than the 256 i used for the first cd!!

[mike tilley]

Audiograbber (http://www.audiograbber.com-us.net/) is excelent and it's free.

I believe a minimum bitrate for reasonable quality is 128 though I'm no expert.... and I'm a bit deaf :p

[jjsaul]

Audiograbber (http://www.audiograbber.com-us.net/) is excelent and it's free.

I believe a minimum bitrate for reasonable quality is 128 though I'm no expert.... and I'm a bit deaf :p

i use that.

128 quality is fine.

BTW, i use mp3, but through a hi quality hi fi separates :p

[Ferryman]

If its a long train journey - I would just hum and look out the window:rolleyes:
I'd take a nap:p

Tony.