Going to rip 2000 cds. Which software?

Give Neal Van Berg @ Sound Science a call.  He sets up his MusicVault servers to be pretty much plug'n'play and can recommend the version that's most appropriate for your needs.  He'll even long on to your machine to help you through any problems you might have.  Best of all, since his server is a PC optimized for ripping, storage, and playback, it can be upgraded as the PC audio paradigm matures. 

Thank for your replies.

The Music Vault and the Naim server are both way out of my budget.  They are, however cool as hell and would be nice to have. 

Ghosthouse:  I ripped a couple of cds using ALAC and it took almost 15 minutes to rip each cd.  If that's normal, it's too long.  The number of hours I would spend just ripping approaches 500!  I'm guessing I've got my settings wrong. 

Hello Jzzmusician,
updating my earlier advice to confirm that ghosthouse’s advice was very good. iTunes is an excellent all in one music library manager. It’s free, simple, and easily controlled by remote. Bitperfect, as an addon to Itunes, is an excellent way to improve sound quality. Amazing bargain too.

When ripping, there are a lot of variables. Damaged or dirty CDs will take much longer because the software attempts to reread the disc. Start with a cold reboot of your machine/cd drive and only run iTunes while ripping.

You don’t say what kind/age machine your using so I am assuming it is less than five years old. Is the drive internal?

Ripping a libary takes a lot of time even on the fastest machines. Your libary will also require some thought on HD storage as it grows.

Keep us posted.

Hello jzzmusician.  Gosh, have to say I'm very surprised to hear 15 minutes to rip a CD.  That has not been my experience using the latest version of iTunes (v12.3.2.35) or even previous versions.  Recent CDs I imported to my iTunes library took at most a minute or two.  Certainly under 5 min.  I am no IT guru so we will quickly reach the limit of what I can tell you.  Checking iTunes' General Preferences Tab and then Import Settings, I see that I have "Apples Lossless Encoder" selected along with "Use Error Correction When Reading Audio CDs".  The import settings are all "automatic" for ALAC (but can be customized for WAV, AIFF, etc.).  Is it possible your CDs are dirty or damaged (pls. don't take offense)...triggering a lot of error correction?  Lots of CD treatment products available if needed; low budge option: eye glass cleaning spray and microfibre cloths.  Because of storing my iTunes library on an external drive, I do have to hold down the option button when clicking on the iTunes icon.  This generates a pop up window asking me to choose the iTunes library...from there I choose the .itl iTunes library file on the external drive as shown in Finder.  

dbtom2 - appreciate your follow up comments.  I often feel like the poor country cousin on A'gon.  Nice to read supporting comments.  Good points too about shutting down any non-essential programs and doing a re-boot prior to importing CDs.  

As a follow up to my own initial comments...those were intended as a simple way for jzzmusician to get started.  Figure out how to do the basics then worry about new hardware and/or software that might well give better sound but will likely mean more $ and greater complication.  Only he/she can decide if the benefit is worth the extra effort.

Ciao.

I use a dedicated 21" iMac with a external ROM Drive for ripping, using iTunes as the library and Audio Nirvana Pus as the playback engine. Rip time for a single CD is a couple of minutes, and if the CD is not to obscure the meta data is captured from the net.  Another benefit from the iMac is the large screen / keyboard / mouse that makes editing etc easy if needed.  

I prefer the Apple format over the PC format as the interface with remote options iPhone or iPad is basically seamless and very easy to navigate.


Good Listening
Peter