Ripping CDs

I like ripping CDs from my new CD player into my brain, followed by putting the ripped CD back on the shelf. There is some loss due to my weak-ish brain, but amazingly I can just put the CD back in the CD player and listen to it again thus letting my brain off the hook. Win win.

I second dbPoweramp, the paid version. On the PC, a lot of folks use Exact Audio Copy (aka EAC). Having said that, ripping CDs is not for the faint of heart. There's a lot to know in terms of tagging the CDs properly, what file structure, etc. And it's 10x more complicated if you are ripping any classical music. I would suggest, before you buy anything, that you watch some tutorials on YouTube.

I have the Brennan B2 and it is amazing! This is the new version called Helix. It is VERY short $$ and it is SOOOO worth it! You can also get it on Amazon. I actually have the B2 right next to my Node in my rig. You’ll want an external DAC and do yourself a favor and grab a Lifatec Toslink, and you’re good to go👌🏻!

Sadly yes, rvpiano, you will need a PC or a laptop. Most laptops and PCs these days don’t have CD drives in them so you also need to buy a USB CD drive. These are fairly inexpensive, around $30. Perhaps you could borrow a laptop from someone. dbPowerAmp is great software but the free Exact Audio Copy works well too. I use a shareware program called mp3tag to snag cover art, album name, track names, and year of production, and add it in the metadata automatically. It finds stuff really well about 80% of the time. Note that .wav files never had the metadata header in them for holding cover art, but you could rip to lossless FLAC or ALAC and they both can contain the metadata for artwork, album name, track name, etc. Do be aware that ripping CDs can be time consuming.

My nephew conned one of his kids into doing it when they were 13 years old, offering them 10 cents for each CD they ripped. I think they felt ripped off. LOL.

Good luck. Long ago I ripped about 1300 CDs into iTunes and will never do that again. It took me a few months doing a few each night.

Another possibility if you don’t want to do it yourself is to make a deal with someone who does have a PC and pay them say a dollar a CD or so then simply get the data files from them.

I’d take a little time and properly clean the CDs before ripping them to help with any error correction. Note if you use iTunes make sure to check the checkbox for "Use Error Correction when reading CDs" in the Import Settings.

Finally, back up those data files in at least two locations for safety. Hardware can fail at any time. Oh and for your use case, that Brennan Helix recommended above by kingbr looks interesting.

I don’t have much to add, but I think the simplest solution for the OP is to get a streamer with a built in ripper and storage.  The second best option is to get a NAS and rip the CDs to it, but this usually requires a computer as well, particularly for editing metadata.

@rvpiano a word of caution.  For Classical Music, there is no good software management system.  It’s all designed for other genres.  Perhaps you know this already.  If you do rip your CDs with the goal of discarding them, be prepared to edit the metadata so that it makes sense to you