Example from a first start over the basic setup to the first rip of a CD
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Chapter 8. Example from a first start over the basic setup to the first rip of a CD

Read the complete handbook, understood everthing and somehow still unsure what to do? Well, no problem, follow this step by step example and you will get enough information to adjust just those areas which will the program make do exactly what you want.

In this example we will start the program for the first time, set everything up and rip our first CD. We will use lame '--preset extreme' to create mp3s with a VBR (Variable Bit Rate) of 224 to 256 kbps in average and ID3V1 tags.

You need to have cdparanoia and lame installed on your system. Both programs should be available as a pre-compiled package for your linux distribution. However, you might need to ask a search engine to find a suitable package of lame, as sometimes it is considered to be not totally free. In any case you might not need to compile from source which, of course, you always can.

The structure how we organize our music on the hard disk is:

In summary : /usr/share/cd/cdartist - cdtitle - year/track# - tracktitle

Please make sure, that the folder /usr/share/cd exists and that you have write permission on it (e.g. try to copy something to it with konqueror).

The example is divided into 2 sections:

Here we go...

E 1 Basic Setup

Here we set the encoder to use to compress the music (lame) and so the audio file format (mp3) as well as the resulting audio quality (--preset extreme => VBR 224 to 256 kbps). You define where the files will go and what structure will be used to store them. In set the program to use freedb to get the CD data via Internet as we are lazy.

While you can always change any of these settings, you will most likely don't change them every time you rip a CD once you found a convenient setup.

E 1.1 Step 01: Setting the device ID for your CD/DVD drive/writer

On the main window:


Screenshot kaudiocreator 1.12 main window

set Device: to /dev/cdrom

The device ID is parsed to the ripper program so it can read the CD data/songs.

Often /dev/cdrom is a symlink to the actual device ID from your drive. If that does not work or you have more than one CD/DVD drive, you can give the exact device ID. If you can access your drive with other programs, take a look into /etc/fstab and try the device entries for CD-ROM and or DVD-drives listed there.

Nothing in there, no luck?

Running kernel 2.6:

If you happen to have one of the common ATAPI (or IDE) drives, with kernel 2.6 the device ID will range from /dev/hda to /dev/hdd. The master on channel 2 is a good starting point: that would be /dev/hdc. If your hard disks are all S-ATA, /dev/hda will probably do the trick. Native SCSI drives will start from /dev/sda unless you have S-ATA hard disks, which come first in the list, so depending on the number of disks the CD/DVD drive will start at /dev/sdb or /dev/sdc .

Running kernel 2.4:

CD/DVD drives are accessed via SCSI, so the devices start at /dev/sda .

E 1.2 Step 02: General Configuration Tab

Settings -> Configure KAudioCreator... -> General


Screenshot kaudiocreator 1.12 General Configuration Tab

The General Configuration tab. Not much to do here. You could define some additional formating though. For our example, just enter/leave everything as shown in the screenshot.

Just check Prompt if information is not complete, so you will get informed when some infos for generating tags are not available.

E 1.3 Step 03: CD Configuration Tab

Settings -> Configure KAudioCreator... -> CD


Screenshot kaudiocreator 1.12 CD Configuration Tab

The CD Configuration tab. Just check both entries. We are lazy and want that the CD data is fetched automatically via the Internet from a freedb server.

Note, you need to be online when ripping the CD to be able to access the freedb server.

The second box is convenient, as if a CD entry is found, the CD will be ripped imidiately. That's low risk, because if you are later unhappy with the database entry and the resulting director/file names or tag entries, you can easily change them. The folder and file names with konqueror->rename and the id3 tags with kid3, the KDE tagger.

Further note appart from this example: If you want to enter everything manually uncheck the boxes and freedb will not be used. You can use freedb locally in off-line mode if you download the database before. However, this will be over 370 MB so think twice if it's worth it. To use freedb in off-line mode, you need to check the boxes here, at least the first one. The mode is set on the following tab.

E 1.4 Step 04: CDDB Configuration Lookup Tab

Settings -> Configure KAudioCreator... -> CDDB -> Lookup tab


Screenshot kaudiocreator 1.12 CDDB Configuration Lookup Tab

CDDB, that's freedb for us. The settings used for the data lookup, for retrieving the CD information from the freedb server via the Internet. How does the system know what data to get? Read the section about freedb. Just set everything as in the screenshot.

Short explanation:

Mode: We haven't downloaded the database, so we want to work remote with the Internet server only.

CDDB Server: PLEASE (yes, I am shouting!) go to freedb.org and look up a mirror near you. This way the load is balanced between the mirror servers. However, as a first try, this setting should work, but PLEASE...

Port and Transport: There are 2 combinations, which even the mirrors should understand.

  • Port=80 and Transport=HTTP

  • Port=8880 and Transport=CDDB

Both work equally regarding the server, but as many firewalls blocking Port 8880 by default, you may have better luck with Port 80, as the HTTP port is usually open for browsing the Internet.

E 1.5 Step 05: CDDB Configuration Submit Tab

Settings -> Configure KAudioCreator... -> CDDB -> Submit tab


Screenshot kaudiocreator 1.12 CDDB Configuration Submit Tab

In this example we don't want to submit any CD data to the freedb server. Uncheck the first box and that should it be.

Note beside this example: If one day you find a CD which is not yet known by the freedb server or you find an error in a CD entry, you can submit the new/updated data. Check the first box at the top of this tab and then either use your mail address known to your system which kaudiocreator 1.12 has already detected or check the lower radio button and enter a new mail address. Please read the section about freedb first. You are asked to provide a mail address when submitting new or updated entries to the server and you should read the information on freedb.org about revision counts when sending updated information in case you found an error.

E 1.6 Step 06: Ripper Configuration Tab

Settings -> Configure kaudiocreator 1.12... -> Ripper


Screenshot kaudiocreator 1.12 Ripper Configuration Tab

Just take the settings from the screenshot. (Make sure the folder /tmp exists on your system!)

Beep after each rip is done : check this to get an audible feedback from the progress.

Number of tracks to rip at a time : sorry, cannot think of a reason to do more than one with one drive? Reading and encoding parallel? Just don't know, try for yourself.

Auto-eject CD after last track is ripped : yeah well, so you know it's done. Do what you like.

Default Temporary Directory : If you check this, you can/must specify the path/folder where the wav files are ripped into. This might be handy if you only have space on another drive. If not checked the files will be created in your home folder. Remember this path if you want do something with the wav files themselfs.

E 1.7 Step 07: Encoder Configuration Tab

Settings -> Configure KAudioCreator... -> Encoder


Screenshot kaudiocreator 1.12 Encoder Configuration Tab

Finally the encoder configuration. We will use lame. Here we have a little bit more to do:

Click on Lame

Click on the Configure... button


Screenshot kaudiocreator 1.12 Lame Configuration

Uff, enter everything as in the screenshot. The command entry is a bit long, so you may have to scroll a bit to the right.

The settings are more or less self explaining. There is a space between '--preset' and 'extreme' .

'--preset extreme' defines the audio quality of the mp3s. As mentioned before, this is a setting for very good audio quality, sufficient even for very good HiFi Stereo systems. The resulting bit rate is about 224 to 256 kbps in average. The achieved compression factor is 6.3 . A good balance between audio quality and space consumption. Storage space/memory is cheap these days, isn't it?

Note the '--id3v1-only' entry to limit the tag creation to V1/V1.1 tags. Delete it if you want id3v2 tags as well. kid3 is a very good id3 tagger for KDE in case you want to manipulate tags later. %f and %o should be the internal variables for the input file (incl. the full path) and the output file name (incl. the full path).

Click OK to close and apply the settings.

Encoded File Location - Back on the Encoder Configuration tab, we define here the destination folder including the folder name for the files from the ripped CD. These are variables which will be filled with the corresponding CD data everytime you rip a CD. The CD data can be entered manually or fetched via Internet (CDDB). As already configured in this example, we will use freedb and fetch the data automatically. Play with the Wizard, but in the end for this example the entry should be:

'/usr/share/cd/%{albumartist} - %{albumtitle} - %{year}/%{number} - %{title}.%{extension}'

Set the rest as in the screenshot. A few comments for future use outside this example:

'Number of wav files to encode at a time: Why would one want to encode more than one wav file at the time, multi-processor machines? Well, these will come soon, so if you already have one when you read this, give it a try.

Encoder Priority: for the fanatics, :-) , play with it, if you feel for it. Higher is faster I guess!

That's about it, we have just finished the basic setup of KAudioCreator. This configuration is used as the default for every CD rip. If you have choosen your music organization structure wise you will never have to change it again. ;-)

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