What are you using to rip your cds to a hard drive?

As I and many others have acknowledged many times in past threads here, science and engineering can neither explain nor predict a lot about what we hear or don’t hear from our systems. However the science and engineering that is involved in the copying of digital data from one storage medium to another is well understood, well developed, and under reasonable circumstances is robust, reliable, and accurate. Especially, in this case, if the software being used assures bit perfect accuracy.

While I don’t dispute that some of Geoff’s tweaks might be beneficial under some circumstances when a CD is being listened to, they have no relevance whatsoever to the process of copying the data that is on a CD to a hard drive. Assuming, again, that the software is designed to re-read data as necessary to assure bit perfect accuracy, and to indicate an error in the unusual event that it is unable to do so.

I say this as someone having extensive background in digital design, and particular expertise regarding computer technology. I also say this despite Geoff’s disagreement that will inevitably follow. And for some perspective on the kinds of tweaks he recommends, you may find the following excerpt from his post dated 9-7-2012 in this thread to be of interest:

Taking all telephone books out of the house will usually be audible when you go back and listen to the system. Even if the telephone books are in other rooms of the house, they should be removed. The telephone book is perceived as an intruder by virtue of the fact that it is linked to a strong Field created by the tens or hundreds of thousands of identical telephone books. So, the link to that field can be eliminated by removing the telephone books from the house, making the house Safe from the telephone book "information field".

Regards,
-- Al

Do the wires connecting the cd drive to the computer or the computer to the external hard drive or from the hard drive to the DAC make a difference? I know the question of whether wires make a difference at all is a point of contention, but I believe that interconnects, power cabes, etc. make a difference. What about those involved in the ripping process?

Not sure what you are referring to by "wires connecting ... hard drive to the DAC." Did you mean "computer to the DAC"?

In any event, though, the reasons cables conducting digital signals can make a difference during playback, such as waveform degradation and noise effects that can contribute to timing jitter at the point of D/A conversion and/or that can affect analog circuitry in various ways, have no relevance to the ripping process. If the software being used assures that the digital data on the CD is been copied to the hard drive with 100% accuracy, there is no means by which cables that are involved in the ripping process but are not involved in the playback process can affect playback of that data. Unless, that is, for some reason there is unrelated signal activity during the playback process on a cable that is not involved in the playback process. In which case I suppose it is conceivable that digital noise related to that activity might couple into the playback path to some degree. But that slim possibility can be easily ruled in or out by determining if disconnecting that cable makes any difference.

But of course if the files are being played back from the external hard drive you referred to, the cable connecting that hard drive could conceivably make a difference during the playback process, via the kinds of effects I referred to above.

Regards,
-- Al

If your external drive is one of the "slim" types I would replace it with one that uses the kind of 5.25 inch drive mechanism that is used in desktop computers. Such as this OWC Mercury Pro, for $69.75. Or, alternatively, you could purchase an Asus bare drive or other high quality 5.25 inch bare drive from Newegg.com for less than $20, and put it in an inexpensive external drive enclosure that provides a SATA internal interface and a USB external interface. Many such enclosures are available at Newegg.

The reason I make that suggestion is that I’ve found that various slim external drives, and also optical drives that are built into laptops, often have problems reading discs that are in less than perfect condition. While those same discs will be read by inexpensive 5.25 inch drives with no problem.

I also concur with the others that the software that is chosen should assure bit perfect copying.

Regards,
-- Al