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Topic: Accurate Disc Image With Individual WAV files? (Read 14876 times) previous topic - next topic
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Accurate Disc Image With Individual WAV files?

Reply #25 –
Quote from: Porcus on
Edit: Don't be fooled into thinking that the CDTOC entry is necessary to recreate an audio CD image for burning. What is essentially needed is the track enumeration.


Being admittedly very new to all of this...what is meant by "track enumeration"?  Plus it's rather confusing to see that every track has the same index of "INDEX 01 00:00:00"?  I thought every track would be a separate index on the disc - so you can skip to track 6 or 7 for example.

By the way...I was reading how dBpoweramp's CUE sheets don't include gap information - does that mean they are incomplete CUE sheets if compared to CUE sheets generated with EAC?  http://forum.dbpoweramp.com/showthread.php?t=18981

---
  Mind as well as one more stupid question while I'm at it: As I've described, in addition to utilizing a lossless format for archiving purposes, I also like to rip my music into AAC (.m4a) for use with my iPod.  Either using EAC or dBpoweramp, are there any benefits to either: (1st) rip into  FLAC from the source CD and then (2nd) rip into AAC from the source CD -OR- (1st) rip into FLAC from the source CD and then (2nd) convert these ripped and now tagged FLAC into AAC?

Accurate Disc Image With Individual WAV files?

Reply #26 –
Quote from: wavlover on
Being admittedly very new to all of this...what is meant by "track enumeration"?  Plus it's rather confusing to see that every track has the same index of "INDEX 01 00:00:00"?  I thought every track would be a separate index on the disc - so you can skip to track 6 or 7 for example.


"Index points" on CDs are "subsections" of a track. The idea was that, say, if track 8 is a toccata & fugue, then it could have the toccata part as index 1 and fugue as index 2.
But "nobody" used that feature, and nowadays the "skip index" button hardly even exists on CD players.
But the "hidden track one audio" is precisely such a thing: it is index number 0 of track number 1.


As for your question on dBpoweramp's cuesheets ... well, it is a very early thing, and although I am regularly browsing the news on this application, I have not checked out this feature. I rip to separate tracks.

Quote from: wavlover on
  Mind as well as one more stupid question while I'm at it: As I've described, in addition to utilizing a lossless format for archiving purposes, I also like to rip my music into AAC (.m4a) for use with my iPod.  Either using EAC or dBpoweramp, are there any benefits to either: (1st) rip into  FLAC from the source CD and then (2nd) rip into AAC from the source CD -OR- (1st) rip into FLAC from the source CD and then (2nd) convert these ripped and now tagged FLAC into AAC?


There is no use in ripping twice. AFAIK, both EAC and (at least the paid version of) dBpoweramp can even output to both. I.e. D:\pathname\filename.flac and E:\pathname\filename.aac, but considering the need for manual fixes every now and then, I would certainly rip to FLAC, make sure the manual fixes are done, and only then convert to a lossy copy.

Either bulk convert if you want a lossy repository, or just convert if and when you need a lossy.

Accurate Disc Image With Individual WAV files?

Reply #27 –
Quote from: wavlover on
it's rather confusing to see that every track has the same index of "INDEX 01 00:00:00"?  I thought every track would be a separate index on the disc - so you can skip to track 6 or 7 for example.

When burning discs from tracks ripped as separate files, your software knows how to create a proper TOC based on the lengths of those tracks.  In the cue sheet the timing is called out relative to the data specified in the preceding file.  When you rip individual tracks with gaps appended to the previous track, the 01 indices (track start points) will always occur at the beginning of each file (00:00:00).  Only when 01 indices occur somewhere into the file (such as a single-file image or when gaps are prepended to the beginning of the current track) will they be called out with a time greater than 00:00:00.

Accurate Disc Image With Individual WAV files?

Reply #28 –
I’m a newbie to all of this and I actually believe I’m starting to understand a lot of this (and hopefully any newbies reading it) – I was hoping you guys might entertain a few more questions?

When a CD player is reading a CD (more specifically, reading the raw PCM code), how does it detect where an individual track starts or rather, what an individual track is?

(I’m assuming that although a CD player is a physical piece of hardware, there is still some type of software that is being utilized in order to translate the raw PCM code that the physical machinery of the CD player itself is reading.  So, when it comes to reading, I guess I’m actually referring to the “software that’s translating the information picked up by the physical machinery of the CD player.”)

In referencing the cue sheet provided above, it says “TRACK 01: AUDIO INDEX 01 00:00:00."  Okay, but what is "TRACK 01" itself on the CD?  I can't call it an “index” because indexes are within individual tracks (as explained above with the Toccata & Fugue example).  What tells the CD Player's software:  “Here, this is where Track 1 begins.”  “Here, this is where track 2 begins.”???

To make an analogy to an analog record player, the laser is simply “dragged” along the surface, and when it detects the PCM binary code, starts playing, and when it stops detecting code, we hear silence.

Assuming that is even close to accurate, that still doesn’t explain how a CD player can jump to certain tracks.  If a CD player were like an analog record player, you would foreseeably have to manually move the laser to a certain point along the PCM code that was no longer the information for Track 1 but, the information for Track 2, etc, etc. (like you do with a vinyl record when you're trying to find a certain track).

However, as this is clearly not the case – we can jump to tracks with ease – again, what is on CD itself that tells a player, okay, “Here’s where to start track 1.”???

Accurate Disc Image With Individual WAV files?

Reply #29 –
A CD has a table of contents at the beginning and then has track, timing and index information interspersed with the PCM data throughout the rest of the disc.

Accurate Disc Image With Individual WAV files?

Reply #30 –
Quote from: greynol on
A CD has a table of contents at the beginning and then has track, timing and index information interspersed with the PCM data throughout the rest of the disc.


Okay, but are there any markers that indicate where the track ENDS and even where the silence between the tracks begin and end?

What prompted this question is the point you made in this other post (http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=78534&hl=) about how EAC’s “gap detection” is not accurate.

Why is is not accurate?

I used to think a CD player reads a CD via the mentioned indexes on the CD itself: Track 1 Begins, Track 1 Ends, Silence Begins, Silence Ends, Track 2 Begins, Track 2 Ends, Silence Begins, Silence Ends.  If this were the case, then it would seem logically, EAC's gap detection technology would be accurate (because it could read the exact point where the track ended).

Then I thought it was more like: Track 1 Begins, Track 2 Begins, Track 3 Begins.  Essentially that the silence YOU hear as being “in between tracks” is actually apart of the of the end of a respective track (the silence you hear between a Track 1 and a Track 2 is actually apart of Track 1).

I then realized this couldn’t be the case because after looking at a CD player’s counter, it actually stops count of one track, does a negative to positive count of the silence (-00:02, -00:01,), and then starts the counter over for the next track.  So, maybe my first theory was correct: Track 1 Begins, Track 1 Ends, Silence Begins, Silence Ends, Track 2 Begins, Track 2 Ends, Silence Begins, Silence Ends.  HOWEVER, that although the beginning of a track is CLEARLY defined with some type of said index, but it’s left up to the respective CD player to decide when the track ends...?

Another backing for this theory is the fact that when you rip a CD, primarily with non-professional programs like iTunes and, say, Nero, you will sometimes get different track lengths for the SAME track, from the SAME CD, read from the SAME drive.  (Different hardware) and the different software translating the information, inherently have different capabilities and will thus produce different results utilizing the SAME source.

How else do you explain the different lengths AND the inaccuracy of EAC's gap detection technology?

Accurate Disc Image With Individual WAV files?

Reply #31 –
Quote from: wavlover on
Okay, but are there any markers that indicate where the track ENDS
More or less, yes.

Quote from: wavlover on
and even where the silence between the tracks begin and end?
No, there is no need.

Are you doing any additional reading beyond this thread?  This was more or less discussed last week, here.

Quote from: wavlover on
Why is is not accurate?

http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....te+%2Bdetection
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&saf...mp;aql=&oq=

If you read through the entire discussion that you linked, you would have come across the link to an article on CUE sheets in our wiki.  If you read it, some of your other questions will be answered.  I suggest you go through the other articles found there as well.

Regarding inaccuracies in track lengths between software, either the program or the way it is configured is to blame, not the format.

Accurate Disc Image With Individual WAV files?

Reply #32 –
Quote
looking at a CD player’s counter, it actually stops count of one track, does a negative to positive count of the silence

This occurs during a track's INDEX 00, also known as a pregap. Audio between INDEX 00 and 01 needn't be silent; it can be an intro, talking before a live track, anything really. Whether these are present or not, INDEX 00 needn't be defined in the TOC; it's purely aesthetic. And audio between two tracks can be continuous, with the boundary defined by the latter's INDEX 01. None of this layout information, which is the producer's choice, affects the actual audio data.

Quote
HOWEVER, that although the beginning of a track is CLEARLY defined with some type of said index, but it’s left up to the respective CD player to decide when the track ends...?

A track ends when the next begins.

Accurate Disc Image With Individual WAV files?

Reply #33 –
Quote from: dv1989 on
Quote
HOWEVER, that although the beginning of a track is CLEARLY defined with some type of said index, but it’s left up to the respective CD player to decide when the track ends...?

A track ends when the next begins.

!!!

This is maybe all-too-obvious to the oldies among us, but had the the makers been a bit wiser, the format could have been too.

Accurate Disc Image With Individual WAV files?

Reply #34 –
I'm not sure that I understand. To me it seems not unwise (do you mean unintuitive?) but necessary. Otherwise one could theoretically specify a track 1 ending at 2:45 and a track 2 beginning at 4:04; then what of the intervening region? That said, there are probably many other things that could be better.

Accurate Disc Image With Individual WAV files?

Reply #35 –
Quote from: dv1989 on
I'm not sure that I understand. To me it seems not unwise (do you mean unintuitive?) but necessary. Otherwise one could theoretically specify a track 1 ending at 2:45 and a track 2 beginning at 4:04; then what of the intervening region? That said, there are probably many other things that could be better.


Hm, if you programmed a good'ole fashion CD player to play track 2 and 7, what would it do about the pregap? I don't remember anymore.

Anyway, for, say, a live recording, my wishlist would sometimes include the inter-talk skipped, especially on programmed order like above, or maybe sometimes an overlap (if the outro of one is the intro of another), or sometimes even a crossfade.  And by the way, the "locking groove" -- the opportunity to have a repeating loop at the end -- was a feature lost when scrapping LP. Not only that, I would wish for a "stop after this track" option before "bonus tracks" on reissued CDs, or between "two on one disc".


Ah, all these things I can simply do myself nowadays ;-)

Accurate Disc Image With Individual WAV files?

Reply #36 –
It wouldn't play track 2's pregap, because that's its INDEX 00, while playback begin at INDEX 01; however, it would play track 8's pregap, in the form of the end of track 7. Confused?

Accurate Disc Image With Individual WAV files?

Reply #37 –
Quote from: dv1989 on
It wouldn't play track 2's pregap, because that's its INDEX 00, while playback begin at INDEX 01; however, it would play track 8's pregap, in the form of the end of track 7. Confused?

And some players would then switch display to track 8, time negative 0:02.

Accurate Disc Image With Individual WAV files?

Reply #38 –
Who said anything about the pregap being 0:02 long? I demand evidence!  I'll stop now.