• Registered: 2012-06-16

Topic: Do I have to re-rip all my CDs...?

I've already ripped all my CDs, and have got maybe 75% of the way through ripping them with EAC settings as recommended by what.cd for a 'perfect rip'.  The vast majority of my CDs are now in flight cases in the attic (I plan to get some shelves built to display them all at some point, but until then they're stashed out of harm's way.  But I digress).

Given that I have cue files, log files, and the FLAC files to be able to reconstruct an exact replica of each of my CDs is there any way I can point Picard at my collection and ask it to tag my music?  (As I finish re-ripping, I'll get Picard to tag CDs as I go - but I've already ripped quite a few and stashed them back in the attic.  I'd would hope to avoid getting them all back down again, then loading each one to let Picard do its thing...)

Can Picard load the data I've already ripped and identify the CD without me actually loading it?

Next question...  Can it do this in "batch mode"?  As in - can I point Picard at my music folder, and get Picard to scan for then read the "CDs" and tag the whole lot?

Cheers!
Dan.

  • Registered: 2012-06-16

Re: Do I have to re-rip all my CDs...?

I need to requalify my question(s).  My goals are :
to standardise my "genre" tags, and hopefully pick them up from the musicbrainz community
to add discID tags to all my CDs (and hopefully learn enough to submit some new ones back)

I'm reading through the wiki, and can see that I can just drag and drop folders into Picard and let it find CDs.  Personally I prefer the tag format to have all first letters to be uppercase, and Picard wants to change this.  But in general I get the idea - it's a cool utility :)

But it's the discID thing that worries me - can Picard generate a discID tag from FLAC+log+cue, or do I need to load each CD in turn for it to find (or generate) the discID?

  • From: Tartu, EE
  • Registered: 2010-11-24

Re: Do I have to re-rip all my CDs...?

The bad news is that Picard can't do it AFAIK. The good news is that there *is* a way to generate discIDs from that... so if you wait a bit someone who remembers how it worked will probably appear and tell us :)

  • Registered: 2012-06-16

Re: Do I have to re-rip all my CDs...?

Cool - thanks for the reply.  I'll keep checking back, and hopefully will get the info I need :)

I've got another couple of n00b questions, but will raise each one in a separate thread to hopefully avoid complicating things.

5 Reply by jacobbrett (edited by jacobbrett 2012-06-16 14:43:30)

  • From: Australia
  • Registered: 2008-10-22

Re: Do I have to re-rip all my CDs...?

This is completely taken from my own observation and the methodology may be incomplete (I don't know what happens if there are pre-gap tracks, etc.).

Consider this Picard-generated TOC and the TOC as according to the EAC .log file:

     Track |   Start  |  Length  | Start sector | End sector 
    ---------------------------------------------------------
        1  |  0:00.00 |  3:26.28 |         0    |    15477   
        2  |  3:26.28 |  1:20.13 |     15478    |    21490   
        3  |  4:46.41 |  2:22.55 |     21491    |    32195   
        4  |  7:09.21 |  0:24.38 |     32196    |    34033   
        5  |  7:33.59 |  2:46.16 |     34034    |    46499

The TOC string generated by Picard is EAC's start sectors, though incremented by 150 (150 15628 21641 32346 34184), as well as a prefix: '1 <number of tracks> <end sector+1> '. Submit the complete string like:
http://musicbrainz.org/cdtoc/attach?toc … 2346+34184

It'd be a good idea to note that these were generated from EAC's logs when submitting the edits.

6 Reply by gutted (edited by gutted 2012-06-16 15:19:26)

  • Registered: 2012-06-16

Re: Do I have to re-rip all my CDs...?

Nice one - thanks.  I'll give it a go, and see if I can get matches with a couple of CDs based on your info.  Would I be right in thinking that if I can get a couple of matches based on your method, then it validates the method and I can start working through all my CDs...?

What do you reckon the chances are of finding a plugin (or something) to do this in "batch mode" so that it'll scan all my CD logs and try to find matching discIDs?  I reckon my chances are pretty slim, but I figured I may as well ask :)

  • From: Australia
  • Registered: 2008-10-22

Re: Do I have to re-rip all my CDs...?

gutted wrote:

Nice one - thanks.  I'll give it a go, and see if I can get matches with a couple of CDs based on your info.  Would I be right in thinking that if I can get a couple of matches based on your method, then it validates the method and I can start working through all my CDs...?

I think that's a reasonable assumption to make. Though, make sure to add a note stating how you generated the TOC to save confusion when someone else adds a different TOC, in the case your TOC is incorrect.

gutted wrote:

What do you reckon the chances are of finding a plugin (or something) to do this in "batch mode" so that it'll scan all my CD logs and try to find matching discIDs?  I reckon my chances are pretty slim, but I figured I may as well ask :)

I'd guess slim. Worthing searching for, anyway. ;)