MP3: The Definitive Guide

Chapter 5. Ripping and Encoding: Creating MP3 Files

Sure there’s tons of free music available on the Internet. But are you able to find the music you’re actually looking for? Chances are that the music you seek is out there somewhere, but servers go up and down every day, and you’ll quickly discover that the MP3 search engines don’t always deliver the goods. When you do find the track you’re looking for, you may find that it’s poorly encoded. Most of the time, you won’t even know what bitrate has been used in the encoding until you’ve already got the file in question on your hard drive. And, of course, there’s the fact that most MP3s available for download are pirated, which means many users end up depriving the artists they respect out of income to which they’re entitled.

There’s one meta-solution to all of this: Spend your energy on encoding your own CD/LP/DAT/8-track collection, rather than trying to download someone else’s. If you don’t redistribute the files you encode, you won’t run afoul of legal hassles, you’ll have complete control over quality issues, and you won’t have to wait for lengthy downloads. Of course, if you’re an artist, you’ll also want to know how to create MP3s from your own original music.

General Encoding Principles

Creating MP3 files is generally a two-step process: Extract your audio from the original source medium into an uncompressed format stored on your hard drive, then run that uncompressed audio through an MP3 encoder. However, many tools exist to ...