Can anyone recommend software to rip CDs and manage MP3 files? I'd like to move the family collection of about 300 CDs into MP3 files for portability. I have iTunes and it isn't bad but not being able to put MP3s into CDs or external devices is a showstopper. I'd also like something that makes it easy to enter album and track names, or even a feature that finds this info from the web.

I have some shareware that does bits and pieces of this. I've had to battle spyware and such so no more shareware for me.

It seems that MS MediaPlayer has some neat features as well but I'd rather have MP3s than WMAs.

Thanks,
Sixto
95 S420
87 300SDL

I've used almost a dozen different programs but wound up sticking to grip. http://nostatic.org/grip/
It does automatic lookups if you want, puts files right where you want them, and also makes it easy to configure bitrate, etc, for encoding.

A general one is xcdroast, a GUI for burning CD's. It has some good ripping / encoding capabilities too.
www.xcdroast.org/

Both programs are free and I've seen them run well on Slackware, Gentoo and FreeBSD. Installation is pretty much automatic too.

I used a program called Ashampoo a couple or three years ago to rip a bunch of CDs. It was a free download and I had no complaints with it. I want to think it is maintained by a German company. I can't comment on the spyware aspect of the package except to say that I have had good luck by searching before I download software. Run a search like:ashampoo spyware. If there are complaints on the web, you will find them before you have your own.

Just looked it up and yes there is spyware stay away!

Use Nero its the best I would think...

I'm sure Winamp rips which is free, but I use Music Match which has worked flawless for me for over 5 years. When you purchase it you get unlimited upgrades and you can use the online store which is similar to itunes.

Nero...

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"If you don't know where you are going, any road will get you there". Lewis Carrol

I have found NERO to work flawless.

http://www.afterdawn.com/guides/

scroll down to CD burning

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Db Power Amp @ www/dbpoweramp.com :-)

its also free and rips flawlessly also, been using this for about 2yrs now and had no problems or complaints

u can install various codecs and rip to whatever format ur heart desires

i think the main i started using it in the first place was because it used the Lame engine which is supposed to be one of the best and accurate ever