This is a guide to ripping a CD with CUERipper.

CUERipper is a free open source program for Microsoft Windows. It should work on any recent version of Windows. This includes Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8.x and Windows 10

CUERipper is designed to mimic the way EAC works, however, unlike EAC, CUERipper is very easy-to-use. However there are some changes that need to be made to the default settings. This guide is designed to show you how to set it up. Don't worry, it is very easy!

CUERipper comes in the CUETools package. Here is the link: http://www.cuetools.net/

Download the latest stable build. At this time the latest stable build is CUETools 2.1.5
You will get a ZIP file. You must extract this to a folder. Inside are the program files for CUETools and CUERipper. To run CUERipper look for the file called "CUERipper.exe" although if you have file extensions hidden then it might just appear simply as "CUERipper"

Here is what the main screen will look like:



In this example I have a CD in my CD drive and it was able to automatically detect the CD and fill in all the metadata (like CD Title, Artist, Track Names, etc.)
Also please note that I have already made changes to my CUERipper. Your default settings (in the lower left) will be different.

1.) Click on OPTIONS along the top and the OPTIONS windows will open up. It should look like this:



Now this image has the default options changed to how you want them to be. So basically change your options to match this image.
One note about the HTOA track. Some will say that you should NOT get rid of this track for a proper rip but it is not needed when ripping to separate, individual audio tracks. It really is only needed if you are doing a CD IMAGE type rip (one audio file). Since we will be ripping to separate, individual tracks, it is A-OK to use the option that I have used (which does NOT keep the HTOA track). Do not worry! The CUESheet file will be made with a pre-gap command that mimics the HTOA track. This is a far more elegant solution. Also note that very few CD's have a HTOA track so it isn't something that comes up that often.

Once you have the OPTIONS set up correctly you need to adjust the settings in the bottom left.

2.) Bottom Left Settings



Here is an image that shows you what settings to use. Your default settings will be different. Just change them to match this image BUT do not change the "Read offset" to match my image. This is calculated by CUERipper based on your CD drive and so it may be a different value or number than in my example. However all the other options here should be changed to match.

3.) That's it when it comes to setting up CUERipper. From now on it should remember these settings so you never have to do any of this again, at least not until you upgrade to a newer version.

So how do you rip? Well it's actually very simple. Assuming it has correctly identified the CD then you simply click on the GO button in the lower right.

Of course you can change anything you want. Click on META at the top to switch between TRACK VIEW and CD INFO. CD INFO has things like the CD title and Artist. So you can manually change any of that if you wish. Also CUERipper uses many different sources for getting the CD info. See the line near the top of my example that identifies the CD? You can click on that and sometimes there will be other options from other CD info providers like FreeDB or Discogs or MusicBrainz etc.

Anyway, when you are done, you should have the audio tracks, the LOG file, the CUE Sheet file and a M3U Playlist file.

If anyone has any questions, feel free to post them here and I will do my best to answer and help you out! :)

This guide written by FulciLives using Windows 10 and CUERipper 2.1.5

*** UPDATE ***
Some of you might find this link interesting: http://cue.tools/wiki/Category:CUERipper_Guides

*** UPDATE ***
Under OPTIONS some people might need to set PROXY MODE to NONE

Very helpful thread !

Thank You!

I tried CUERipper last month on Win10 & something wasn't correct so I deleted the tracks.

I'll try again using your guide & see if that fixes the problem.

Thanks for taking the time to create this guide!

Thank you very much FulciLives ! Maybe,you would have the possibility and the kindness to write such a guide for a "ripper" under Linux do you have? Love it ! It will become a fellow companion!

I have some trouble with CueRipper:
First, I can't access freedb for tagging. And yet it is more complete. Pity !












And :Strange : Although .cue is excluded in the settings, Foobar opens the folder twice in the playlist: one for the .cue and the other for the .m3u

But: only for the CueRipper .cue ?? For example it does not open the cue of EAC ....

@CdS
Have you tried any other CD Discs to see if freedb shows up as an option? Maybe there's just some weird thing with that one CD and CUERipper that keeps it from working correctly? It either has to be that OR for some reason your CUERipper is having trouble finding the freedb database (although I'm not sure why that would be, other than maybe some sort of proxy error or firewall issue).

For what it's worth, I just tried 2 different CD's and the one CD gave me freedb tags as an option (and the only option but it is a rare CD release) whereas the other CD I tried gave me many options (including two from freedb and two from MusicBrainz).



In my set-up of CUETools you will see that there is a proxy setting. This was the default and I simply left it as is (without changing it) but you can turn it off.

Here is my OPTIONS settings (as seen in the first post of this thread)



In the OPTIONS settings below, everything is the same but I changed proxy to read NONE



Perhaps on your system you need to change the proxy to NONE or adjust it to some other setting should you have some sort of custom proxy thing on your system.
I should point out that on my system, it works with the default setting as well as working AFTER changing it to NONE.

As for the CUE and M3U both being seen by foobar2000 ... I can't really speak to that as I don't use foobar2000 as a player to catalog my music. I will sometimes use it if I am manually browsing my music by clicking on the M3U file, which I have set to auto open into foobar2000 (and that works fine). However for browsing my music catalog IN program, I use MusicBee and have no issues there with rips from CUERipper. However, I don't have foobar2000 set up to auto scan my music folders (which I am guessing is where the problem is for you).

*** EDIT ***
Just had a thought about the CUE file.
EAC sets the CUE to *.wav files
CUERipper sets the CUE to the *.flac files
I think this explains why the CUERipper CUE shows up in foobar2000 while the EAC CUE does not.
You could open the CUERipper CUE with Windows Notepad and do a SEARCH & REPLACE on ".flac" to ".wav" and then save it. Now it should 100% match an EAC CUE file and not show in foobar2000.

Thank you again for your kind explanations. The problem is that you cannot enter the freedb server instead of the CueRipper server. Indeed, this is not a proxy problem. As for the double reading of the cue and the playlist by foobar, it must be a catalog problem.

I think I'll use Cueripper for simple tags like soundtracks and EAC for classical music.

Anyway, your post was very interesting!(And cueripper very practical!)

I see CUERipper as a simple yet effective method to rip CD Discs for those who don't want the trouble and hassle of setting up EAC (which even for an experienced user like me is a pain-in-the-rear-end).
However, for anyone who has EAC set up correctly and knows how to rip with it, there really is no need to use CUERipper instead.
But for those who find EAC a challenge to set up and use, then yes, CUERipper is a great (and free) alternative.

Ah ! ok ! I omitted a character ( *) in the exclusion of format .cue ! It works fine in Foobar ! I also noticed that the driver speed is high sub CueRipper ?

... I also noticed that the driver speed is high sub CueRipper ?
Not sure what you mean by this ???

OK this is a dumb question and I'm embarrassed to ask it but here goes my most noob post ever: what's the purpose of ripping and creating a cue file? I mean, I usually just use iTunes to convert to 320k mp3 and then that's it. I know flac is supposed to sound better but what does one do with the cue file? For that matter I never understood what log, ffp or m3u files were for either. Is there a faq about this stuff? I guess for me it's never been an issue since I play all my music on earphones or on computer speakers and haven't burned an actual audio CD in about 10 years....

Under Foobar we can regulate the speed of the cd drive .Under Winamp also ( ...) . Sub EAC may be it is automatic . There are no indications sub CueRider and I had the idea that the cds drive turned fast . Maybe it is only a feeling ?






---------- Post added at 12:38 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:16 PM ----------


OK this is a dumb question and I'm embarrassed to ask it but here goes my most noob post ever: what's the purpose of ripping and creating a cue file? I mean, I usually just use iTunes to convert to 320k mp3 and then that's it. I know flac is supposed to sound better but what does one do with the cue file? For that matter I never understood what log, ffp or m3u files were for either. Is there a faq about this stuff? I guess for me it's never been an issue since I play all my music on earphones or on computer speakers and haven't burned an actual audio CD in about 10 years....


Hello dooj,
Suppose you are a fan of Leonardo da Vinci's painting. You would prefer, no doubt, that on your wall the fair woman should have her eyes in the right place?
With a real lossless rip and an "index" that indicates where the eyes really are, you almost have the Mona Lisa at home ...
But this only concerns music lovers of truth and it is another debate ...

---------- Post added at 12:44 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:38 PM ----------




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I still use EAC to have 100% perfect rips and because that's what most music trackers will accept good. My only complain with EAC is how long it takes to rip in perfect rip mode, and that the metadata system is not as good as CueTools's.

OK this is a dumb question and I'm embarrassed to ask it but here goes my most noob post ever: what's the purpose of ripping and creating a cue file? I mean, I usually just use iTunes to convert to 320k mp3 and then that's it. I know flac is supposed to sound better but what does one do with the cue file? For that matter I never understood what log, ffp or m3u files were for either. Is there a faq about this stuff? I guess for me it's never been an issue since I play all my music on earphones or on computer speakers and haven't burned an actual audio CD in about 10 years....

The CUE file, or CUE Sheet file, is a file that allows you to burn your CD rip back to a CD so that the new CD is an EXACT copy of the original. Obviously this is only possible when the CD Rip is done as WAV or using lossless compression (such as FLAC or APE or WavPack or ALAC etc.)

The LOG file, at least the way EAC does it (this also applies to XLD and CUERipper), is a report of the ripping process. You see, despite CD being digital, it was very poorly designed (for instance DVD and Blu-Ray are way better) when it comes to error handling. This means that it is possible to rip a CD and have data errors occur during the ripping process. Programs like EAC attempt to rip in a way that ensures that the rip is error free, and the LOG is part of that, since it shows the ripping process and that no errors have occurred, etc.

ffp files are called FLAC FingerPrint files. This is a checksum of the files. It is somewhat unique in that it only looks at the data structure of the music and not the tags. Tagging can change but as long as the structure of the file, the music data itself, does not change then the ffp will be able to verify the files. Why have this? Well files can get corrupted just sitting on a HDD, not to mention anytime you copy them from one drive to another, or upload and re-download from the web.

There is also sfv and md5 checksums. The sfv format is older. The md5 format is newer and better. I often use md5 as it applies a checksum to ALL files in a folder (or directory), including subfolders, and again can be used to verify data integrity over time. Also useful when sharing files back and forth via the internet.

I hope that answers some of your questions.

As for EAC vs CUERipper ... it does seem that CUERipper is a bit faster than EAC even though they both appear to be doing basically the exact same thing. Not sure why that is but I've noticed it as well.
EAC is the gold standard for Windows. XLD is the gold standard for MAC.
CUERipper is a great alternative to EAC for Windows users. I feel it is just as good but much easier and simpler to set-up and use. That's why I made the guide. I wanted to make it easy for people to do proper CD rips!

FulciLives thanks for the explanations of those files. It's kind of something like what I expected but wanted to make sure. I'm a self-admitted crap cd ripper lol.

Very clear explanations Fulcilives . Thank you ! By the way : an interesting subject :

The Effects of MP3 Compression on Perceived Emotional Characteristics in Musical Instruments


...The results showed that MP3 compression strengthened neutral and negative emotional characteristics such as Mysterious, Shy, Scary, and Sad, and weakened positive emotional characteristics such as Happy, Heroic, Romantic, Comic, and Calm. Angry was relatively unaffected by MP3 compression, probably because the background �growl� artifacts added by MP3 compression decreased positive emotional characteristics and increased negative characteristics such as Mysterious and Scary. Compression effected some instruments more and others less; trumpet was the most effected and the horn the least...



http://www.aes.org/e-lib/browse.cfm?elib=18523



http://www.aes.org/e-lib/download.cfm/18523.pdf?ID=18523

This paper is Open Access which means you can download it for free.

You cannot use that paper to assert that anything but the most intensive compression settings (for today) compromise the enjoyment of the music. The paper clearly states that the bitrates used were 112 Kbps, 56 Kbps, and 32 Kbps. I don't doubt the findings of the study, but you can't extrapolate its findings to just any lossy compression.

(Not directed at you necessarily, CdS; I just don't want someone to not read the study itself, and then get the wrong idea about MP3 compression in general).

Nice tutorial Fulci. I'll try CUERipper right now, EAC is too slow.

Nice tutorial Fulci. I'll try CUERipper right now, EAC is too slow.

Let us know how it works for you.

Let us know how it works for you.

SPEED: Approximately twice as fast in comparison with EAC

QUALITY: Well, check for themselves

Thread 216514

SPEED: Approximately twice as fast in comparison with EAC

QUALITY: Well, check for themselves

Thread 216514

I went ahead and downloaded it and you did great! :)

Glad to find this tutorial! Thank you very much. For the question: is there any chance to make a CUETools tutorial to convert, for example, APE + CUE to FLAC format, or APE + CUE to IMG + CUE? Thanks in advance.

However, for anyone who has EAC set up correctly and knows how to rip with it, there really is no need to use CUERipper instead.

Nice to know this. I always used EAC.
There are guides for EAC too. It's hard to configure it the first time, but it's actually worth it.