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When I buy CD's I tend to rip them to FLAC right away. When ripping I use Foobar2000 or Exact Audio Copy and enable secure ripping which uses error correction. Recently I bought a 2 CD compilation album brand new but when I tried to rip the second CD on my laptop using Foobar2000 it struggled with the last 2 tracks and was unable to finish. EAC was also unable to get an accurate rip and reports read errors. Ripping in fast mode results in audible errors in the output track.

I have tried another computer and having similar problems. I cannot see any damage to the disc and it has not been dropped or anything.

The weird thing is that I had similar problems with a different album and different PC a while back. This other CD was a compilation disk so it was also right up to the CD capacity limit and again it was the last few tracks that would not rip. Dozens of other discs have ripped fine

So I am wondering if the CD is simply defective, or whether it is something else. How common are defective CD's? Do some CD drives struggle with CD's of this capacity? Or Is this some kind of copy protection?

I'm thinking of asking Amazon for a replacement but it would be annoying if I get the same problem again.

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  • No idea, really, except they could be data tracks?
    – M'vy
    Mar 11, 2011 at 14:26
  • I think it does have something to do with how "full" the CD is. All I can suggest is you try a) a different CD drive, b) a different PC or c) a different ripper program.
    – ChrisF
    Mar 11, 2011 at 14:26
  • The disc is just under 79 minutes long, which is only slightly longer than usual. As I mentioned in my post, I have tried using another program and I have tried using another computer (with a different brand of CD drive) and each time had the same problem
    – James P
    Mar 11, 2011 at 14:54
  • Music labels are constantly looking for new ways to protect their CDs from being ripped. It's also possible it could be a new protection scheme. I doubt it since you were able to rip the other tracks, but just throwing that out as a possibility.
    – BBlake
    Mar 11, 2011 at 15:09
  • I should probably have mentioned that the album is Echoes: The Best of Pink Floyd which was originally released in 2001. I recall that there was some kind of copy protection popular around that time but I think it rendered the discs unreadable in PC's.
    – James P
    Mar 11, 2011 at 15:18

2 Answers 2

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CDEX has never failed me; it might be worth trying that.

...and here is an (old) explanation on how to use CDEX & FLAC!

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  • Thanks, I am trying it right now. It is useful being able to set drive speed manually, since I think the higher speeds lead to less reliable rips.
    – James P
    Mar 11, 2011 at 16:41
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Got a replacement disc on Friday and it seems to have ripped fine so I'm guessing that the previous disc was damaged or defective.

I'm wondering if the original problems had something to do with the double CD jewel case. The one this album comes in is pretty awful and requires quite a lot of force to remove the disc. It can imagine that bending it like that doesn't do it much good. Maybe it even causes it to crack?

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