Mac Tutorial

[mattstrike]

Hi,
I finally found a silver in my collection (Bad Religion, "Epitaph" 1992 Paradiso, Amsterdam - Living Legend Records in the blue jewel case) that no one seems to have seeded and I would love to contribute to the community. However, I am a little unsure of how to go about making the torrent correctly on my Mac. I am running 10.4.8, have xact, and I *think* I know what to do, but if some one could post a quick tutorial, that would be great - I couldn't find it in a post here...

I am also posting the frequency and spectrum (Audacity) screenshots - do these look okay?

Thanks...
mattstrike

[ffooky]

For a kick off you need to go Audacity->Preferences->Spectograms->Display and set the Maximum Frequency to 24000.

Perform multiple (at least 3) rips of the disc with xACT and make an MD5 of the first one. if all the subsequent extractions pass the MD5 of the first then you're as sure as you can be that your rip is good. If you have a PPC Mac, Exact Audio Copy runs perfectly under Virtual PC. If you have an Intel Mac you can boot into XP with Boot Camp or use Parallels.

As to creating the torrent, you'll need to say which bit torrent client you're using but this (http://www.thetradersden.org/forums/faq.php?faq=new_faq_item#faq_rules) is the guide as to what your torrent should contain. I always run any text file I create through LineBreak (http://www.trancesoftware.com/software/linebreak/) if it's for cross-platform consumption, selecting the DOS option.

[U2Lynne]

As ffooky said, rip the tracks from the CD using xACT (go to the util tab and select CD Extraction, drag/drop the files from your CD there and then hit Execute). You will end up with a bunch of .wav files. Then, go to the encode tab and drop those wav files in the box, select flac, and Encode. You will now end up with a bunch of flac files. Then, go to the checksum tab, drop the flac files in that box, click Checksums, say you want to make them (not verify them) and hit Submit. Make a text file that has all the info about the show, including the lineage (in this case "Silver CD > xACT > wav > xACT > flac") and I also like to open the fingerprints file and paste them on the bottom there (just open the ffp file with the same text editor). Now, in your folder you should have a text file, the fingerprint file, and the flac files (you don't need the wav files anymore). To make a torrent using Azurues, see this FAQ (http://www.thetradersden.org/forums/faq.php?faq=bittorrent#faq_a_torrent). If you have any other questions, feel free to ask.

[mattstrike]

Hey,
Thanks you two. I appreciate the help.
Did the sepctrum look good, or did those images not really tell you anything?

One more thing - Lynne, you mention converting them to WAV files, is converting them to AIFF (which I understand to be native to Mac OS) and different? They are both lossless, correct? Or is the issue cross-platform?

Thanks again.
(PS - I am using Transmission and Bit Torrent as clients...)

[U2Lynne]

Hey,
Thanks you two. I appreciate the help.
Did the sepctrum look good, or did those images not really tell you anything?

One more thing - Lynne, you mention converting them to WAV files, is converting them to AIFF (which I understand to be native to Mac OS) and different? They are both lossless, correct? Or is the issue cross-platform?

Thanks again.
(PS - I am using Transmission and Bit Torrent as clients...)
It wouldn't matter if you converted to aiff or to wav, however, I think the recent version of xACT will only convert to wav, not aiff, because of some issues xACT was having. I forgot to mention that after you convert to wav, you will get a window from xACT that tells you if everything extracted correctly. I always copy that window and then save the contents as a .log file.

You may want to look at this thread which explains all the steps: http://www.thetradersden.org/forums/showthread.php?t=20671&highlight=guide

[mattstrike]

I think the recent version of xACT will only convert to wav, not aiff, because of some issues xACT was having.

Lynne - I am using xACT 1.58 and it is giving me no probs when converting to AIFF. FYI.

Thanks again for the info...

[AAR.oner]

a fwiw...i prefer extracting to .wav over .aiff since its cross-platform compatible, and then you can include a .wav checksum with the file set

and always include the extraction log as Lynne pointed out

[Wsucks]

Got a Mac question.

I'm fairly knowledgable about all things Mac and music compression/extraction generally, however, I've recently run across file sets that I am having problems burning.

On some other BT sites I'm coming across .ape and .flac files that are accompanied with a .cue file. I'm familar with all the file types, but I'm used to seeing .bin files with a .cue file. These sets contain one long .flac or .ape file, and the indexing for disc is contained in the .cue file.

Problem is I can't find software to burn a .cue file without a .bin file. I've learned that Windows has an app called foobar that will burn these two files into the original disc image, but thus far I've not found a Mac equivilant. :mad:

Any suggestions? All help appreciated!

[ffooky]

It's possible to burn a cue/wav (or other audio format) combo under OS X but it's a bit of a kludge or requires the ability to install and run cdrdao:cdrdao write --device IODVDServices --driver generic-mmc my.cueMake sure the relevant WAV is in the same directory as the CUE.

Burn, Disco and LiquidCD *will* burn cue/wav combos but there are apparently problems (http://forum.insanelymac.com/lofiversion/index.php/t32104.html) (see last post).

Your best bet is to split the audio file according to the cue and the primo app for that is XLD (http://tmkk.hp.infoseek.co.jp/xld/index_e.html). The author updates the prog with dizzying frequency so I advise you to check every week or so. Once split you can burn/archive as usual but you will of course lose any pregaps and 00 INDEXES.

[Wsucks]

Thanks, I'll check out both options.

[U2Lynne]

Damn, ffooky, is there anything you don't know about macs? I would love to know what you do for a living!

[ffooky]

Damn, ffooky, is there anything you don't know about macs?Well how to get cdrdao to compile on my Intel iMac for a start :) I would love to know what you do for a living!So would I.

It's good to bang the drum for XLD because it doesn't appear on Version Tracker and it's a terrific little bit of kit.

[ohkeepa]

im starting to get annoyed that I still cant play SHNs on my macbook :mad:

[ffooky]

SHN has absolutely no point nowadays. I'd wouldn't even recommend archiving anything in that format even if it was the way it was received as it's pretty likely that decreasing numbers of software players will support it. Make an ST5 of your SHN files, drop them into xACT's encode pane and convert them to FLAC or WavPack. Label the ST5 you made so it's clear it relates to your original SHNs and you should be able to check if any other sources of the tracks you come across in the future are identical or not.

[U2Lynne]

Have you tried MacAmp (http://www.arcticlounge.com/maltx/index.php), Shawn? I stopped using that since cog plays all my files (even shn). I've occassionally got the problem launching the application but just used the fix they link to and everything would be fine.

[ohkeepa]

yeah, I tried again today and downloaded MacAmp and it does the same thing it did before. And Cog still crashes when I play them :hmm:

[U2Lynne]

What does MacAmp do? Did you try the fix posted on their site (if that was the problem)?

[ohkeepa]

the tracks don't play.. it just goes to the next track then the next track and so on and so on...

[ohkeepa]

can you give me a link to the fix you are talking about?

[AAR.oner]

i'd be interested in the fix too...wonderin if maybe the shn crash bug has something to do with the new intel chips :hmm:

[ohkeepa]

i'd be interested in the fix too...wonderin if maybe the shn crash bug has something to do with the new intel chips :hmm:
thats what I am thinking

[U2Lynne]

MacAmp has had no further development done in ages. Here's the link to the fix, but it's for if the application stops launching. http://www.arcticlounge.com/maltx/launchfix.php

[AAR.oner]

i was referring to Cog...but i do remember having an app. crash problem when i tried MacAmp a while ago...maybe i'll give it a try again, cuz the shn crash with Cog is irritating

[U2Lynne]

Has anyone tried the not-yet-released cog versions? http://cogosx.sourceforge.net/testing.php

edit: I don't think that will fix the shn problem, but may work for those on the newer macs. This is from the cog developers forum:

I looked into this, and the SHN decoder Cog uses is not thread-safe. This causes problems for multithreaded apps like Cog. So, the result is, crashing! I contacted the developer about this, and he is working on it, but theres no timeframe for when it will be ready.

So, sorry, but SHN support will remain broken until either the decoder is fixed, or a replacement decoding lib is found.

[ffooky]

Well I just converted a FLAC to SHN with xACT 1.59 and it plays with the Cog beta (0.06) that I have but there's a kind of interferency skipping when the track starts and if I seek to any point within it. this happens when each new (SHN) track in the playlist begins.

Play <http://www.sbooth.org/Play/> doesn't support SHN at the moment. If you want support I suggest you let the developer know.

Edit: I forgot to say I'm running an Intel iMac.

[U2Lynne]

Play is actually by the same group who develops cog. I'm not sure why they are doing both since they are so similar. :hmm:

[ffooky]

I totally agree with you Lynne. I think sbooth intends a more fb2k-ish direction for Play whereas Cog is not intended to be more than a player. Whether we need another all-singing, all-dancing application, like iTunes, is a moot (UK) point.

Personally, I tag AAC/MP3 in iTunes or Media Rage, FLAC with the latter and have no objection to the separation of metadata editing and player.

The most annoying thing is that neither Cog nor Play are in a fully usable state, though Cog is rock-solid with FLAC at least.