[X4U] importing audio CD as AIFF

[Alex]

On May 1, 2005, at 21:14, DZ-Jay wrote:

> [...] which part of my argument was your explanation supposed to be 
> debunking?

This:

>> [...] The collective recording industry does not want us, consumers, 
>> accessing the files directly from the disc [...]

and this

>> [...] Commercial hardware and software, is commonly crippled to 
>> prevent (or make difficult) bit-by-bit copying. [...]

(and it was not an attempt to "debunk").

> I already had mentioned in a previous post that an audio CD is not 
> organized in files [...]

Can you explain how the recording industry doesn't want us to access 
directly something that isn't there?

> [...] When iTunes, and other popular commercial software, extract a 
> song from an Audio CD, is it performed by extracting directly the raw 
> data, bit by bit, and thus making an exact clone of the original [...]

You labour under a misconception. Bit-by-bit copies are quite rare in 
modern mass storage, and only performed for very specific tasks -- for 
one thing, because they're extremely inefficient. But in the case of 
audio CD, it's completely irrelevant, because the audio data is 
actually encoded on the disc surface in EFM (8 to 14 modulation). In 
other words, when the RF signal is read, each 14 symbol bits + 3 
connecting bits from the disc surface are converted to 1 byte of data. 
And this data actually forms two streams, the audio stream and the 
subcode stream, which go through further processing. And yes, this is 
what goes on in your CD player, and there are very good, sound 
engineering reasons for each step. So the process of reading an audio 
CD -- in a CD player or a CD drive -- is actually a process of 
recreating the audio stream. That's why I said in my first post in this 
thread that it's virtually impossible to make an exact duplicate of an 
audio CD on a desktop computer.

> [...] copying limitations on common applications is due more to 
> political pressure applied to developers, and not by technological 
> limitations.

"Political"? In China, perhaps; here, no. Business? In some instances, 
yes. (I suspect Apple dropped audio CD copying capability from Disk 
Copy at the request of its partners in the recording industry, though I 
don't know that for a fact.) Mostly, no. Toast and Nero -- to take just 
two instances -- can very easily duplicate audio CDs to the 
satisfaction of the overwhelming majority of users. The reason why 
Roxio and Ahead don't build more advanced audio CD copying capabilities 
into them is purely commercial. As this thread amply demonstrates, it's 
only a small number of hobbyists or audiophiles who is interested in 
such capabilities.

[...] making a copy of CD in iTunes is now less convenient than it used 
it [...]

As I recall, iTunes (which began life as SoundJam, didn't it?) was 
never intended to be a CD copying app. I don't recall it ever having 
this capability.

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