Which drive for protected audio?

Software & Apps
#1

Yo guys, which drive does the best job of reading audio CDs protected by the various methods? Assuming you don’t let any of them install a trojan on your machine.

I have a Litey LTD163 DVD drive and it works great with unprotected CDs, but what should I get to handle the protected stuff?

Thanks.

#2

CD-RWs:

Plextor Premium (non plus ultra for CD copy protections of any kind)

LiteOn LTR-52327S (cheap and great alternative)

Most DVD-ROM readers are not that good when it comes to audio CD protections, the only good ones at it:

DVD-ROMs

LiteOn 166S

Aopen 1648/AAP

Both generally great drives as well. But the CD-RWs mentioned first are the better choice when defeating audio protections is the main concern (I personally recommend the Premium (have it myself), but it is not cheap).

#3

What program are u going to use?

#4

Talking to me? Exact Audio Copy (EAC) (freeware). The best audio ripping tool there is, nothing else comes even close, including all commercial products.

Edit: Plextools is quite useful for ripping protected audio discs as well.

#5

Does everyone use that program? I have been a prod EAC user for a long while now and I have only mety about 20 people that don’t use EAC.

#6

EAC is the quasi-standard amongst audiophiles. Especially the secure ripping mode, the good support / integration of all kinds of audio compression formats, and all the geeky extra options (e.g. offsets) make it quite unique. And the best thing about it: It’s free.

#7

I usually use EAC. However, I’ll use whatever is necessary to get the job done. Which ripping program is best for protected CDs?

#8

EAC is excellent. Also PlexTools Pro is great for audio protected CDs (and as a ripper in general), but of course you need a plextor drive :wink: .

ET

#9

Out of all the drives I tested Plextors work the best, Sony lasers work the worst and Yamaha falls somewhere in between them.

#10

The Yamaha CRW-F1 is supposed to be very good at audio protections. You might have trouble finding this drive considering its not in production anymore. I would test out audio protections with it if I had protected audio cds, but I can’t find any here in the US.

#11

I never tested the Y F1 but I did also here it was good.

I have a few CDS200 USA cds I grabbed off Amazon (the sony lasers can’t rip track01 and but my plex can):

#12

the yamaha crw-f1
is not in shop anymore oly on inetnet maby ebay
i have the yamaha crw-f1 it a very good burner for audio cd protections
and games protections

#13

the time that i bay the burner yamaha crw-f1
it was 2 jears ago i bay it in a copmuter shop.
but a weak later it wasent anymore becuase it now a illegal
burner, becuase it bur a lot of audio cd protections.
this shop was in the netherlands europa.
sorry for my bat english so if you see i come from the netherlands.

#14

try feurio . its a very good program to defeat some protections.

#15

I couldn’t get game backups to work very well in this drive, the ones made in the liteon ran of course, but it wouldn’t defeat them. Maybe because I think I only tested with firmwares 1.0d-f I never got around to 1.0g testing.