Using VLC to RIP a CD

Software name : VLC
Software version : 0.8.6

VLC can be used to copy audio from a CD. When VLC does this it can also convert the CD audio to another type of audio file format so it is more useful to you. It can, for example, copy a track from a CD to your harddisk as a MP3 file. Although VLC can do this its not that useful for copying large numbers of tracks as it can only do one track at a time, it won't convert a whole CD at once. The process of copying a file from a CD or a DVD is called 'ripping'.

First of all you will need to choose a CD to 'rip' and know which track number it is you wish to copy. Insert this in your computers CD Player.

Using the Wizard

We will use the VLC Wizard to rip the track from the CD. Open this by choosing from the File menu, and selecting 'Wizard...' :

This will open the following window:

We want to Transcode the file. Transcoding means to convert the file from one type to another. In this case we wish to convert the CD audio to Ogg Vorbis (you could also choose MP3 or another type of audio file). So make sure 'Transcode' is selected :

The press Next > and you will see the following choices :

Here is where we select the CD and track for ripping. In VLC technical language they refer to this as the 'input stream' which is a bit confusing for most users. Press the 'Choose...' button and you will be presented with this window :

With the above window you can select from any number of sources that could be copied. We are going to choose a disc (CD) so we choose 'disc' (unsurprisingly!). You could also, by the way, copy DVDs following a similar process, but for now we will just look at audio. When you click on the 'Disc' tab you will see something like this:

Now we must simply choose 'Audio CD' :

and we must select which track we want to rip. For this example we choose the first track, so I press the little up arrow so it changes from '0' to '1' :

Now we press 'OK' and we will be returned to the same screen of the Wizard. Press 'OK' again and we move forward to the next screen :

Here we actually choose what format we will convert (transcode) the audio to. We don't need to worry about the video options as we are only working with audio. So click on the 'Transcode audio' box :

When you do this the other options in the audio box will be highlighted which means you can now change them. We want to convert the CD audio to a OGG Vorbis audio file, so we will select 'Vorbis' from the drop down menu :

Once that is selected we will leave the bitrate option as it is and press Next > :

We have no choices here so press Next >

The above window asks us to choose where on our computer we wish to save the file. Press 'Choose' and another window will open :

Browse to the directory you wish to save the new audio file, and also write the name of the file to be saved in the 'Name' field. we must also include the correct file suffix in the name. We will call the file 'myfile' and the suffix for OGG Vorbis files is '.ogg' (MP3 files use '.mp3') so the complete name is 'myfile.ogg' :

When you have chosen the directory where you wish the file to be saved and the filename then press 'Save' :

Now press 'Finish'. The Wizard will disappear and the VLC player will appear. However nothing will appear to be happening. The VLC team, although they have made an amazing software have still something to learn about usability. Although nothing appears to be happening the transcoding process itself may still be continuing so don't quit the player.

However there is a way to tell that it is transcoding. The above image shows VLC in transcode mode, and the below image show the player when it has completed transcoding :

See the difference?...its the small extension to the player at the bottom that is the give away. Subtle...

Now your new file should be ready to play. You can open it in VLC and check!