Ripping Tortoises

When you rip as many CDs as we do you become hyper sensitive to the way computers perform. Little glitches, when you're up against a deadline, become massive headaches. Usually its just the user being a little cranky. Until iTunes 7.

I'll admit to being bowled over by the new facilities. So we put iTunes 7.0 on all our production machines. Soon it became apparent that this new platform isn't just slow, it takes slow to a new dimension. But here's the funny thing, maybe that should be funny in quotes.

iTunes on OS X (the Mac operating system) seems unchanged. Macs have for long been the fastest rippers, particualarly with freestanding CD readers connected via FireWire. But on Windows, well we're talking less than half previous ripping speeds. In practice we've had 60 min CDs take 90 mins to rip, 30 mins per CD became the norm solidly on one machine. Looking at the user support forums at Apple everyone has found the same problem with iTunes 7.0.

There have been suggestions that the suddenly released 7.0.1 would solve the problem, so we upraded again across the board. Here's where 'funny' gets to be 'fishy'. On two machines speed has definitely increased but not up to previous maximum rates, on the others there's been no noticeable difference, so later today all machines except one will be put back to pre iTunes 7.0. If you're experiencing the same issues I'd suggest you do the same, then when your ripping is done you can switch to the latest version for the clever new options.

But all this has set me thinking. Why did it happen? Surely someone in Apple's development team would have noticed this drop in speed and realise the outcry there'd be from the user base? The cynic in me says yes, they must have known, so why did they do it?

Well, it defintely hits Windows machines much harder than Apple's own platform, and the iLife suite (which includes iTunes) is a cutting edge tool in persuading Windows lovers to jump ship in favour of Macs. Second, there has been massive pressure on Apple from the music industry to avoid what music moguls see as piracy.

And that really set me thinking. In the original design of the iPod it was perfectly feasible to be able to drag music off an iPod onto any connected computer. The iPod is a special type of portable hard disc, so it would be possible for iPod users to drop off a copy of their music library at the computer of everybody they met. Following pressure from the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) this was lopped off. Yes, there have been several companies offering after market software to do this (XPlay 2 from Mediafour.com is my favoutite), but no Apple feature for years. That is until guess what, yes - Release 7.0 neatly pops the feature back.

Have the RIAA forgotten all about this? Have they given up the witch hunt on piracy? Perhaps, or maybe there's another entirely innocent explanation.

Maybe I'm paranoid, but could it be that extra slow ripping is the price Apple had to pay to get this extra degree of music portability put back into iTunes? The industry here in the UK and America hate the idea of people ripping their own CDs. If I were in their position I'd know that extra slow ripping would discourage many users and make buying those tracks from iTunes Music Store so much more attractive. Well, that's my take on it. How would we know? Well just watch your speed of ripping in iTunes 7 and beyond. If it suddenly jumps back to normal, I'll eat my words.

But just to add to my conspiracy theory. Another popular piece of software used to 'rip' DVDs to play on iPods has seen an even worse reduction in speed. The RIAA works closely with its Motion Picture counterpart.