Your CDs get the same love and care as everyone else - we just trim down the service to bare necessities. We’ll pull your album information and artwork from the FreeDB and Gracenote databases. While they’re not GD3 and AMG, these are the sources Apple uses with iTunes, so you know you’re getting quality. Insurance is extra, and if a few of your discs are damaged and unable to rip, we’ll separate them out for you so you can replace them or purchase them digitally online. We’ve also made insurance optional. It’s highly recommended, but optional nevertheless.

In the coming weeks we’ll be posting more information about the Standard CD Ripping Service, but for now click over to our services page and check out what the new option has to offer!

Believe it or not, the actual “ripping” process (the action of turning your physical discs into digital files) is the fastest part. In fact, almost every job we have come through our facility can be ripped in less than 24 hours. The two longest time-takers are also two of the most crucial: shipping and love!

When you place an order, we send you our shipping kit for your discs. This takes between 1 and 4 business days, depending on where in the United States you live. You then get the boxes, pack your CDs with our materials, and put the return label on the box. We then receive your discs in a few more business days.

Once we’ve received your order, you get placed into queue. We have a system that determines who gets placed at what position in the queue based on when you ordered, how long it took you to ship your media to us, and how big your collection is. Your CDs are then ripped into the first format you specified, and are moved to be groomed. This is where we get to the “love” stage.

“Love” is the part of the process that is the most crucial – remember, we love your CD collection as much as you do, and we want to make sure that you get the best possible product back. We make sure we find as much album art for your collection as possible, we check for inconsistencies in names between composers and artists, and generally try and clean up the digital files from any irregularities as best as possible. If you have a second or third format you’d like, your collection is queued on our server cluster to be converted into those formats, and then your music is loaded onto the device you’ve sent to or purchased from us.

Usually your collection is in our facility for 3-4 business days. However, this is a general rule of thumb, because we don’t prioritize timing. Our philosophy is “If it’s not right, we don’t ship it.” End of story. If we can’t make it pass our quality control, we hold and fix until it’s correct. It is, however, rare when we have to hold a collection beyond the usual time frame.

All said and done, the process usually takes about 2-3 weeks, depending on how fast your CDs get to us and how large your collection is. If you need your CDs back by a certain date, we’re happy to quote you on a rush job, it just might cost a little extra per disc.

If you’re interested in hearing more about a specific part of the process, or want more information about anything, give us a call, send us an email, or reach out to us on Twitter or Facebook!

P.S. – Please update your RSS feed! You can find our RSS link at the top right of every page!

We ran into a few problems, and I’m going to address one today – most of our customers are not worrying about ripping CDs all day (as they shouldn’t be) and therefore do not know what to call the service we offer, much less know how to search for it. We don’t blame them at all. In fact, we want you to stay ignorant, so you can enjoy the better things in life! However, this doesn’t get us business and doesn’t get your CDs ripped.

So let’s chat. At Ripstyles, we take your CDs and make them available in a digital format. We do this through a process called CD ripping, or as we define it, “the service we offer to convert and copy your CDs into a digital music collection, suitable to be played on a computer, portable media player, home media center, and many other devices.” Not too shabby, however, it doesn’t address the problem. Often times our customers use the term “burn” instead of “rip.” To make it simple, burning is putting data onto a disc, and ripping is taking data off of a disc. Easy! We also hear the phrase “download my CDs to iPod” quite often. While Apple uses the word “syncing” a lot, we prefer to just say “we’ll load your iPod.” It’s quick, easy, and clear.

Does it matter what you call us? Heck no, we love being creative. “Those CD Guys and Girls” works just fine. We do, however, want to make it easy for you to find us so that we can help out with that pile of CDs sitting in your living room. If you hear of a good name for CD ripping or conversion, let us know. Drop a comment below, or email us with your thoughts.