I know you're all immediately thinking this thread need to be deleted due to the forum rules but its all perfectly legal and above-board. My girlfriend's laptop has her entire CD collection on the HDD. Ripped using Windows Media Player unfortunately. Now the laptop had to be wiped recently due to a virus infestation and it generally needed a really good clean out. I did manage to backup the music though before wiping and put it back on after (and after sweeping it for anything nasty). Only problem is, Windows thinks the files are stolen or something. Keeps saying you can't play them on more than one PC or some such rubbish. Obviously, the stupid WMA files have the copyright bit set and the re-install has made them lose their licences and think they're on another PC. Is there any way to get them back or do I have to tell her to rip them all again? Any assistance appreciated. TIA. Oh, and if its time to re-rip, is there anything better than CDex or is it still teh daddy?
According to ye ol' Googleness there are various methods to remove WMA. Unfortunately the legalities of this are circumspect. I'd say re-rip as MP3 or FLAC. Much nicer
I'm not too concerned by the legalities as my GF has bought the rights to the music when she bought the CDs. I had a google and so much of the sites that have apps for download seem dodgy. "Here, download and run this exe and everything will be fine". I'm not even sure it is possible to remove the DRM from the files without the licences on the machine? Its just gonna be a mammoth task of re-ripping them all. Hehe, would be easier to download them... Who says DRM protects music? Just promotes illegal filesharing.
Just burn them on to a CD, then take them off. If not, just buy the tracks again, or speak to MS for freebies
Unfortunately, since you didn't back up the licences before formatting, you will have to re-rip, but don't use WMA this time! There is a tool for removing DRM from Windows Media called FairUse4WM but that only works if you have a licence to play the media in question in the first place, so that's out of the question. Burning them to a CD in order to re-rip them is also out of the question, you need the licence to do that.
use FLAC to re-rip. It is lossless (unlike WMA and MP3) and is quick to convert over to other types. If you (or your GF) use an mp3 player, at least rip to FLAC as a digital backup/computer usage and have a separate rip set (or conversion from FLAC) for the MP3 player management program (a la iTunes)
Yeah, I suspect its gonna be impossible to save these files without the licences I deleted during the format & re-install. Quack, never before have I so strongly agreed with your sig...
What kinda size tradeoff is there for using FLAC? Its a laptop and as such doesn't have an abundance of HDD sapce. Also, what's the best app to rip CDs to FLAC and/or MP3?
FLAC has its own ripping program, and/or a plugin for CDex if I remember correctly. and the size tradeoff is minimal, I wouldn't use it if it wasn't.
FLAC! or high bitrate mp3 for computability simply because no portable player natively supports flac and getting album art is a pain in the arse I need album art for some 200GB of music.
actually there is a firmware plugin for the iPod that allows it to play FLAC files. but it requires Linux+Amarok
