Neil Young - remember him? If you're around my age he's that bloke with the winning stage persona and a rather reedy voice. Made some great tracks on his early albums (70s, 80s) and then, well so-so and he got very political.

Recently the news broke that he (sometime singer) was collaborating with Steve Jobs on a new music format. Just let that sink in - the technical genius at the head of one of the world's biggest IT companies, the man who gave the kiss of life to the whole portable music thing, is turning to a singer for tech advice. Young's argument rests on the "fact" that when Jobs went home he listened the vinyl. Rather a shaky foundation on which to build an easily rebutted argument but then SJ is dead.

Did anyone say MP3 was top quality? CD ripping has been about liberating music at a compromise setting that works well for most purposes. You get compressed music files so you can take them around with you, so you can store them on a hard drive, so you can make backup copies, so you can buy and download new tracks. So you can sort and access music in ways vinyl never allowed.

Recently we've added two music file format options to our ripping option - Apple Lossless and FLAC. These are becoming better received given the availability of small USB hard drives, believe me the upgrade in quality is worthwhile. But if you want to get every last ounce out of that iPod, MP3 or AAC is the way to go.

This week we have three jobs in, each client would like their files returned on USB hard drives. CD ripping is pretty much complete so I've just been to our local computer store to buy three discs.

We use Argos. OK, it's not the Apple Store but for several years we've been sourcing standard computer peripherals from them, particularly after losing the alternative which was Dixons. Today, no luck.

I could have a drive (not three, just one) at around £120 (compared to the £55 we've been paying). That was the best they could offer and I've just checked online where stock isn't more plentiful. I had a similar experience just before Christmas but was told in PC World that supplies would be back to normal by February. It seems not. What is to be done? I hope not a trip to Lakeside.

There are two great ways to ship CDs.

First, take your discs out of their jewel cases and put them into a CD wallet. You can get these in a range of capacities and they're just great for shipping and long term storage. Cost is modest, very cheap on eBay.

Second, again this is the discs only, just use those spindles / tubs on which blank CDs and DVDs are sold. This relies on a heavy usage of blank discs, or a lot of friends, and some foresight but it is a safe way to mail CDs. If you look at each disc you'll see a small ridge on the back. When stacked on top of each other on the spindles this ensures their faces don't rub against each other. Clever.

If you need packing let us know, we'll mail some to you.

Thanks to the brilliant graphic brain and creativity of the logoglo.com who’ve done a great job for us. Here it is -



Hope you like it.

Thanks to the brilliant graphic brain and creativity of the logoglo.com who’ve done a great job for us. Here it is -



Hope you like it.

Just been looking at the website stats Google collates for us, some great detail and a few odd ball insights into what goes on in the world of the web.

I know we’ve had CD ripping clients in mainland Europe. We have ripped CDs for clients in Ireland, Germany, Switzerland and France plus a few others. However it seems from Google that we have potential CD ripping clients in Indonesia, India, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Brazil.

It seems we have interest in some of the technical terms used on this site, the most popular being terms relating to compression in music and CD bitrates. This has provoked interest in a raft of countries that my lapses in geographic knowledge just think of as the former Soviet Union, along with Chile and Mexico.

When I registered our service on the web I understood that having a .com rather than a .co.uk or .eu would tip interest more towards the USA and sure, we have a fair number of visitors from North America. Of course we have most hits from the UK but USA is out ranked by Germany comparing each country. If you add the smaller European nations they out hit the States, as do the combined -stan nations (with a chunk of help from Saudi Arabia).

If you’re reading this from any of those more remote nations, yes, we’d be happy to rip your CDs for you. I’d be thrilled to get our first client from Uruguay or from the Philipines.

Just been looking at the website stats Google collates for us, some great detail and a few odd ball insights into what goes on in the world of the web.

I know we’ve had CD ripping clients in mainland Europe. We have ripped CDs for clients in Ireland, Germany, Switzerland and France plus a few others. However it seems from Google that we have potential CD ripping clients in Indonesia, India, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Brazil.

It seems we have interest in some of the technical terms used on this site, the most popular being terms relating to compression in music and CD bitrates. This has provoked interest in a raft of countries that my lapses in geographic knowledge just think of as the former Soviet Union, along with Chile and Mexico.

When I registered our service on the web I understood that having a .com rather than a .co.uk or .eu would tip interest more towards the USA and sure, we have a fair number of visitors from North America. Of course we have most hits from the UK but USA is out ranked by Germany comparing each country. If you add the smaller European nations they out hit the States, as do the combined -stan nations (with a chunk of help from Saudi Arabia).

If you’re reading this from any of those more remote nations, yes, we’d be happy to rip your CDs for you. I’d be thrilled to get our first client from Uruguay or from the Philipines.

We rip CDs, and we listen to music, just like you. Except a few of our clients who have Sonos systems and upgraded to a new Mac with the Lion operating system.

They hit the sound of silence as the vital Sonos Controller software didn’t work with Apple’s Lion. Until, today. earlier I received an email saying that a new version of Controller is now available for Lion. Good news, roar of approval.

We rip CDs, and we listen to music, just like you. Except a few of our clients who have Sonos systems and upgraded to a new Mac with the Lion operating system.

They hit the sound of silence as the vital Sonos Controller software didn’t work with Apple’s Lion. Until, today. earlier I received an email saying that a new version of Controller is now available for Lion. Good news, roar of approval.

When I designed this site originally I tried to cover all the options, including a FAQS (frequently asked questions) page to address the details of our CD ripping service. It’s not modest but I thought I’d done a pretty good job.

Then we got clients ringing to ask the questions they thought were obvious but I had just not thought of, hence many additions by way of FAQs or free standing web pages. We got to the point where I think 99.99% of what you need is here on the site. Until yesterday ..... Two questions.

First, do you send my CDs back? Yes, of course. It had seemed so obvious to me that I hadn’t thought it necessary to say so. To make it completely clear I’ve added a FAQ entry to say so and I repeat it here. Yes, we do send your CDs back to you.

Second, how much can I save? Are you really that much cheaper than the opposition? Yes, we really are. We recently quoted for a major CD ripping project of over 3,000 CDs. Our clients secretary rang to ask if we could confirm by email what we would charge. Our nearest competitor had quoted 70p per CD and she just wanted to be certain. So I was more than happy to send her an email to confirm, yes, it really is just 50p per CD and that she was saving her boss £600.