After a few months of trial, error (and gaps and cue sheets and the dreaded read offset ) and learning from these great forums (and a little help from AccurateRip) I have my EAC configured and feel very confidant that I actually know what I am doing

But this one question just occurred to me, do I need to use "Test and Copy Selected Tracks"? Or is that just for the non-secure mode?

You can test & copy in all modes to make sure that read and written data (CRC's) is perfect. It makes most sense to use this in burst mode since that mode has no error correction. Personaly I use burst + test & copy and secure mode when that fails. This works for 95% of my CD's and secure mode doesn't even fix many of the problem cases.

I know you can, but if you don't, and you receive no errors in secure mode, then you have a "perfect" rip right?

Sorry, I probably didn't phrase the question clearly enough in the opening post, so I'll try it this way; are CRC's necessary in secure mode to be sure of a "perfect" rip?

I agree on this. It is a funny thing, though, that one would think that secure copy could handle those ocassions burst mode cannot, but as you said, if fails pretty much the same times as burst.

Having an extra drive could come in handy.

Or trying something else, like foobar2000's secure rips.

Nope.

It is just an extra check.

Some people would consider it a necessary step, but if you got a "No errors ocurred" on secure mode or matching CRC's in burst, well, that is pretty much as perfect a rip you are going to get.

What's that all about?

Link?

Ahhhh.....

http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....showtopic=37313

*Goes to read..........

Hi lextune,

My guide (link in my signature) tackles the secure / test & copy topic pretty well. Chances are this is what you were looking for.

Thanks, I'll check it out.

Using EAC's secure mode with Test & Copy is handy sometimes. Not often, but on occasion you'll get two different CRC's. So I always use it. Afterall, I only have to rip a disc once if I do it right.