Rufus

My question is: I want to create an archival quality WAV backup of all my audio CDs which in future and if necessary I can either (i) use to create a backup copy which is identical (in WAV) to the original and/or (ii) rip using a lossless codec. The reason for creating a backup is a) in case of deterioration of the original and b) in case of theft (some years ago all my CDs were stolen and I lost a lot of good music).

I have commenced using EAC on Windows XP to backups CDs to an external 500GB hard drive - it seems to be the perfect application due to its secure extraction and offset correction. The hard drive has heaps of capacity so I don't mind saving in WAV.

My problem is this: much of my music plays without gaps (it is dance music and there is no audible pause between the tracks). I want to ensure that if/when I need to make a CD copy from the corresponding folder on the hard drive (ie which holds the songs in WAV format as separate files) I retain gapless playback.

Currently when I extract the CD to the hard drive, the folder contains a number of WAV files that correspond to the songs on the CD. How would I copy these back to a blank CD as gapless (in a lossless codec or in the original WAV) and how can I ensure that if I convert them to a codec they remain gapless?

I have googled for half a day to try to find this answer but the tutorials, forums and FAQ sites do not seem to have anything on it. There are items about creating a CUE etc but I don't see how this applies.

I don't want to start making the backups before I know the answer to this question otherwise I will have to make all the backups again later!

Grateful for your advice. Thanks for your time with such a basic query.