The Audio Disc problem

If you try to mount an audio CD on (a bare bone) Debian 8 with XFCE you will get :
Failed to mount “Audio Disc” Location not mountable

Background information

Audio CDs are never mounted ! Mounting works only with data CDs,

The CDDA (CD Digital Audio) format is not a regular filesystem. The Audio Disc does not have the iso9660 filesystem, so the standard line for CD/DVD drives in the /etc/fstab will be ignored. The only way to view the contents of an Audio Disc is with a software that “understands” the CDDA format. The software can be a GUI, an application software or the command line.

More information for CDDA on Wikipedia

1) GUI software – solution

The underlying virtual file system (VFS) of a GUIs filemanager scans the audio CD, then presents the tracks as raw wav files in a GUI window. This is true for Gnomes Nautilus, KDEs Dolphin BUT NOT for XFCEs Thunar on Debian 8.

Read and copy files from an audio CD (XFCE + Debian 8)

In order to copy files from the audio CD to the hard disk, you have to add basically some packages to make Thunar work as you are used in Gnome and KDE.
In the two GUIs you just click on the audio CD symbol (on the desktop or in the filesystem folder), then you get a window with the audio files inside.

A) The following packages must be installed in order to get a window – with the audio files – by clicking on the audio CD icon in the Filesystem folder :

This is a list generated by comparing two systems (a working one and a not working one). Maybe not all packages are necessary to do the job …

gir1.2-soup-2.4
gjs
gnome-desktop3-data
gnome-sushi
gnome-video-effects
libgconf2.0 cil
libglibmm-2.4-1c2a
libgnome-vfs2.0-cil
libgnome2.24-cil
python-3gi-cairo
zenity
zenity common

B) Prerequisites in order to get a window – with the audio files – by clicking on the audio CD icon on the desktop :

go Applications Menu // Settings // Settings Manager // Hardware // Removable Drives and Media // Storage // check-box ON for :
– Mount removable drives when hot-plugged
– Mount removable media when inserted

With these settings I got no consistent results. Some machines did require these settings, some not …

C) Other prerequisites and some nice stuff to install (or already installed with the base system)
debian-dektop
xfce4-goodies
thunar-volman

2) Application software – solution

Applications like Exaile and Gxine (and others) have direct access to audio CDs, they “understand” the CDDA format.

Copy and play files from audio CDs :

– Exaile

copy audio CD files to hard disk : click “import CD” (this puts the files in /home)

play : drag Tracks to Playlist, then double click on the a track

– Gxine 

play : go “File” // choose “CD”

3) Command line – solution

Copy the wav files from the audio CD to the hard disk : # cdparanoia -B “1-“