Win XP Pro, iTunes - V Slow Rip, WMP10 3 times as fast on same PC

Question

Hello All,
Well I did it - I took the plunge and went out and got me an iPod after everyone saying how great Apple are. Used to have (still do) a beasty that plays MP3 and WMA and I am in the process of converting my CD library....
End of pre-amble.
Anyhow - I have a strange and disconcerting problem. I have so far ripped about 500 of my CD's - ripped them to WMA at 192kbs, using WMP10. The PC I use is being dedicated for this purpose. When ripping to WMA (with error checking) the thing flew by (very fast - average CD took about 5 - 8 minutes).
But now I have the iPod - decided to use iTunes, and set it to Rip my CD's to AAC (Apple's "native" format, at 128 kbs). Problem is the first CD took over 1 hour to rip - that is actually slower than playing the thing!! It was occasionally "ripping" at about 0.8x (so iTunes tells me). So decided to remove error checking - well that was an improvement now it only takes about 18-25 minutes to rip a Cd - and according to iTunes we are at a rate of about 3x.
I have the latest XP Pro updates, I have the latest iTunes (just downloaded from Apple) - but this thing is a DOG...
Has ANYONE got a clue as to how to get this thing to work faster? I cannot believe that it is SO bad (or SLOW)....at this rate I'll be 80 years old before I get my CD's done.
It is obviously NOT the PC, nor the drivers - these go at a great clip when using WMP10.
If anyone can post any light as to how to give iTunes a swift kick up the jacksy to make it do its stuff - it would be truly appreciated.
Although I like the player - so far the software has not been satisfactory.
HP Pavilion, AMD Athlon etc   Windows XP Pro   Its Fast......
  Windows XP Pro   Its Fast......

Answer 1

I am not re-ripping my CD's to AAC
Huh?
Then why did you write, "decided to use iTunes, and set it to Rip my CD's to AAC"?
If possible (and for best quality) you should RIP for the CD and not convert between lossy formats (AAC/MP3/WMA).
My question was simply why does iTunes take 3 times as long to RIP a CD at 128kbs AAC then WMP10 does to rip a CD to 192kbs WMA, and what can I do to give iTunes a boost?
In response to yoru question, Pac wrote;
"1) UPDATE FIRMWARE for the CD burner drive and get the latest updates for your system,like BIOs hardware ect ect from the PC makers site
2) Slow the burn speed from "Max" downto 16x 8x or 4x"
The reason I would prefer to go with AAC is that for the "same" bit rate/quality as MP3 you actually end up saving some space - on my calculation about 25% - so that is preferable.
You must be calculating something incorrectly.
Using iTunes to RIP, AAC and MP3 at the same bit rate are almost identical in file size.
The quality is definitely not the same.
There are better MP3 codecs available(LAME).
if there is other software out there that will RIP to AAC - and is faster than iTunes - then let me know.
Yes, there are different apps that will RIP AAC, but I can't recall offhand.