There is a choice of CD rippers out there. Unlike, say, word processing, there is no industry standard yet, so everyone is free to try and see what is best for their needs. You can choose to use a 10MB tool with lots of additional options and features that would shame a slower PC or use a free lightweight tool like FreeRIP.
     FreeRIP is a program that lets you rip audio CDs and encode audio tracks to WAV, MP3 or Ogg Vorbis files. It looks pretty simple and is not a pain to learn how to use. On the first run the program asks you to adjust the configuration right away, including default file format, bitrate, you online/offline status and even email address for access to freedb.org. Once you've done that, and picked the CD-ROM drive from which the tracks will be ripped, you can proceed to rip your first CD. If the audio CD in question does not have CD-text, you can retrieve information about songs from freedb.org.
     The tool is nice and easy to use. The only drawback is some ads in the upper part of the window, but these are the price for keeping the software free. Download it today and see for yourself.