Do I have to store/rip CDs to iTunes to get songs on my iPod? Or can I just drag and drop without ripping?

Question by maxximumjoy: Do I have to store/rip CDs to iTunes to get songs on my iPod? Or can I just drag and drop without ripping?
Sorry for such a newb and stupid question, I’m sure. I’ll really appreciate someone’s help … .

I’ve already checked in my preferences to “manually manage music,” and I think that’s the first step. I want to be able to just load a CD into my laptop, open up iTunes, plug in my ipod and then just drag a song title onto my iPod. Is that possible?

My reason is that, OK, my iPod can hold 1000 songs (approximately). But I don’t necessarily want a library of 1000 songs ON my laptop/in iTunes.

I tried just selecting a song from the CD playlist and dragging it to my iPod’s name in the left window pane, but it doesn’t work. Is it supposed to?

Is my only solution to maintain my entire iPod library ALSO on my laptop in my iTunes library? I don’t necessarily want to download other music management software in order to do what I want with my iPod, but if that is the best solution, I’d appreciate info on that, too.

Thanks in advance!
Many thanks to both of you! Yahoo is making me wait four hours to note a “best answer,” but I do believe that with both of your answers combined, I have the answer to my question. I appreciate the quick responses!

Best answer:

Answer by desiderio
If you have iTunes running when you put in a CD, it should automatically give you the option to upload the songs. If the page doesn’t switch automatically, you can access it in the same menu on the left side of the screen as the iPod itself shows up when plugged in. Once there, you can select which songs you do/don’t want to be uploaded, and iTunes will do the rest for you.

If you don’t want the entire library loaded onto your iPod, uncheck the boxes (in the library view) next to the songs you don’t want and those songs will be removed or withheld when you next plug in your iPod for update.

Drag and drop only works if you already have the digital file of the song somewhere else on your computer, so at some point you would have to rip them from the cd or download them from another source.

What do you think? Answer below!