[Hampshire] How to upload music CDs to computer

How do people upload their music collection to their hard drives? cp
(or GUI equivalent) for every CD is painfully slow. There must be a better
way, since a lot of people seem to upload their whole CD collection and listen
from the computer.

Or even: how does one upload one CD (temporarily?) in order to use a unique
optical drive for something else (e.g. burning something else to CD) while
listening to music?

I have tried Googling, but - possibly because I am tired and worded my search
badly - I can find only how to handle MP3s etc., or upload to the Internet,
not a person's own CDs to his/her own computer.

TIA
Lisi