# Music collection archive



## Jeff Flowerday (Jan 23, 2006)

Who else has archived their whole music collection using a lossless codec?

I just started doing mine to "WMA Lossless". It's the best solution for me, I use Windows Media Center.

I might pick up a 32GB Touch shortly and ITunes will convert "WMA Lossless" to "Apple Lossless" as needed.


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## ronmac (Sep 22, 2006)

FLAC and Media Monkey work well together, for standalone media server use. Not supported by ITunes though. Pity!


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## Jeff Flowerday (Jan 23, 2006)

ronmac said:


> FLAC and Media Monkey work well together, for standalone media server use. Not supported by ITunes though. Pity!


 
I thought about FLAC because my Pioneer receiver has native support for it. Unfortunately nothing else I run does. I'm not much for installing 3rd party codecs.


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## Guest (Feb 11, 2008)

Jeff Flowerday said:


> I thought about FLAC because my Pioneer receiver has native support for it. Unfortunately nothing else I run does. I'm not much for installing 3rd party codecs.


The FLAC codec for WiMP is painless to install and use. There's also an iTunes plugin for FLAC. Ultimately FLAC is more portable. But if you're all Windows, all the time WMA is easy and included in the OS.

Personally I encode everything at a high average VBR MP3 for listening on my portable. Headphones and my listening level (low) make any lossless/lossy codec differences impossible for me to spot. At home I still use CDs. I like to touch things.


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## Jeff Flowerday (Jan 23, 2006)

iaresee said:


> The FLAC codec for WiMP is painless to install and use. There's also an iTunes plugin for FLAC. Ultimately FLAC is more portable. But if you're all Windows, all the time WMA is easy and included in the OS.


I don't want to have to install plugins for Windows Media Player, Windows Media Center and ITunes.

Though Itunes might not be an issue, from everything I've read the IPods aren't the greatest for sound quality. I might go with a Cowon MP3 player.


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## fraser (Feb 24, 2007)

sorry if i sound like a know- nothing, but would something like this be a viable way to archive a cd collection of around 5000 cds?
i have a large collection, and find that i cant be bothered sifting through that mess, then inserting a cd in the player, etc- id love to just slap together a dedicated jukebox pc, and load em all in there- would sure make organization simpler- and could set up playlists etc- id guess i need some large hds.
id like to hear what some of the others here have done


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## Jeff Flowerday (Jan 23, 2006)

fraser said:


> sorry if i sound like a know- nothing, but would something like this be a viable way to archive a cd collection of around 5000 cds?
> i have a large collection, and find that i cant be bothered sifting through that mess, then inserting a cd in the player, etc- id love to just slap together a dedicated jukebox pc, and load em all in there- would sure make organization simpler- and could set up playlists etc- id guess i need some large hds.
> id like to hear what some of the others here have done


To archive them bit for bit into a lossless format you'd need about 2TB of storage. Not to extreme with todays HDs.

You are looking at about $500 dollars worth of HD. You'd probably want to double that so you have a backup, it would suck to have to rip everything again on a failure.


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## fraser (Feb 24, 2007)

Jeff Flowerday said:


> To archive them bit for bit into a lossless format you'd need about 2TB of storage. Not to extreme with todays HDs.
> 
> You are looking at about $500 dollars worth of HD. You'd probably want to double that so you have a backup, it would suck to have to rip everything again on a failure.


ahh ok, thanks jeff- definately id have to have multiple copies, also id need space redundancy, as i still gather cds at a few a week, if not more- but then again, i dont really listen to them all. perhaps the way to go is to archive my favourites, and add space as needed- will look into this further-
thanks!


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## Guest (Feb 11, 2008)

fraser said:


> ahh ok, thanks jeff- definately id have to have multiple copies, also id need space redundancy, as i still gather cds at a few a week, if not more- but then again, i dont really listen to them all. perhaps the way to go is to archive my favourites, and add space as needed- will look into this further-
> thanks!


A few years ago these guys came into existence: http://www.cdripping.ca/ -- they're up in Markham IIRC. They'll take all your discs and rip them, give them back along with the encoded files loaded up on hard drives and backed up on DVDs. For 5000 CDs I'd seriously consider out sourcing that effort. By the time you're done we'll be on to music streamed directly to the brain. :smilie_flagge17:


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## Jeff Flowerday (Jan 23, 2006)

fraser said:


> ahh ok, thanks jeff- definately id have to have multiple copies, also id need space redundancy, as i still gather cds at a few a week, if not more- but then again, i dont really listen to them all. perhaps the way to go is to archive my favourites, and add space as needed- will look into this further-
> thanks!


You could also look at a single raid 5 solution that would be easier to manage instead of multiple copies.


Raid 5 would require 3 1TB drives and a special external enclosure. You could probably set one up for less than $750.


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## fraser (Feb 24, 2007)

Jeff Flowerday said:


> You could also look at a single raid 5 solution that would be easier to manage instead of multiple copies.
> 
> 
> Raid 5 would require 3 1TB drives and a special external enclosure. You could probably set one up for less than $750.


thanks again!- it occured to me that this was maybe the way to go- i have a bit of research and planning to do, and some sifting through my pile of pc parts-

iaresee, thanks for the idea and link- but in the last half hour i realized that a majority of my stuff is live stuff- i dont really need 75 live hendrix concerts at my fingertips, nor do i need all of abbas discography there-so i think the reality of it all would reduce the actual archived stuff only to the things i listen to from time to time at least.

really it need not be such a big deal- with the correct setup i guess i can add space as needed, and as i go, be selective of what i choose to archive
already i have an 80gb drive about half full of certain albums, but they are all mp3 to save space
bah- pretty heady stuff for a sunday night-


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## Jeff Flowerday (Jan 23, 2006)

Actually this looks like a real sweet solution:

http://www.drobo.com/products_drobo.aspx

I might pick one up, I'm at a point where 2 single 1 TB drives in a mirror isn't enough space.


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## violation (Aug 20, 2006)

Personally I find lossless overrated... I don't hear a _big_ difference between that and a V0 rip, nothing that'll drive me crazy. I can live with a little bit of compression when I look at the size difference in the files and the money I'll save by not runnin' out of storage so soon. 

I was looking into that Drobo awhile back when NCIX first got it in stock... but it's only USB 2.0 and expensive for what it is IMO. Building a file server out of spare parts + FreeNAS + the guide I saw linked on The Green Button = cheaper for me, I just need a bigger case. I haven't setup RAID5 though... I'm still working on buying storage. 1tb drives are expensive so I just keep buying 500gb ones when they're on sale for like $80. Gotta' hate the 2 per customer rule. 

You seem like a cat that's got parts spread all over like me lol should check it out.

http://www.fransatech.com/whats-new...rk-attached-storage-with-media-center-pa.html


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## violation (Aug 20, 2006)

Paul said:


> until you've heard audiophile vinyl on a reference quality system.....you have no idea how crappy current recorded music sounds.


Let's keep it that way... I can't keep spending money on this shit haha.  

Alls I know is when I brought my media center to my dad's house and played v0's and flac through his home theater setup (which I setup and is far from cheap... I remember the front bookshelf speakers are Celestion F15s, two back speakers are Klipsch F1s and the receiver is an Onkyo SR605, I forget the speaker/sub models... only reason I remember those is because I scored a wicked deal on them. $299 for a pair of F1's @ Best Buy. Regular like $800, yes please!) and I really didn't hear a huge difference. 

Either way, different strokes for different folks.


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## Jeff Flowerday (Jan 23, 2006)

violation said:


> Personally I find lossless overrated... I don't hear a _big_ difference between that and a V0 rip, nothing that'll drive me crazy. I can live with a little bit of compression when I look at the size difference in the files and the money I'll save by not runnin' out of storage so soon.
> 
> I was looking into that Drobo awhile back when NCIX first got it in stock... but it's only USB 2.0 and expensive for what it is IMO. Building a file server out of spare parts + FreeNAS + the guide I saw linked on The Green Button = cheaper for me, I just need a bigger case. I haven't setup RAID5 though... I'm still working on buying storage. 1tb drives are expensive so I just keep buying 500gb ones when they're on sale for like $80. Gotta' hate the 2 per customer rule.
> 
> ...


It's more than just audio quality, it's an archive incase anything happens to the original CDs. Just knowing everything is bit for bit to do any conversion from is nice.

From everything that dobro does it isn't expensive. Built in Raid controller. small cabinet with built in power supply and cooling. Handling mixed drive size and completely automated Raid is a real bonus.

Yes it would have been nice if it had ESata as well.

Unfortunatelly I don't have ethernet around the house so network storage does me no good. My HD content is too much for wireless to handle.


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## violation (Aug 20, 2006)

I forgot this thread was about storing music for a second. I guess it would be good for that purpose. Should you decide you want one to stream videos from... not a good idea (check reviews about speeds when near full). 

Personally I want a 16TB file server like this guy: http://img95.imageshack.us/img95/6291/dsc05238uv9.jpg

Neighbourhood blackout when that bitch is powered on... and now he's going for over 20TB in a pimp Lian-Li cube case.


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## Pneumonic (Feb 14, 2008)

I am in the (long) process of archiving much of my CD collection into FLAC files which I have stored in duplicate and which I stream via a Squeezebox media player all about my household.

I am about 2500 or so CD's into the archival and, while it has been a tiresome and boring process, it is very much worth it since I find myself listening too much greater, and more varied, music than I ever have. 

It also is re-assuring to know that I have exact duplicate copies of my CD's, many of which are showing up with more and more read errors, as they age.


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## Jeff Flowerday (Jan 23, 2006)

400 CDs in and I'm only at 130GB.


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## Jeff Flowerday (Jan 23, 2006)

Ok I just reached 1320 CDs and I'm at 416GB. I'm totally impressed with WMA Lossless compression.


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## Guest (Feb 29, 2008)

Jeff Flowerday said:


> Ok I just reached 1320 CDs and I'm at 416GB. I'm totally impressed with WMA Lossless compression.


Apologies if you already mentioned this, but what's the size comparison between WMA Lossless and FLAC? Similar? WMA-L a little smaller?


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## Jeff Flowerday (Jan 23, 2006)

iaresee said:


> Apologies if you already mentioned this, but what's the size comparison between WMA Lossless and FLAC? Similar? WMA-L a little smaller?


I haven't done a side by side comparison personally but from everything I've read WMA-L does produce slightly smaller files but takes more CPU power to play back. Not that CPU power is an issue now a days. 2-4% more compress with WMA lossless is the figure I see being tossed around.


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