I'm going to begin the inevitable switch from CD to PC audio. Although I don't see decommissioning my well-loved Rotel RCD 1070 CDP any time soon, I'd like to get my feet wet with the technology of today.

I have a good friend who is in IT as well as an audio hobbyist who can set me up with an old laptop running Linux as a dedicated music server. I just need to buy an external HD.

I see you can buy a Verbatim SmartDisk 1TB External hard drive for about $150.

http://www.google.com/products/catalog?q=external+hard+drive&oe=utf-8&cid=7808675321495872737&sa=title#ps-sellers

This is about half the price of 1 TB drives from other companies, and about the same as most other 500 Gig drives. This Verbatim deal boarders on too good to be true? Is it?

New Egg has even cheaper ones than $150. Storage is dirt cheap these days.

Another option is one with a SATA connection. However, that one (the Verbatim) looks perfectly serviceable. That said... All drive fail at some point or other. Backup your stuff. I believe that several external drives have a duplexing (or mirroring) option (two drives with identical data). Unfortunately, I think they only work with Windows....

I've had good luck with Western Digital My Book drives. I have three of them.

And I'll give a strong second to the suggestion to make sure you back your music files up. This becomes more and more important as you build your library up, and if and when you sell off your CDs. Some people go so far as to store a backup off site, in the event your house is robbed or burns down!

I've had good luck with Western Digital My Book drives. I have three of them.

And I'll give a strong second to the suggestion to make sure you back your music files up. This becomes more and more important as you build your library up, and if and when you sell off your CDs. Some people go so far as to store a backup off site, in the event your house is robbed or burns down!

That's what I use: The MyBook 1TB external USB drive. Got it for $119 - well, $129 with the 2 year extended warranty from wallyworld. So far, works OK.

I use a western digital in an accomdata case. I have it plugged into my xbox via USB. and my xbox is connected via optical cable to my amp. Yet cd's still sound better from my CD player..... Anyway WD makes great drivers

Thanks for the recommendations so far. I think once I get serious and feel like I have something to lose, I'll set up a mirror system.

Thanks for the recommendations so far. I think once I get serious and feel like I have something to lose, I'll set up a mirror system.

If portability is a concern, remember that most (all?) external drives of the 3.5" variety use an external power supply of the wall wart style.

If you get the smaller 2.5" drives they typically run directly from the USB port and don't require an external power supply.

Also, while mirroring does provide a measure of hardware redundancy, it's not a substitute for backup because it provides no protection from malware/viruses, inadvertent deletion, corruption of files, etc.

I may get smacked for this but I use a Zune 120 as my primary "portable" digital source. For desktop storage/archive I use both a LaCie NAS (1.5 TB raid 10) and a USB 1 TB raid 1 along with storing on my hot swap raid 5 arrays.

I keep a selection of my favorite tunes on a 16gb USB flash drive (my car stereos have USB input so this is nice and easy)

I know this is redundant backup well past anal retentive but I have never lost anything.... EVER.....

...Also, while mirroring does provide a measure of hardware redundancy, it's not a substitute for backup because it provides no protection from malware/viruses, inadvertent deletion, corruption of files, etc.

Agreed. I use some cheap software (there's a free trial version too) called AllwaySync that was recommended to me here. It is a simple and fast way to backup your music files, and keep the backups current as you add more music. Highly recommended.

Get this http://www.thermaltakeusa.com/Product.aspx?S=1268&ID=1731

Add internal HDD I prefer Seagate but WD does not offer Enterprise drives and I run an IT department so I am a bit partial. Also you will find these types of drives have 5 year warranties. This way you can add more drives as you need them.

As everyone else has said here BACKUP,BACKUP,BACKUP!!!!!:yes:

Look at this software for backup it will do Linux as well as Windows. It does not say for linux but it does work I have done it. There will be lots of free stuff out there under GNU license as well.

http://store.storagecraft.com/acb/stores/1/ShadowProtect-Desktop-Edition-33-P55C0.aspx

Or the bundle for 3 machines. Very good software:yes:

Look at this software for backup it will do Linux as well as Windows. It does not say for linux but it does work I have done it. There will be lots of free stuff out there under GNU license as well.

http://store.storagecraft.com/acb/stores/1/ShadowProtect-Desktop-Edition-33-P55C0.aspx

Or the bundle for 3 machines. Very good software:yes:

I use, and also recommend, ShadowProtect Desktop. I have it on my work computer and on my home computer.

It's not the cheapest stuff around, but it's easy to use, fast compared to some others I tried, and the backups restore very easily and reliably.

Actually, I just image the whole drive, I don't mess with directory or file level backups.

I have a LaCie 2Big Triple that I use as my main data drive....it gets moved around a LOT and has never had a problem...

Get this http://www.thermaltakeusa.com/Product.aspx?S=1268&ID=1731

Add internal HDD I prefer Seagate but WD does not offer Enterprise drives and I run an IT department so I am a bit partial. Also you will find these types of drives have 5 year warranties. This way you can add more drives as you need them.

As everyone else has said here BACKUP,BACKUP,BACKUP!!!!!:yes:

Look at this software for backup it will do Linux as well as Windows. It does not say for linux but it does work I have done it. There will be lots of free stuff out there under GNU license as well.

http://store.storagecraft.com/acb/stores/1/ShadowProtect-Desktop-Edition-33-P55C0.aspx

Or the bundle for 3 machines. Very good software:yes:

I have been using Hitachi Cinemastar HSC721010KLA330's and have found them to be the best hard drive yet for durability and reliability.
Hitachi doesn't go as far as to say they are ENTERPRISE level but they ARE rated to run 24/7/365.
You can find them for a whole lot less than this link, like probably half of the price of the vendor i linked to's listed price.
http://www.memory4less.com/m4l_itemdetail.asp?itemid=27319263

I like you, work in IT and have experienced a LOT of HD failures from a huge variety of manufacturers.
I certainly hope anyone who reads this thread takes away this one thing; BACKUP IS ESSENTIAL!
tal

Thank you IT gurus for weighing in.

That docking station is an interesting product...

juniorJBL, qboneus (and anyone else with a knowledgeable opinion) what advantages are there to using a hard-drive that is designed to be mounted in a drive bay? Whether mounted in a PC as designed, or with a docking station? Seems like with the docking station it would be much more prone to damage than something like a WD My Book or Seagate equivalent external drive.

What am I missing here?

I think the point was that you stick a HDD in the docking station, back up to the HDD, then pull it from the docking station and store the backup HDD in a safe place. Could be wrong though...

I think the point was that you stick a HDD in the docking station, back up to the HDD, then pull it from the docking station and store the backup HDD in a safe place. Could be wrong though...

Makes sense, but I still don't understand why this would be preferable to doing the same thing with an external drive. I thought the external drives were basically the same as the kind designed to be mounted in drive bay but with a protective case.

If that is wrong, and there is some difference I'm not aware of that makes a high quality internal drive such as the Hitachi referred to is significantly more reliable, then I can see why it might be worth using one and a docking station. Otherwise I don't see any upside to risking damage by having all the workings exposed...

It certainly does involve more care to use a internal drive. Mine sits on my desk with a drive in it all the time but I store the others in a safe place. The one in my dock is for music and my backups are out of harms way. I also use my dock to image all of our HDD's so I do not have to sit at the computer for hours on end installing software.

The externals are basically the same but the drive inside will differ in model # so as you cant get them use them in a machine and get the same 5 year warranty. externals tend to have a year or two for a warranty.

whoaru99:
I also like the IBM/Hitachi drives and would consider them to be an enterprise drive. Very good drives IMO. I use mainly SAS for all of our drives in servers running raid arrays. Most of our servers are Virtual as well running under Hyper-V. Seagate is what my wholesaler gets for me and they have been good to me.

All:

When you go to bed.......... Backup!:yes: :D

If that is wrong, and there is some difference I'm not aware of that makes a high quality internal drive such as the Hitachi referred to is significantly more reliable, then I can see why it might be worth using one and a docking station. Otherwise I don't see any upside to risking damage by having all the workings exposed...

If you want reliability in a hard drive get one that is enterprise rated not desktop rated. I have some enterprise rated drives that have been running non stop 24/7 online since 2001 in my oldest web server. It no longer does anything important because of its age but it is still serving stats, ftp, nntp and a few other non critical "odd jobs" and not a burp out of these 2 drives that have never been turned off (they are running in a raid 1 array).

At the cheep cost of drives today (even enterprise level drives) there is no need to compromise with your data.

BUT.......

No matter how reliable you "think" your storage is, you MUST backup.... THEN backup your backup.

.

BUT.......

No matter how reliable you "think" your storage is, you MUST backup.... THEN backup your backup.

.



And then your backup of your backup!!:D
and so on and so on and so on..................

I've been looking at USB DACs to play my FLAC files through my main system. Looking to make that my primary method of playback. But I've heard varying opinions on using USB as the interface between the computer and the DAC. Before I commit to a USB DAC, I'd like to know if that is the best way to go.

Could some of you experts elaborate on the pros and cons of USB? If that isn't the best option, what is? What is involved if I want to go a different route? What additional parts will I need for my PC, if any?

I could also use some input on what type of PC to use. I waffle between one of those "all in one" units e.g. Gateway Profile 5 or similar, or a laptop. The smaller the footprint, the better, but I'm not a fan of laptop keyboards. And I need to have a mouse. (OK call me a Luddite, sorry, I have big meaty semi-arthritic fingers from so many years of rowing. Laptop user interfaces seem made for Ken or Barbie, or children, not full sized humans...)

This PC would be used just about exclusively as a music interface and likely would be located on a shelf near the audio gear. But it would have web access and might be used for casual surfing for music reviews, etc.

I've been looking at USB DACs to play my FLAC files through my main system. Looking to make that my primary method of playback. But I've heard varying opinions on using USB as the interface between the computer and the DAC. Before I commit to a USB DAC, I'd like to know if that is the best way to go.

Touching on that first...USB sound is quite good if you get the right device. One of the main reasons I reccommend a USB DAC anymore is mostly because it's an external unit. It does all of it's decoding far far away from the noisy enviroment of your computer. Pros and Cons generally measure up to quality of the DAC to the cpu overhead required for the USB bus. The overhead isn't much anymore with the exceedingly fast processors that keep coming out. The one basic piece of hardware you'll need is a minijack (headphone/TRS) to RCA connector to connect the sound output to your stereo...and this is true for either USB or internal sound options. The USB device doesn't need to be located near the computer, so you can use a shorter cable and put it next to your stereo where as if you went with a sound card you'd have to extend the cable all the way to the PC, or locate the PC next to the stereo....both options can contribute to large amounts of PC noise in your setup.

Saying all that, if you want something simple...pick up a M-Audio Transit USB. I've owned one for just over a year and while it was the biggest impulse buy I wasn't able to talk myself out of, I wound up falling in love with it. 96khz/24-bit decoding with a top-notch codec, and the term codec has been stretched and skewed that a lot of people assume it means there's a lot of software involved; in this case, it simply means it's a enCOder/DECoder...that one chip contains both the ADC and DAC. The Transit has a couple of drawbacks...if you're wanting to record, you cannot monitor your input off the card like you can with normal cards as this thing has no DSP functions for mixing audio (it's literally just a straight ADC/DAC solution) and if you want to run the 96khz/24-bit mode, you have to turn off either the inputs or outputs as it's limited to USB 1.1. I suggested one to a guy on here for getting his vinyl in to his PC...he loves it. You could go out and buy a high-end sound card for a couple hundred bucks...but the Transit will do the same job for about $89, plus, like I said, you can have it located closer to the amplifier and keep the PC away from the rig. It also has an optical output if you're wanting to use that route.

As far as what PC you should use...that's up to you. I'd make sure whatever you use has enough oomph to actually run the OS you want to use and the ports for upgrading. Some of those slim PC's simply don't have expansion slots, leaving you with USB only connectivity...and with a laptop, USB sound is your best bet. I would however suggest you keep your PC as far away from your audio gear as possible...I don't even keep mine on the same shelf, they're across the room from each other..wireless keyboard/mouse combos are coming down in price if you decide to use a laptop.

Now, on external hard drives:


I highly recommend not using an external drive. External drives are only to be used if you're too lazy/unable to connect a second drive to a computer...and you NEVER NEVER NEVER want to keep vital data you intend to keep for a while on it. Every external drive I've ever owned has failed and every internal I've put in to an external enclosure has failed. It doesn't seem to matter what brand of drive/enclosure I use...they fail. I've even bought the WD MyBook's and had them fail just months after heavy heavy use. The cases are not designed/ventalted for long-term constant data use. The only external drive I've not had fail is my 320GB WD MyPassport...and that's after getting droped/flung from 4ft+ on more than 10 occasions.

The thing one needs to remember about all external drives, the ones you assemble or like the MyBooks...they're ALL the same basic principal...take an internal hard drive and slap it in an external enclosure. They're no more protected than they are in a PC case and in fact, more prone to damage...not many people drop or bang thier cases around..but people toss thier external drives everywhere. I cannot go with the arguement of "if you don't move it, it won't die", I had a 500gig MyBook that didn't move from the day it was hooked up till the day I just about lost every bit of my music off it. You can't trust 'em.

However, I have another suggestion if you want to store mass amounts of music. A file-server. The way I have my music stored is I have all my music in it's main archive on my 500 gig drive in a desktop computer that sits in a dry, but cool, corner of my basement hooked up to power and network (wired), right now it's running Linux, however, it previously ran FreeBSD for the same task. I simply share my /music directory as a SMB network share (windows file sharing) over the network. Unlike trying to do this in Windows (where it fails..especially if it's XP Home), the open-source Samba server for *nix provides the same functionality without the muck. Ok, so it can be a bit of a bear to configure...so I have another solution.

I'm sure you've heard (or maybe you haven't) of something called NAS...which stands for Network Attached Storage. Basically what these things consist of are hard drives in a small device running an embedded OS that you simply plug in to your network and it provides access to the data via either standard SAMBA methods or more advanced options like NSF. These devices are similar to an external....just internal drives mounted in a small box with an embedded OS. However, if you have an extra computer sitting around that you can stick a larger hard drive in to, here's a little project you should look at.

FreeNAS (freenas.org) is a minitaure FreeBSD distribution that is configured and targeted toward provided all the functions of a commercial NAS solution with very little cost, all you provide is the hardware. The main advantage of keeping your data in a *nix solution is you don't have to use NTFS (Fat32 shouldn't be used...ever..unless you demand unreliable data at fast speeds). So, set FreeNAS up and just connect to the share over the network. It's how I've been doing things for years and it wound up being soooo much more reliable than an external drive, especially for my laptop. While I do keep a copy of my music on an external drive so I can carry it around..it is not my only means of storing it, and it's not an everyday use item.

In fact, the only thing I worry about after moving to my *nix system is physical hardware failure since the filesystem is robust and *nix is impervious to viruses.

set FreeNAS up and just connect to the share over the network. It's how I've been doing things for years


Yep, me too. I got a Maxspeed Maxterm thin client from fleabay for $10, and added an internal IDE laptop drive (free) to it.

Set up SMB/CIFS server on it so I can import CD's from my Windoze PC to the shared drive using iTunes, and can access it directly from my two Puppy Linux PCs. I've tried the Linux rippers, but they're much slower and cddb doesn't come close to the accuracy of the CD database used by iTunes.

Set up NFS server on it so my 2 (soon to be 3 - won another for $2.25 today) OmniFi DMS-1 streamers running OpenFi firmware can (wirelessly) access the music collection on it.

Set up UPnP server (MediaTomb) on it so my Freecom MusicPal internet radio/streamer can access the music collection on it.

Added Music Browser (http://musicbrowser.sourceforge.net/) (excellent software) to it to browse/play music collection from my Puppy Linux laptop and thin client using their web browser.

The $10 Maxterm is no longer available, but there's a much more powerful Maxspeed 8300 available for about $35 right now on a certain auction site - FreeNAS can easily be installed on the CompactFlash drive that comes with it, and an internal 2.5" IDE drive can be added (with a 44-pin ribbon cable) internally, or an external USB drive will work. Cheap, fanless, noiseless,"green", reliable and extremely flexible.

Heh - all this and I still regularly listen to vinyl :)

I built myself a server out of an old Gateway desktop I salvaged. I picked up an Adaptec 2410SA hardware RAID card and 4x Western Digital Black 500GB drives in RAID 5. Its running a P4 2.53GHz with 640MB of RAM. Im using Ubuntu Server 8.04.2 with NFS, Samba, Music Player Daemon, and Squeezecenter. It serves up music and movies to 2 Squeezeboxes, 3 soft modded Xboxes, and 5 computers. Total cost was $300.

I built myself a server out of an old Gateway desktop I salvaged. I picked up an Adaptec 2410SA hardware RAID card and 4x Western Digital Black 500GB drives in RAID 5. Its running a P4 2.53GHz with 640MB of RAM. Im using Ubuntu Server 8.04.2 with NFS, Samba, Music Player Daemon, and Squeezecenter. It serves up music and movies to 2 Squeezeboxes, 3 soft modded Xboxes, and 5 computers. Total cost was $300.

Nice! But, you still need a backup solution/plan if you don't have one. ;)

Nice! But, you still need a backup solution/plan if you don't have one. ;)

I have a couple 1TB Western Digital Green drives for backup purposes in the same machine. I have a cron job scheduled to back up daily. :)

I have a couple 1TB Western Digital Green drives for backup purposes in the same machine. I have a cron job scheduled to back up daily. :)

your data is not truly safe until it is sitting on a shelf, locked in a secure location.

Multiple redundant hot swap drives rotated regularly are a good start.

http://www.audiokarma.org/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=154989&d=1245199061

Man, some of you go over the top! :)

I just took a ten-year-old 600Mhz iMac G3, slapped OS 10.3.9 on it with a cheap 40G harddrive (basically, spare parts), and use iTunes.

That's my level of expertise: "not much."

To be perfectly honest...and i'm not trying to justify backing up...but in my case, my collection of music is HUGE...the only way i'm going to back it up is to another hard drive...which i've done...but i've had the backups fail on me more than the original media drive. If treated right, a hard drive will last for quite a few years.

As far as CD ripping..I generally use Linux for that since that machine does have a desktop UI I can remote in to, but I've got a couple of command-line rippers that do just a good of a job as windows (and cdparanoia rips problematic CDs better than even EAC), and since that machine actually has a beffier processor than my laptop, I do a LOT of transcoding in command-line back and forth..I can also use ffmpeg to convert DVD's to h.264 or whatever and it's not tying up my main hardware and gets done a LOT faster.

The biggest problem is linux is difficult to use if you're not used to command line. My history with computers started with an Apple II which had no GUI of any kind and went to Windows 95, but I still took the time to sit and learn DOS....and then the linux command line when I started playing with it.

But, as an example, my friend's got a couple of TB's spread across multiple windows machines and if you try to say, grab an entire drive, about 10 to 20 gigs in to it windows pukes and has to reset the smbblock server....XP Home is utterly worthless for this kind of work and XP PRo is only marginally better....Win 2000 or 2003 Server is required if you want to use windows to reliably serve massive amounts of data over a network

My linux configuration on the other hand....my friend grabbed my entire 500 gig hdd off the sucker once over wired lan and it pumped out 11MB/sec (pretty much the max you can get off a 100mbps wired connection) constantly for the entire 500 gigs...and when it was done, it kept working. Most of the time if I watch a movie...I simply mount the ISO image over the network and my laptop plays it flawlessly.

To be perfectly honest...and i'm not trying to justify backing up...but in my case, my collection of music is HUGE...the only way i'm going to back it up is to another hard drive...which i've done...but i've had the backups fail on me more than the original media drive. If treated right, a hard drive will last for quite a few years.

If you are having backup failures you are not using the right equipment.

Look into a 4 drive NAS capable of raid 10 (mirrored and striped) (http://blogs.zdnet.com/storage/?p=131). 4 x 500 gig enterprise drives will give you 1 TB of storage and it will be redundant (i.e. one drive can fail without data loss). Being mirrored and striped it is redundant AND fast access so you can use the NAS as the primary data source if you map to that unit as a network drive and any computer on the network can access it just as if it were internal storage.

I use a LaCie with 4 x 750 gig drives set to raid 10 for 1.5 TB of storage. Using enterprise level drives (drives that are rated to run 24/7/365 for years and years) you "should" not have any drive failures. Enterprise drives will cost you 20% more than "home user" drives but the reliability is excellent. If you want more speed and less redundancy you can use raid 5. I use 10 scsi 320 dives in 2 x 5 drive arrays ruining raid 5 as my primary storage. Raid 5 is also redundant (one drive can fail without data loss).

If you do not think you need a NAS (don't need to access your data from multiple computers across a network or from a remote computer via the web) you can get a 2 drive raid 1 USB unit and hang it off of your computer. Raid 1 is redundant (i.e. 1 drive can fail without loss of data). Here again use enterprise rated drives and you should never have a drive failure. If you go with raid 1 understand that the drives are mirrored (hold exactly the same info) so if you have 2 x 500 gig drives you have a total of 500 gig (as one drive is nothing more than a mirror image of the other one)

Now I have both a raid 10 NAS AND a raid 1 USB so I have double redundancy just in case a power supply failure takes more than one drive down. On top of that I have a single USB drive that mirrors both of the raid drive arrays (which I take with me as archive storage/retrieval when I travel with a laptop). Now combine this with raid 5 drives in the primary system and I have a total of 16 drives holding the same data.... Data is stored un compressed (file copy) and compressed (acronis) so the data stored on each of the backup units is self redundant. This is not your typical "home user" arrangement but the info that I must keep is rather important (business wise) so I cannot play around with wonky half baked backup ideas.

My case is simply a deal of...i can't afford the proper backup equipment.

When I had a job...I could justify buying a computer once every 4 years after saving up. The only reason I even have my vintage gear is it was given to me...I worked for peanuts for six years. Right now, i'm completely unemployed and making nothing. My last computer was $500 of spare parts tossed together...that's literally the most i've ever spent on something.

i mean, you should like you've got a backup suitable for a freakin datacenter...which I don't think i need...given the reliability of all my internal drives...even my 40 gig from 10 years ago is chugging away in a computer just fine.

when you can't afford it, make due without it...what bothers me the most are people who preach about these setups that are 5 to 10 grand alone in disk backup and think i'm an idiot for not having it all i got to say is "sorry dude, i don't have enough cash to wipe my ass with hundreds....i don't even see a hundred bucks these days"

My case is simply a deal of...i can't afford the proper backup equipment.

Look into something like this and you can swap raw drives in and out of it.

http://mydl.me/2009/03/newer-technologys-toaster-for-hard-drive-mechanisms/

You will have to google for the lowest price on them (and compare brands).

I am sure that you have a few spare drives sitting around that you could use in something like that.

The safest backup is data sitting on a shelf somewhere not plugged into anything. It does not matter how you get it there.

.

I'll weigh in here to tout the defunct Rio Karma as a player. This was the creme player of Rio inc., the originator of mp3 players, playing lossless flac, gapless, creating playlists on the fly- WAIT, THERE's MORE! with an RCA-out equipped dock for quality audiophile sound.
This player was designed and built by their engineers as the ideal device they themselves would want to own.

Rio audio shut their doors in 2005, due partly to the immense clout of Apple's iPod, and partly to high incidences of their Hitachi hard drives or Sony batteries failing. :sigh:
The Karma technology was bought up by Trekstor, who have since struggled the past 4 years getting a reliable player out the door in any meaningful quantities.

The original player had a 20 gig 1.8" Hitachi hard drive. Modders and hackers like myself have expanded on that to use 40 & 60 gig IDE drives, ZIF drives up to 120 gig, solid state SD cards, etc. It does not have a remote function built-in, but there are add-on devices for that.

The player's read capacity will never exceed the original 137 gig cutoff, but keep in mind that this is not a storage solution, it's a jukebox with true CD quality output.
So using even the original 20 gig drive holds something like 60-75 CDs worth in lossless flac, more in vorbis, mp3 or wma.

(plug) Their newish forum is riovolution.org, as the original riovolution.com domain went admin-awol, then later defunct and none of us wanted to pick it up...which, in retrospect, was a shame.