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Help -- need Idiot's Guide to music server system

Squeezebox, FLAC, Mac Mini, lossy, lossless -- help, what does all this mean? I'm trying to find out more about taking a CD collection onto hard drive music server. Can anyone recommend a Beginner's Guide, whether online or in print? I'm not completely computer illiterate but I can't figure out the basic hardware needed. My main interest is not to broadcast music wirelessly to different rooms but to get a thousand-plus CDs into some more convenient and secure data storage system without loss of CD audio quality -- can it be done, and with what? If you can point me to an Idiot's Guide, I'd appreciate it.

If it matters, my current system (set up in a small listening room) is a Naim Nait 5i amp and Naim CD5i-2 player driving a pair of Spendor S3/5s. The rest of the room is filled with CDs. Thanks.
jhold
martykl
3,578 posts
 
Chasmal and Kijanki,

You might be surprised. I'm a vinyl first guy -Oracle,Graham 2.2, Graham Nightingale - but I also use a QSonix/Benchmark digital system. Now, my hearing isn't what it was 10 (or more) years ago, but IMHO this is a very good sounding souce. In direct comparison, the vinyl still sounds a bit rounder, but the best cds sound awfully close to their LP counterparts. You might find the gap more significant than I do, I'd be surprised if you liked the sound of a good LP on my system and disliked the digital presentation of the same recording. Of course, I've been surprised before!

Marty
slikric3000
638 posts
 
Kleech, the way to make it easier is to do a specific number/day say 10, 20 or whatever.
mcgarick
277 posts
 
Great question, love the post! I want to know too.
mcgarick
277 posts
 
What I would like is a component type box, that has a USB port in and RCA outs, and a screen to pick album/songs
So, I can just take the dig music player to my computer load the songs like my Sony mp3 player. Then put it back on my audio rack,play music.

If it had its own CD ripper on board that would be best and I could skip the transfer from the computer.

I do this some now with my great sounding Sony mp3 player but it's awkward with the little buttons and small menu. I would like a bigger box.

Is there any thing like this? thats not a million dollars.
kijanki's avatar
kijanki
4,394 posts
 
Martykl - I ended up with Benchmark as well. A little unforgiving with class D amp and inexpensive speakers (that I intend to replace). New releases are often better and some of them have surprisingly rounded sound. Sadly many recording engineers don't care and I have quite a few CDs to prove it. We will switch to music servers, I believe, just for the practicallity of it. For the same reason I avoid LPs - too much hassle and not enough new releases. Server might even make me less dependant on format (new CODE 24/96 etc). There is nothing wrong, for instance, if you play old and poorly recorded music you cherish on MP3/4.
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