Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Systems Building Your Own Audio Server (again)

Jerry,

My 561 tells me it locks on 44.1. The AIFF files are the "same" as WAF so I presume I am getting bit for bit digital audio. I cannot hear a difference when compared to a 506.20

As for controlling it, either a touchscreen or for that matter, S-Video or composite output on a TV screen with a wireless KB will do the trick.

You can fit 2 x 250Gig drives in the G5 so that's roughly 720 CD's in full format on the Mac. You can always add external firewire drives to add storage. They come cheap.

You can also control your Meridian gear through the serial port using a USB>serial adapter. If it's just Prev, Next, Play Stop etc. I'd be more than willing to write an app for you.

The Harmony WiFi TCP/IP to infrared box adds new possibilities. One could use a palm pilot or iPaq to control your gear RF based throughout the entire home.

richard

Just saw another new option from Netgear. Not quite as many features as the Slim Devices Squeezbox, but is also less pricey ($180 vs $300). Here's the URL:

http://www.netgear.com/products/details/MP101.asp?view=


Followup: according to buy.com the Netgear box is list priced at $216 and they are listing it at $145.

Followup #2: Another new option is the WML11B from Linksys. Not many details, sounds similar to the Netgear offering, but according to CNET pricing should be around $100.
http://www.linksys.com/press/press.asp?prid=143


Dan


[This message has been edited by Lerxst (edited 01-08-2004).]

[This message has been edited by Lerxst (edited 01-08-2004).]

Chris,

That is awesome... I'm starting to see the benefit. Even for something like continuous random music, the terrible delay on CD changers between songs is not an issue when playing from Hard drives...

I really like to make CD-R samplers. I cannot tolerate lossy compression with music. How do I take my DTS music and Dolby Digital music and make a CD-R sampler of the songs I like?

Chris

Richard,
Thank you very much. Thats very kind of you.

I dont think that will be necessary though.

I will be speaking with the powers that be at ReQuest when CES is over. I believe they have a fix in the works, but it will be in a new product.....

In the mean time, Ive been thinking about adding a little airport and small powerbook to the room for light emailing and browsing when we are watching tv.

if this were done, I could use remote desktop to control itunes....

Im not in any great rush.

I will do a little test soon-
use itunes to rip a track in aiff, then in WAV and then I will simply copy the track off the CD and then use toast to burn a CD that has all 3 tracks on it and I will play it back and see if theres any noticeable difference. last night I tried copying a track off Outkast's new album right to the hard drive. then I ripped it as aiff (44.1/16/stereo) and the file sizes were ever so slightly different. perhaps thats due to metadata?

Im still curious and this experiment costs very little to perform. Ill let you know.


Chris,
Thanks for the really helpful description. I might yet still go with a PC for this purpose.

Chris (HN),
I dont know about DD, but for DTS thats on CDs- its encoded as regular CD tracks. What you can do to make a sampler is simply copy the files you want directly off the CD to your HD- then use a burning program like Nero and presto you have a dts CD sampler. I know this should work as I used to do this.

[This message has been edited by JerryL (edited 01-08-2004).]

Don't use remote desktop Jerry,

There's another app which will do remote itunes control. There are quite a few apps out there to do it. Just do a google search.

RD is slow..

Richard,
have a look at this- http://www.swssoftware.com/products/iham.html

all the discussion Ive read on this is positive.

Everyone has me excited now! I'm trying to put together all the posts I have but need some help deciding what is best.

I have no interest in using any lossy compression and want to accomplish two things:

1) Make DVD-R/W samplers for car and home from my CD collection as well as my DVD music collection.

2) Be able to use my computer as a playback source for the Merdian 861 which is in the living room, which upon actual measuring is only 50-60 feet max if I drill and run the wiring in a direct path. If so, what sound card, cost no object, is recommended for this purpose? 96 kHz would be nice also since I do have some 24/96 Chesky 2.0 stuff. Can I have a digital output from a sound card that can span the distance of 60 feet without any loss/problems?

Roxio says that their DVD creator has no problem making DVD-R/W's of CD music collections... Can anyone verify or recommend something better for making DVD-R/W recordings of CD's? What about Exact Audio Copy (CD ripping)
As well as SmartRipper 2.41 (DVD ripping). Any somments or suggestions on those?

How does an Audiotron fit into this picture? ("comes with an ethernet port on one side and TOSLINK + analog outputs on the other. It'll play MP3 and uncompressed .WAV files off all the CIFS servers on your network. It has a front panel, IR remote, and can be controlled via a web server.")


About being able to make DTS/DD DVD-R samplers or to Rip them to the HD for a music server, this also seems possible:

From http://www.backupdvd.info/Members/video/Dolby.shtml see below:

Required tools to create your own Dolby Digital Audio CD (DD-ACD), you will need software tools to:

extract AC3 files from DVD-Video (see BackupDVD ripping section)
extract 6 channels from the AC3 (Sonic Foundry's Soft Encode)
resample from 48kHz to 44.1kHz (Syntrillium's Cool Edit 2000)
encode 6 PCM channels in AC3 format (Sonic Foundry's Soft Encode or Minnetonka)
encode 6 PCM channels in DTs format (Minnetonka Audio's SurCode CD Pro DTs)

I also love Plextor and only have Plextor drives, so that is not an issue. I'll buy their latest DVD-R/W drive.
http://besweet.notrace.dk/ and http://www.doom9.org/index.html?/BeSure.html seem nice also, particularly besweet!

Can anyone tie this all together for me? I'm wondering what I can and cannot do???

Thanks,

Chris


[This message has been edited by Health Nut (edited 01-09-2004).]

I ripped every CD I own into my Apple G5 - over 10,000 songs at 192 kbps - and wrestled for sometime on how to get that music into my whole house system with losing any audio quality, and keeping the mac in my office. Anyway - I found this. I haven't set it up yet, but I have high hopes.

Joyport2
http://www.joyfaktory.com/index.html

Supported Media:


JPEG images
MP3, WMA, MP4, AAC, OGG and WAV audio formats
MPEG 1,2 & 4 video, including VOB (DVD) format
Windows Media Video
Apple QuickTime Video
DiVX video

Network support:


Ethernet (10/100 Mbit)
Wireless networking (802.11g/b) with optional adapter

User Interface:


On-screen menus for navigation
Optional LCD screen for music navigation and playback

Video Outputs:


SVGA (RGBHV). Resolutions:
640x480 (4:3)
720x480
848x480 (16:9)
Component Video with optional adapter
S-Video
Composite Video

Audio Outputs:


SPDIF digital audio (coax)
5.1 Analog audio

Physical Characteristics:


Size: 14 x 10 x 4" (including feet)
Shipping Weight: 10 lbs

Package Contents:


JoyPort device
Universal power supply
Remote control
JoyPort software Compact Flash card
S-Video cable
Analog audio cable (2 channels)
Digital audio cable
JoyPort Manual
JoyPort Media Server software CD

Power Requirements:

12V DC, 5A with supplied universal adapter. Typical power consumption under 40 Watts


[This message has been edited by mcbain (edited 01-09-2004).]

I can confirm that itunes ripping to aiff at 44.1khz 16bit stereo makes a bit for bit accurate copy.

I used a DTS CD for this test- Gaucho. Track #2- Hey 19. Great song and great DTS mix, btw.

Since the data is stored as a aiff/ WAV file on the CD, but the data is not really PCM data, if it were converted to analog or resampled or otherwise manipulated, the result would be hiss when played back.

I made 3 files

1- itunes ripping an aiff (manual control, 44.1,16,stereo)

2- itunes ripping WAV (manual control, 44.1,16,stereo)

3- just copy the file to my hard drive right off the CD.

I used toast 6 to burn an audo CD from these three tracks.

Just tried it. Put the CD-r in the 800 and let it play. the electronics report every track as dts and the tracks sound indistinguishable from each other.

it must therefore be making a perfect copy of the original- and hence, you do not have to worry about itunes not making a bit accurate copy. I was worried because the file size when ripping with itunes was a little different. my guess is that difference is due to metadata for title, track number, artist, etc.

Well,

I have the seagate 120 Gig HD coming, I have the outboard USB 2.0 Plextor DVD-RW coming...

I was thinking of getting the M-Audio outboard USB 2.0 sound card, M-audio Audiophile USB. http://m-audio.rjmg.com/index.cfm?pid=3372 ... Is this good for both a HTPC as well as just for a music server? I need DTS complince, 24/96, etc... Is it possible to get DVD-Audio passed through the digital coax output? I don;t believe digital coax is limited in bandwidth simply because DVD-Audio is only 10 Mbit/sec... Any soundcards that wil pass the MLP output because I have a Meridian 861... Either way I would appreciate advice on which high end sound card to get, or else I'll get the one in the link above I guess. Any problem running 60 feet of coax from the sound card to the Meridian??

So, that leaves me mostly with picking and chosing through many ripping software. I'll worry about how to rip DD and DTS stuff later, but for now, I need help figuring out how to best way to store/play/rip my CD 44.1 music to the hard drive. As someone mentioned, I don`t want to do this very often, if only once! This is a huge effort.

Since I know I am not interested in any lossy compression, which method do you recommend: Uncompressed or lossless? Although don`t you 'technically' alter/lose something going through the lossless encoding process? Not a big deal, but technically, lossless compression doesn`t mean identical to the master, only the ability to make perfect generational copies once the encoding process is complete? Or am I wrong? Not a big deal...

Knowing I desire lossless or uncompressed storage for my PC, what would you recommend? I have Roxio 6.0 DVD/CD which came with the Plextor drive. I don`t know what limitations there are, nor do I know what advantages other software has... I know eventually, very soon I want to rip DVD to get the music from the VOB files on DVD for both DD and DTS. I will also likely want to edit the music for better fades. I used to use Turtle beach software a while back for that... I even had the original Multisound Card from Turtle beach when it cost $995.00!! It seems I hit medical school, and then residency, and I have amnesia as well as don`t know what happened to that wavw software, but now it seems that software for this purpose is abundant and even free... I don`t mind paying for good software, but if share/freeware is equal or better, that`s great.

Could someone please summarize what I'll need for my purposes?

1) uncompressed or lossless compression?
2) Sound card?
3) I will use 60 feet of Coax cable from the digital output of the M-Audio to the Meridian 861 in another room. (Should not be an issue.)
4) Which software to use for said purposes? EAC, FLAC, Windows, Roxio, aye carumba!!!

I'll get a USB 2.0 drive for backup.

I would really appreciate advice on questions 1, 2, 3, 4

Thanks!

Chris

HN,
as to file formats, I prefer to keep things that are standard. If you can convery with no loss of quality back to WAV from FLAC or another lossless format, which I think you would be able to do, then I think that makes a lot of sense.

I've been getting lots of good feedback on the use of FLAC, so if that cuts storage space in half, with no penalty, that can't be a bad thing. I'm still trying to figure out about the other 3 questions. But if I want to make a CD-R or a DVD-R from stored FLAC files, then I'd need to convert them to .WAV first, then burn them? Maybe I'll just leave them all in .WAV as I have 120 Gig storage, and can always buy more storage...

Still not sure which M-Audio sound card product to get, which ripping software to use... Does Roxio support FLAC? How does Roxio differ from Winamp or foobar 2000? I have no experience other than making CD-R's from the bundled Roxio software that comes with Plextor drives, so I need big time guidance in this area...