Change over.

[Mike - H]

Four years ago I switched to an iMac 27inch, from PC. Now I'm going the other way. All the software for music file handling: Toast, Max and XLD, are mac only, what do you PC guys use for file conversion ect.

Cheers

[Gazjam]

Hi Mike,
Jriver does it all.

For PC, nothing comes close imo.

http://www.jriver.com/audio.html

[Zoidburg]

As a recent convert to jriver im very impressed with it so far.

[Stratmangler]

I still use Foobar on the computers in the house.
JRiver covers most of the bases in one package, and it's multimedia too.

I trialled JRiver a while ago and couldn't detect any differences in sound quality compared to Foobar, so dropped JRiver at the end of the trial. I will add that you need to ensure that you have drivers correctly installed relative to the Windoze OS, and according to your interfacing hardware. As a general rule, but not in every case, you'll require to install WASAPI drivers for Foobar.
Foobar is free.

You can use Foobar to convert files to most formats, and there's even a DSD plugin if you so desire.

I use dbPoweramp to rip CDs and occasionally convert files to AAC for use on my Smartphone.
dbPoweramp is not free, as ultimately you need to buy it, but it is free to trial for 30 days.

If you want to rip CDs for free then there's EAC - the program produces the same results from ripping CDs as dbPoweramp, but it requires a bit more user input.

Generally, if you want convenience you pay for it, and if you're prepared to make a little effort in the process somebody has it covered too.

[Mike - H]

Thanks guys, thats a great help. Having lots of fun removing /?\:*<> etc from folder names as I move huge quantities of files over.

[Yomanze]

Hi Mike,
Jriver does it all.

For PC, nothing comes close imo.

http://www.jriver.com/audio.html

I've recently started using JRiver Media Centre / JRemote & it's awesome...

Question for you Gaz: do you think it's worth selecting "play from memory" or is a SSD already good enough?

Thanks,

Neil

[roob]

Just use play from memory no need then to worry about the quality of your drive.

[Mike - H]

Should I make jriver my prime audio player, I'm using itunes at present mainly because of my ipod.

[roob]

Yes. iTunes is shit on a PC:)

[PaulStewart]

Yes. iTunes is shit on a PC:)

To be fair iTunes is shit on Macs too :) I was using jRiver but have swopped over to Audivana, which I feel is better on my Mac Mini based system.

[Gordon Steadman]

To be fair iTunes is shit on Macs too :) I was using jRiver but have swopped over to Audivana, which I feel is better on my Mac Mini based system.

No its not, its fine. I've tried all the others now and always come back to iTunes for its simplicity and ability to arrange my music the way I want. Combined with BitPerfect, it sounds perfectly good too.

The above statement is no more true than yours.:eyebrows:

[Gazjam]

I've recently started using JRiver Media Centre / JRemote & it's awesome...

Question for you Gaz: do you think it's worth selecting "play from memory" or is a SSD already good enough?

Thanks,

Neil

Hey Neil,

Depends on your setup mate.
If your pulling your Flac's from a network they are already being stored in a ram buffer anyway, so no need to select Memory Play in Jriver options.
I farted about with the different options and its actually detrimental doing it, maybe because there's more activity "re-reading" it back to ram when its already there.
Discussed this with Jim H over at Jriver and he agreed.

My golden rule is get the computer doing as little as possible!

If playing from a USB drive, Esata or whatever Memory Play improves things a wee bit, but nothing to get excited about.
I'd set it to off unless playing from an external drive or an internal SSD. (Every little helps, even if its just 1%)

Use your ears, have a mess about. :)

[Mike - H]

just down loaded this, starting the mammoth task of creating the library, first of many questions to come :) Can I show albums but keep them in artist groups? or show artist and open the stacks?

[Stratmangler]

My library is organised into artist folders, and the albums listed as sub-folders within the artist folder.
Because I use a Squeezebox and run Logitech Media Server I can access things in a variety of of ways, but usually follow the artist/album route.

[Mike - H]

Sorted!

[Clive197]

I use dbPoweramp to rip CDs and occasionally convert files to AAC for use on my Smartphone.
dbPoweramp is not free, as ultimately you need to buy it, but it is free to trial for 30 days.

If you want to rip CDs for free then there's EAC - the program produces the same results from ripping CDs as dbPoweramp, but it requires a bit more user input.

Generally, if you want convenience you pay for it, and if you're prepared to make a little effort in the process somebody has it covered too.

I can vouch for EAC which I've now used for a couple of years. Believe me as a complete computer idiot, I find EAC easy having now ripped some 600+ disks.

Clive

[Yomanze]

Hey Neil,

Depends on your setup mate.
If your pulling your Flac's from a network they are already being stored in a ram buffer anyway, so no need to select Memory Play in Jriver options.
I farted about with the different options and its actually detrimental doing it, maybe because there's more activity "re-reading" it back to ram when its already there.
Discussed this with Jim H over at Jriver and he agreed.

My golden rule is get the computer doing as little as possible!

If playing from a USB drive, Esata or whatever Memory Play improves things a wee bit, but nothing to get excited about.
I'd set it to off unless playing from an external drive or an internal SSD. (Every little helps, even if its just 1%)

Use your ears, have a mess about. :)

Well I have had a mess about, and it's nice that the function works with CDs too, I can pop a CD into the Blu Ray drive and JRiver buffers it into RAM as evidenced by it continuing to play when I eject a disk. I use a SoTM filter on my drive and can confidently say that my old budget favourite the Pioneer DV-717 is surpassed by my media server / Halide Bridge with dedicated USB power. This is a relief as I wanted my media server to function as a CD transport too (as well as streamer, movie player etc.).

[synsei]

I still use Foobar on the computers in the house.
JRiver covers most of the bases in one package, and it's multimedia too.

I trialled JRiver a while ago and couldn't detect any differences in sound quality compared to Foobar, so dropped JRiver at the end of the trial. I will add that you need to ensure that you have drivers correctly installed relative to the Windoze OS, and according to your interfacing hardware. As a general rule, but not in every case, you'll require to install WASAPI drivers for Foobar.
Foobar is free.

You can use Foobar to convert files to most formats, and there's even a DSD plugin if you so desire.

I use dbPoweramp to rip CDs and occasionally convert files to AAC for use on my Smartphone.
dbPoweramp is not free, as ultimately you need to buy it, but it is free to trial for 30 days.

If you want to rip CDs for free then there's EAC - the program produces the same results from ripping CDs as dbPoweramp, but it requires a bit more user input.

Generally, if you want convenience you pay for it, and if you're prepared to make a little effort in the process somebody has it covered too.

I too trialled JRiver and found SQ was actually worse than Foobar plus it is way more complicated and fussy to use. Oh it looks 'pretty' but that's about all it has going for it IMHO. JRiver also kinda takes over your media libraries leaving little files everywhere on the HDD which I found extremely annoying. I never did get it to output in anything other than 16/44 so eventually I gave up, it's long gone. I shot JR!!! :D

You can't go wrong with Foobar, it's compact, efficient and gets on with the job with a minimum of fuss. I like that... :smoking:

EDIT: Another thing, you don't need fancy software to rip your CD's, set WMP to rip to .wav, works wonders for me and is very simple to use.

[Stratmangler]

I too trialled JRiver and found SQ was actually worse than Foobar plus it is way more complicated and fussy to use. Oh it looks 'pretty' but that's about all it has going for it IMHO. JRiver also kinda takes over your media libraries leaving little files everywhere on the HDD which I found extremely annoying. I never did get it to output in anything other than 16/44 so eventually I gave up, it's long gone. I shot JR!!! :D

You can't go wrong with Foobar, it's compact, efficient and gets on with the job with a minimum of fuss. I like that... :smoking:

I fully concur with your findings :)
Funnily enough I thought that the only thing JRiver brought to the party was a pretty looking interface too.

[struth]

I have both but have to say that Foobar sounds better for my system, and it is easy once set up. Not so pretty as driver but if you just want a music player/convertor then it is excellent. EAC is my ripper and find it does the best, if not the quickest job. Does not work on my win 8 laptop though. Dunno why but it won't find a disc although it says the drive is there.just comes up no disc inserted. Fine on vista

[Gazjam]

Foobar scmoobar....ppft! :)

[Gazjam]

Well I have had a mess about, and it's nice that the function works with CDs too, I can pop a CD into the Blu Ray drive and JRiver buffers it into RAM as evidenced by it continuing to play when I eject a disk. I use a SoTM filter on my drive and can confidently say that my old budget favourite the Pioneer DV-717 is surpassed by my media server / Halide Bridge with dedicated USB power. This is a relief as I wanted my media server to function as a CD transport too (as well as streamer, movie player etc.).

Nice one mate.

[Mike - H]

Next question: how do I get JRiver to see a double album as one, instead of two separate discs?

[Tim]

Next question: how do I get JRiver to see a double album as one, instead of two separate discs?
Make sure the album titles are identical first. Select the whole album in the right hand pane and right click > select Tag. In the left pane the metadata Tag list opens.

http://i173.photobucket.com/albums/w63/greatgig/tagging1_zpse35851ec.jpg (http://s173.photobucket.com/user/greatgig/media/tagging1_zpse35851ec.jpg.html)

Scroll down to Disc # and put 1 for the first disc. Repeat process for next disc, naming the second disc 2 - then the two discs will merge into one double album.

http://i173.photobucket.com/albums/w63/greatgig/taggingtwocopy_zpsbfb34604.jpg (http://s173.photobucket.com/user/greatgig/media/taggingtwocopy_zpsbfb34604.jpg.html)

[Mike - H]

Cheers Tim, that's done the trick.

[Mike - H]

Right so far so good, this is the computer I've built to be the server for my digital music streaming:-

MSI Z97 G3
INTEL i5
8Gb Ram
Samsung 840 500Gb SSD
2 x 2 Tb WD Reds
LG M-Disc 24x Disc Drive
Windows 7 (64 bit)
2 x 2 Tb WD Mybooks

I've loaded JRiver MC 20 and ripped about 350 CDs to Flac, plus about 100 Flac albums. The PC is hard wired to my Virgin router,
my HiFi kit is listed below, what do I now need to join the two together? I'm assuming I need something like the sonos bridge+connect wired into the dac in my XTZ A100, Controlled from my iPad? Keep it simple I'm a complete newbie at this.

[The Black Adder]

Just a quick question, Mike... You choose FLAC for your toonz. Is there any benefit of using FLAC or is WAV just as good?

Also, have you ever thought of using a Blueray player for the interface/output to the dac? I'm currently doing this with extremely nice results.

[Mike - H]

Hi Joe, I'm definitely no expert on this, but from what I've researched and read there doesn't seem anything to choose between the the two formats. Even though storage is a lot cheaper than has been in the past, unless you get it for free saving space without loss of quality has to be good. Not thought of using Blueray, but I have an high end HD disc player l picked up cheap when the world turned to Blueray, I'd been told that linking it to a decent dac would make a player equal to a 2k+ unit, just never got round to it plus the player takes an age to boot up.

[WAD62]

Just a quick question, Mike... You choose FLAC for your toonz. Is there any benefit of using FLAC or is WAV just as good?


FLAC - For; Less storage, Less network bandwidth, Proper Tags (ID3V2), Bit perfect playback

WAV - For; Bit perfect playback ;)

[Mike - H]

Right so far so good, this is the computer I've built to be the server for my digital music streaming:-

MSI Z97 G3
INTEL i5
8Gb Ram
Samsung 840 500Gb SSD
2 x 2 Tb WD Reds
LG M-Disc 24x Disc Drive
Windows 7 (64 bit)
2 x 2 Tb WD Mybooks

I've loaded JRiver MC 20 and ripped about 350 CDs to Flac, plus about 100 Flac albums. The PC is hard wired to my Virgin router,
my HiFi kit is listed below, what do I now need to join the two together? I'm assuming I need something like the sonos bridge+connect wired into the dac in my XTZ A100, Controlled from my iPad? Keep it simple I'm a complete newbie at this.

Bump!

[337alant]

+1 for FLAC for bit perfect and excellent tagging
I use DBPoweramp for ripping all my CDs to a NAS drive on my nework
As per Gazjams recommendation JRiver Media is a superb Audio player and picks up all my ripped CDs into its library.

+10000 that ITunes is pants

Alan

[destroysall]

I currently still utilize iTunes. I will try JRiver though.

[Mike - H]

Thanks guys, the question I'm asking is what is the best way to stream the files once created regarding hardware? From what I can find the Sonos seems to be one of the better systems but I know the square root of FA about it. Advice on hardware and cables would be great, as mentioned my amp has a built in dac to start with, but where that sits compared with other dacs I have no experience.

Cheers

[Stratmangler]

Thanks guys, the question I'm asking is what is the best way to stream the files once created regarding hardware? From what I can find the Sonos seems to be one of the better systems but I know the square root of FA about it. Advice on hardware and cables would be great, as mentioned my amp has a built in dac to start with, but where that sits compared with other dacs I have no experience.

Cheers

Logitech left a huge hole in the market when they stopped making and selling Squeezeboxes.
I continue to run them on my home network, and they're fantastic in my opinion - Logitech Media Server is an excellent way to manage a music library.
In my case LMS is running on a low powered NAS, and the NAS goes to sleep after not being accessed for 15 minutes, and it wakes up quickly when required.
So if you don't mind using what is an obsolete system then getting a Squeezebox Touch or two wouldn't be a bad idea.

The only direct competitor to the Squeezebox way of doing things is the Sonos way, and I have never used one to be honest.
It's a popular system, and it's not as flexible as the Squeezebox with regard to the file types it will handle (Sonos currently will not play Hi-Res material), but other than that it comes across as being pretty well rock solid.

You could always build your own silent streaming computer, which is an option many are taking.

[337alant]

Ive just bought a Marantz NA7004 for my son for £235 , just tried it out in my system and its very good, seems to have a decent DAC and plays Flac files from my NAS or from a USB drive or IPOD. Also plays network radio has DAB and AM/FM radio as well
Picked this up from ebay as they stopped making them now as well
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/181548834427?_trksid=p2059210.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT
I also have a SBT and that is a very good player as well

Alan