Ripping CD collection to a drive for Network Streamer
Discussion
Hi folks,
I thinking about upgrading my music streamer from a Bluesound Node 2i to one of the Cambridge Audio offerings (CXN100 or even the new EXN100) and also putting all of my CDs on to some sort of NAS drive so I can simply (I hope) select what I want on the streamer app and play it.
So far so good. But what is the best and most cost effective way to do this from a NAS point of view?
I have just upgraded my PC so have an old PC with a 1TB SSD just sitting there doing nothing. Can I repurpose this as some form of NAS drive?
What other options are there. I suppose I may also decide to do the same with my DVDs and BluRays at some point too so no doubt extra storage space will need to be factored in.
I have done a bit of research and frankly it am more confused than I was when I started. I quite like the idea of repurposing my old PC but not if it is going to make everything complicated - the idea is to end up with something really slick to use - and avoid having to hunt for CDs that have mysteriously gone walkies.
Rather than write a book as a first post can I ask you guys to give me a few pointers to help me narrow down my options?
Ta in advance and Happy Christmas.
I thinking about upgrading my music streamer from a Bluesound Node 2i to one of the Cambridge Audio offerings (CXN100 or even the new EXN100) and also putting all of my CDs on to some sort of NAS drive so I can simply (I hope) select what I want on the streamer app and play it.
So far so good. But what is the best and most cost effective way to do this from a NAS point of view?
I have just upgraded my PC so have an old PC with a 1TB SSD just sitting there doing nothing. Can I repurpose this as some form of NAS drive?
What other options are there. I suppose I may also decide to do the same with my DVDs and BluRays at some point too so no doubt extra storage space will need to be factored in.
I have done a bit of research and frankly it am more confused than I was when I started. I quite like the idea of repurposing my old PC but not if it is going to make everything complicated - the idea is to end up with something really slick to use - and avoid having to hunt for CDs that have mysteriously gone walkies.
Rather than write a book as a first post can I ask you guys to give me a few pointers to help me narrow down my options?
Ta in advance and Happy Christmas.
I rip my own blurays and store them on a hard drive in original quality, no recoding. Quality is therefore almost always much better than streaming sites, unless a Blu-ray of something isn’t available. In that case I do have a bit of software that’ll download from Netflix etc, but I try to avoid it and the quality you can download at is variable.
CoolHands said:
I don’t do it but surely one would be best off downloading ripped films from torrent sites than actually ripping them yourself? What would be the point of all that time & effort?
Interesting point.Mind you I do have some recordings of certain albums that I can't find elsewhere. That having been said I have not explored the torrent options. Do torrent copies come with all the additional album data?
And to clarify I'm primarily thinking about CDs rather than films - I have a few UHD subscriptions so I can usually find what I am looking for, and don't have a huge BluRay collection. I have lots of CDs though.
Edited by TorqueDirty on Wednesday 25th December 21:47
I used dBpoweramp when I ripped my CDs (it's paid for but a mate gave me his) or Exact Audio Copy is freeware - I only had a couple of hundred discs and it's not a quick endeavour, took 10+ days during lockdown.
Might be worth taking the drive out of the old PC and sticking it in a caddy and physically connecting to your streamer (although you'll be able to point a streamer at the correct folder on the old PC)
Did you know that Bluesound has just released the Node Icon, similar price to the Cambridge Audio but also with Dirac room compensation for sorting your room out/subwoofer integration (I believe it's Dirac live which covers upto 500hz which is where most room issues are, and you'll need a microphone - you can also upgrade to the full Dirac license)
Very, very good by all accounts and BluOS is arguably the best software on the market outside of Roon.
Might be worth taking the drive out of the old PC and sticking it in a caddy and physically connecting to your streamer (although you'll be able to point a streamer at the correct folder on the old PC)
Did you know that Bluesound has just released the Node Icon, similar price to the Cambridge Audio but also with Dirac room compensation for sorting your room out/subwoofer integration (I believe it's Dirac live which covers upto 500hz which is where most room issues are, and you'll need a microphone - you can also upgrade to the full Dirac license)
Very, very good by all accounts and BluOS is arguably the best software on the market outside of Roon.
stevoknevo said:
.......... and BluOS is arguably the best software on the market outside of Roon.
Actually this is why I'm thinking of changing. Neither my wife or I can ever get the Node 2i to work and the BluOS app will never find the device.I end up having to unplug the Node 2i so that the BluOS app can find it again. Sometimes I need to delete the app and reinstall it. Drives me nuts.
So much so that I simply don't use it anymore. Just yesterday we had to rely on CDs because it would not play anything.
Also, I'm looking for a streamer that sounds as good as my Musical Fidelity 308cr CD player, and the Node 2i doesn't cut it unfortunately.
stevoknevo said:
I used dBpoweramp when I ripped my CDs (it's paid for but a mate gave me his)
That is what one of my kids has just used to rip my collection for me. There is a free trial period available. With the right drives you can really fly through it (PC has two drives, often spinning up to 30x).
We have subscriptions to Apple Music and Tidal, but getting fed up of albums vanishing from the latter in particular.
It might be worth looking at Roon if you want album data. I have around 8,000 albums in my library which is on a Link Station NAS - that is plugged into a MacMini and the whole lot live remotely in my cellar. Roon does an excellent job of finding and organising my library - with all the sleeve notes you could want... all done automatically.
If you only want to access the files locally, then PC based is easy.
You need to consider that the PC needs to be on and out of Sleep mode in order to stream from. Do there are energy and noise considerations. If you're happy for your current PC to be on all day (or at least when you want to stream from it), you may as well just use that. Put the spare SSD inside a d use your chosen software. No need to over complicate things.
If noise/energy are issues, you may want to use the old PC and locate it somewhere specific.
The benefit of NAS s that they are purpose built for the job, so low noise/energy and they come with dedicated software to make it easy to configure security, set up disk arrays and backups etc. But it's nothing you can't already do on your PC.
You need to consider that the PC needs to be on and out of Sleep mode in order to stream from. Do there are energy and noise considerations. If you're happy for your current PC to be on all day (or at least when you want to stream from it), you may as well just use that. Put the spare SSD inside a d use your chosen software. No need to over complicate things.
If noise/energy are issues, you may want to use the old PC and locate it somewhere specific.
The benefit of NAS s that they are purpose built for the job, so low noise/energy and they come with dedicated software to make it easy to configure security, set up disk arrays and backups etc. But it's nothing you can't already do on your PC.
I'm not sure on the best current option regarding storage/streaming - I have a couple of thousand CDs ripped to FLAC on an old NAS (Synology DS411j bought 12 years ago), and use gen 1 Sonos Connect players to stream the digital files, then output digitally into separate DACs to feed my amps, so not relying on the Sonos sound quality.
DACs in various rooms are an Audiolab M-DAC plus (into an Ecko EV55SE tube amp), Eastern Electric Minimax Tube DAC Plus (into an ATC SIA2-150 Integrated Amp), and in the kitchen, the digital signal goes into a Marantz PM 7005 integrated amp which has its own decent built in DAC.
Despite being old kit, it still sounds great to me, and I'm pretty happy using the Sonos app to control it. I wouldn't touch Sonos kit for the role of DAC, amp, or speakers where I'm concerned about decent sound quality, hence only using it as a digital streaming device.
I'm going to add some music in the garage (already have a spare amp and speakers), so will likely use the Sonos Connect to do the DAC role for this, as sound quality isn't so important. I picked up a used gen 1 Sonos Connect for this from eBay for £15, so adding further rooms if needed is not expensive at all.
What I would say is that DbPowerAmp is a good bit of software for ripping the CDs. I've previously used the free Exact Audio Copy (EAC), but don't regret spending the £40 or so on DbPowerAmp for the more user-friendly interface, which still gets used regularly as I'm still buying CDs to add to the collection.
DACs in various rooms are an Audiolab M-DAC plus (into an Ecko EV55SE tube amp), Eastern Electric Minimax Tube DAC Plus (into an ATC SIA2-150 Integrated Amp), and in the kitchen, the digital signal goes into a Marantz PM 7005 integrated amp which has its own decent built in DAC.
Despite being old kit, it still sounds great to me, and I'm pretty happy using the Sonos app to control it. I wouldn't touch Sonos kit for the role of DAC, amp, or speakers where I'm concerned about decent sound quality, hence only using it as a digital streaming device.
I'm going to add some music in the garage (already have a spare amp and speakers), so will likely use the Sonos Connect to do the DAC role for this, as sound quality isn't so important. I picked up a used gen 1 Sonos Connect for this from eBay for £15, so adding further rooms if needed is not expensive at all.
What I would say is that DbPowerAmp is a good bit of software for ripping the CDs. I've previously used the free Exact Audio Copy (EAC), but don't regret spending the £40 or so on DbPowerAmp for the more user-friendly interface, which still gets used regularly as I'm still buying CDs to add to the collection.
Edited by C n C on Thursday 26th December 13:12
If you are going to rip all your CDs then it is important that they are ripped correctly and tagged correctly. Dbpoweramp is very good at doing this.
Ripping to NAS would be preferably to ripping to old PC as NAS is 24x7 and always available. A lot of NAS come with media servers and iTunes server builtin. I use both Synology Diskstation and QNAP NAS. A two drive NAS would be the minimum requirement here. Both Synology and QNAP provide small home media NAS systems that would meet this requirment. I tend to prefer QNAP these days.
It will take some time to rip CDs - during lockdown I ripped my whole collection to NAS - it took the best part of a month to do this. Once you have ripped them to NAS you need to think about backup as the last thing you want is to lose the ripped copies if you have an issue/failure with the NAS. I backup from one QNAP NAS to another on a regular basis.
Once the CDS has been ripped then you need to access them and play them on various audio end points. Others have mentioned ROON which is very good at indexing all your music on various sources and then providing a means to play on various end points. I use ROON a lot and it is very good. I run the Roon server on a QNAP TS-h973AX and it works very well connecting to a large 12 zone Sonos 2 system plus Naim equipment in a dedicated listening room.
Ripping to NAS would be preferably to ripping to old PC as NAS is 24x7 and always available. A lot of NAS come with media servers and iTunes server builtin. I use both Synology Diskstation and QNAP NAS. A two drive NAS would be the minimum requirement here. Both Synology and QNAP provide small home media NAS systems that would meet this requirment. I tend to prefer QNAP these days.
It will take some time to rip CDs - during lockdown I ripped my whole collection to NAS - it took the best part of a month to do this. Once you have ripped them to NAS you need to think about backup as the last thing you want is to lose the ripped copies if you have an issue/failure with the NAS. I backup from one QNAP NAS to another on a regular basis.
Once the CDS has been ripped then you need to access them and play them on various audio end points. Others have mentioned ROON which is very good at indexing all your music on various sources and then providing a means to play on various end points. I use ROON a lot and it is very good. I run the Roon server on a QNAP TS-h973AX and it works very well connecting to a large 12 zone Sonos 2 system plus Naim equipment in a dedicated listening room.
Re. Backups. I lost much of my film collection due to a hard drive failure once. despite it being on raid 5 and took me months to re-rip everything.
Now I use stablebit drivepool for local redundancy of files - it’s good because the drives are still accessible with the files on independently, so even with the most major failure, you can plug what you have left into a new PC and recover everything that is recoverable. I have somewhere over 100TB running in drivepool, presented as a single drive but with a large number of physical drives underneath it.
And then I use Backblaze for all my large backup needs. All my day to day stuff is in OneDrive, but backing up the film stuff, Backblaze was the best I could find. It “just works” and any new film I rip onto the media drive automatically gets backed up too.
Might not be what you guys want, but the above things work for me.
Now I use stablebit drivepool for local redundancy of files - it’s good because the drives are still accessible with the files on independently, so even with the most major failure, you can plug what you have left into a new PC and recover everything that is recoverable. I have somewhere over 100TB running in drivepool, presented as a single drive but with a large number of physical drives underneath it.
And then I use Backblaze for all my large backup needs. All my day to day stuff is in OneDrive, but backing up the film stuff, Backblaze was the best I could find. It “just works” and any new film I rip onto the media drive automatically gets backed up too.
Might not be what you guys want, but the above things work for me.
Another vote for NAS, if we're voting. But for the reasons of it being a central store of your data, including any music. You might find that it's a bit of a faff to remember what music you have if you're browsing through it all on a tiny screen.... with the result that you'll not use it so much! At least with the discs right there it's easy to browse, select and play what you feel like. But for music where you don't, ahem, have the physical media then a NAS and streamer is what'll work well.
OK folks. Significant update.
This evening I took delivery of a new and shiny Cambridge Audio EXN100 Network streamer.
So far so good - up to a point. I am using it via the Cambridge audio Streammate app which seem OK so far.
It is probably still really cold from having been in a delivery van for 8 hours in sub zero temperatures but has now been plugged in for a couple of hours.
I have played a few well recorded songs through it and compared it to the same CD played thought my cherished Musical Fidelity A308cr CD player.
The streamer wins in some areas (detail) but does not (yet) match the A308 for the really three dimensional sound and warmth of the A308. I'm hoping that after running in the EXN100 for a day or so it will begin to deliver the same sonic depth of field and become a little warmer sounding. We shall see.
Either way I am impressed and optimistic that after a few days it will really sparkle. I might swap the cables too since I'm using very different cabling for each.
Sound quality aside I do have a question on the network streamer in general. How do I play pod casts through it? I can get every radio station under the sun it seems, but I have not figured out how to access BBC i player for example.
I have a tidal account (not yet configured) but have never used Tidal for podcasts. I presume I can find them on there right?
Any tips? I guess I can use Bluetooth from my phone but after dropping £1600 on the EXN100 I really want the best possible sound quality and I suspect Bluetooth might not cut it sonically.
New to streamers so assume I know next to bugger all about them - I wont be offended.
This evening I took delivery of a new and shiny Cambridge Audio EXN100 Network streamer.
So far so good - up to a point. I am using it via the Cambridge audio Streammate app which seem OK so far.
It is probably still really cold from having been in a delivery van for 8 hours in sub zero temperatures but has now been plugged in for a couple of hours.
I have played a few well recorded songs through it and compared it to the same CD played thought my cherished Musical Fidelity A308cr CD player.
The streamer wins in some areas (detail) but does not (yet) match the A308 for the really three dimensional sound and warmth of the A308. I'm hoping that after running in the EXN100 for a day or so it will begin to deliver the same sonic depth of field and become a little warmer sounding. We shall see.
Either way I am impressed and optimistic that after a few days it will really sparkle. I might swap the cables too since I'm using very different cabling for each.
Sound quality aside I do have a question on the network streamer in general. How do I play pod casts through it? I can get every radio station under the sun it seems, but I have not figured out how to access BBC i player for example.
I have a tidal account (not yet configured) but have never used Tidal for podcasts. I presume I can find them on there right?
Any tips? I guess I can use Bluetooth from my phone but after dropping £1600 on the EXN100 I really want the best possible sound quality and I suspect Bluetooth might not cut it sonically.
New to streamers so assume I know next to bugger all about them - I wont be offended.
Just the streamer, which does have a preamp but I'm running it in to my Musical Fidelity A308 pre / power combo.
There was a marked improvement in sound as it warmed up and I had read that these things benefit from being run in for a bit - but I tend to agree that digital circuitry ought to be good out of the box. We shall see.
It is almost as if it has been tuned to bring out the individual instruments and voices at the slight expense of the more rounded and atmospheric sound stage that I get from my CD player.
I ran the same track on both last night - but running at the same time and switched between both sources. It was interesting. Both were excellent but different. I'm going to play with the interconnects today. The streamer is using some quite bright sounding Nordost interconnects.
There was a marked improvement in sound as it warmed up and I had read that these things benefit from being run in for a bit - but I tend to agree that digital circuitry ought to be good out of the box. We shall see.
It is almost as if it has been tuned to bring out the individual instruments and voices at the slight expense of the more rounded and atmospheric sound stage that I get from my CD player.
I ran the same track on both last night - but running at the same time and switched between both sources. It was interesting. Both were excellent but different. I'm going to play with the interconnects today. The streamer is using some quite bright sounding Nordost interconnects.
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