Best PC audio server software?????

[edkoz]

I would like to use my PC as a high rez music server but, I'm not sure what software to use for copying the CDs, downloading high rez music and playback' My HP desktop has a 2TB hard drive and a video card with a optical output. The digital output feeds into my Mcintosh MDA1000. I feel I have the hardware I need to get the results I would like.
Suggestions for software would be great.
Thanks Ed

 

[js1138]

Don't know a lot about music servers, but here's a thread dealing with CD copying.

http://www.audiokarma.org/forums/showthread.php?t=454261

I'm in the middle of a massive rip of all my CDs, and I can vouch for Exact Audio Copy as having the potential to make a perfect copy of any CD that is readable at all. (Some aren't)

dBPoweramp is a paid program that claims to have some additional convenience features.

I'm ripping to flac, primarily to have lossless copies that have embedded metadata.

As I go along I use Media Monkey to sample the rips and entertain me while I work. i haven't chosen a final media server.

 

[edkoz]

I have gone through the different forums but I am NOT a computer geek so much of the jargon is greek to me. Any help would be great. I will give exact audio copy a try.
Thanks Ed

 

[sKiZo]

Best I've found and am currently using is jRiver ... you can try it for 30 days before you buy it.

Does the whole shebang, from music to video to pics and such and it's all integrated. Wanna rip a cd, stick it in the tray. All jRiver needs to know is what flavor you want, and it's got most any encoder you'd want. I use FLAC myself. You can also set it to automatically download track info, cover pics, etc.

Once you get the music on the hard drive, it's just point and shoot to pick 'n play.

Lots of other bells and whistles, runs on most anything, good tech support thru their forum, and it's got a good track record.

For more info:
http://www.jriver.com/

 

[JimmyNeutron]

+1 on J. River. Been using it for a few years now. In addition to supporting files up to 24/192 resolution, it can now play back DSD streams with ease.

Jimmy

 

[RichPA]

I like dbPoweramp for ripping. I have a Sonos system and use their software for indexing and playback.

 

[edkoz]

Thanks for the J. River info. Will this make bit pefect copies of my CDs? I'm trying to get the best quality I can. Can I also download Hi-rez music directly into J. River?
Sorry for so many questions but this is not the thing I do best!
Thanks Ed

 

[js1138]

I'm a little biased about ripping. That's why I started the thread on accurate ripping. As far as I know there are only two programs that do fully secure ripping. EAC and dBPoweramp. there are others that compare your rip with accuraterip, the online database, and tell you if it's OK. But they don't check sector by sector while doing the copy.

I suppose it depends on the quality of your CDs and how common they are. I have a lot of used CDs that are not in perfect condition, and I find that about one in four of my CDs are not in the database. So I have to depend on the ripper itself to do error checking.

If the CD cannot be ripped perfectly, EAC has another mode that allows the CD player to do the correction, which sometimes means "filling in" bad spots. Occasionally this is audible, but generally not awful. It''s what CD players do all the time when you play CDs live.

 

[JimmyNeutron]

J. River uses EAC internally for it's rips. It will make bit perfect copies. J. River is also one of the only, if not the only, one player that handles all meida formats, as well as DSD SACD files. This is a full audiophile quality media player.

Jimmy

 

[Bob Clobber]

J. River uses EAC internally for it's rips. It will make bit perfect copies. J. River is also one of the only, if not the only, one player that handles all meida formats, as well as DSD SACD files. This is a full audiophile quality media player.

Jimmy

That's excellent info Jimmy! I tried EAC but its interface left a lot to be desired. I didn't know I was still using EAC when I switched to JRiver for ripping. I can't tell the difference between a FLAC file and the original CD.

 

[Sanc]

I can't tell the difference between a FLAC file and the original CD.

You shouldn't be able to. A FLAC made from the WAV files from a CD should sound identical to the CD. Unless that is what you were talking about and commenting on how it is working the way it is supposed to.

 

[js1138]

A flac file when expanded is bit identical to a wav file or the original CD.
Now I'm curious about the eac interface and what people don't like.

 

[JimmyNeutron]

I've never used EAC standalone. I'd like to try it but since I use J. River exclusively I really don't need to fiddle with about 10 seperate programs as J. River has them built in. The best part of the software is that it can now play SACD DSD .dff files directly, and in several ways. If you have a DSD compatible DAC then you can play back the files just like if it were a SACD player. But if you don't, and the maximum rate your DAC supports is 24/192, then J. River will, on the fly, play back the .dff file at that rate. Obviously this is not SACD quality, but the sound is still hi-rez. To be honest, I doubt most people could tell the difference between the two. Listening to a true 24/192 file is really amazing.

Jimmy

 

[js1138]

I like interfaces that provide maximum information about what is going on, particularly with processes that can go wrong. For example, I can see when a particular track is not being read and probably never finish without errors.

I can skip that track and come back to it. Maybe cleaning will help. If it is permanently damaged I can try ripping it in burst mode, which isn't bit perfect but may have inaudible fill-in. Anyway, I have the information I need to make decisions.

 

[sKiZo]

J. River uses EAC internally for it's rips. It will make bit perfect copies. J. River is also one of the only, if not the only, one player that handles all meida formats, as well as DSD SACD files. This is a full audiophile quality media player.

Jimmy

Ah. That explains why my experimentation going between jRiver and EAC for rips didn't seem to make for any noticable results.

Other than the fact that EAC was much slower. Methinks jRiver uses one of EAC's less aggressive matching routines for it's rips. I did have issues with a couple CDs that jRiver couldn't or wouldn't rip the last track for whatever reason. Fired up EAC, went away for a day or so and they did eventually pop out. I do know the CDs in question were exceptionally long and probably had some sort of compression hocus pocus going on that was confusing the drive.

And PS ... thanx again. Jimmy's the guy who talked me into trying jRiver and got me out of XP Media Center hell ... <G>

 

[edkoz]

Wanted to say thanks for the help you folks have given me. I downloaded J.River and started copying CDs. Have a lot to learn about the software but I am happy with the sound of the playback. Well, need to get back to loading the remaining 936 CDs
Tanks Ed

 

[sKiZo]

One thing you've apparently already learned is how easy it is to do the basic stuff. Just point and shoot.

Before you get too carried away, might want to double check the file system you're using. I've got my HTPC set up with an 80 gig "software" drive, and two terrabytes in mirror RAID for media storage. jRiver defaulted to trying to store everything on the small drive, which was easy enough to change once I noticed.

You'll also want to play around with the input settings. Try clicking on anything that's available, and compare. For me, Direct Sound is my best option. If your DAC has an ASIO driver, that should show and is probably your best option.

You might also want to play around with the output settings ... if you're ripping CDs, those are probably defaulting to 44.1/16 redbook. jRiver can internally convert to a higher resolution file that can make substantial differences in playback ... try jacking that up to 96/24 and you may be pleasantly surprised.

TOOLS -> OPTIONS -> AUDIO - DSP SETTINGS -> and you'll see a list of all the different resolutions supported and how you can tweak them.

Enjoy playing about ... there's about a million options and tricks that can really enhance the experience.

 

[Sanc]

You might also want to play around with the output settings ... if you're ripping CDs, those are probably defaulting to 44.1/16 redbook. jRiver can internally convert to a higher resolution file that can make substantial differences in playback ... try jacking that up to 96/24 and you may be pleasantly surprised.

TOOLS -> OPTIONS -> AUDIO - DSP SETTINGS -> and you'll see a list of all the different resolutions supported and how you can tweak them.

Enjoy playing about ... there's about a million options and tricks that can really enhance the experience.

Interesting you say that. Do you believe upping a 44.1/16 to 96/24 gives the DAC more "headroom" perhaps?

Part of the reason why EAC may go so slow is because you can opt for it to rip at 1x speed, meaning the actual play speed of the disc. Which is the best option.

 

[sKiZo]

Yup ... I thought it was snake oil, but there's a very noticable difference. Way I understand it, even though you're starting out with a low res source, the upsampling almost doubles the effective dynamic range and increases the, for want of a better word, definition of the musical content, resulting in more accurate reproduction. Instruments become much more distinct and separate from one another. Another nice feature of jRiver - it's easy to do A/B comparison tests.

Not sure if this is accurate with a pure digital stream - maybe more noticable on an analog receiver ... and I expect a lot of that is dependant on how good your DAC is, not to mention how good the software you're using to upsample does it's job. Lots of variables.

 

[JimmyNeutron]

Don't confuse with recording a 16/44.1 CD format to a 24/96 format and think that this somehow adds more musicality and detail. It does not. Nothing can majically add what is not there in the first place. What it *is* doing though, is giving the music signal ( a car, for instance ) a wider road to drive on. It's like driving on a dirt road and then driving onto a 6 lane super highway. Having that much more space around the actual music file means that any brickwalling, and frequency ripples, and thus noise that actually affects the music, gets pushed out farther away from the signal itself. Pushing all this digital muck further away from your file means it's affected less. And this is a good thing. With a redbook 16/44.1 file, the lane that the signal is on is so tight that all the filters literally squeeze these digital garbage into the hearing range. That's why oversampling is used in CD players - to move the garbage away. But now you can do it affordably by literally giving it a highway to ride on - a 24/96 lane highway.

I hope this helped a bit in clearing the confussion.

Jimmy