Welcome to New Technologies!

[Walt]

Well now, Kamakiri has gone and annointed me as moderator of New Technologies! So I figured that I better get the forum kicked off with a thread to get things moving.

Come one, come all, (even you really knarly, hardened old vintage chaps ) ... the subject matter is wide, so let the discussions begin ...

 

[ckelly]

I was thinking, what could make a cool mp3 computer for the system?

Here are some ideas

Motherboard: AOpen AX4B-533 tube

http://www.aopen.com/products/mb/ax4b-533tube.htm

Sound Card Sound Blater Audigy Platinum EX

http://www.soundblaster.com/products/audigyplatinumex/

Rack mount ATX Case:

http://www.rackmaster.com/rm-18atx.htm

PIV 2.0 Ghz processor, 512Mb RAM, 120 GBs CD-56X, CDR 40*12*24

What do you think?

Chris

 

[Walt]

Wow,

That's a pretty sexy looking case ... I like the handles look ... maybe you could then fit it into your audio rack?

Yes for an MP3 box, you just need disk space, so large efficient HDD's would be a must. Fastest IDE-type HDD on the market today is this:

http://www.westerndigital.com/products/products.asp?DriveID=32

ATA-100 (forget ATA-133 its no faster), 7200 RPM, 8 Mb cache (that's the thing that makes it real fast).

Get 2 of the 80 Gb drives, put them in a RAID 0 array, and voila, heaps of storage and fast access times. Would make a great video editing machine as well (Tom Hoots).

Audigy is nice too ... analogue outs into all those vintage receivers out there ...

 

[Wardsweb]

As Operations manager for a Network security company, I buy the 2U rackmount chassis from Technoland. P4/512/80gig/52X in a sweet black case with a lockable door.

Ok thats one side of new tech but what about high tech audio? Can you believe $23500.oo for speaker cables

 

[Walt]

Ward,

Ain't no cable guys that I know of around here, except for mIke ...

Me, I'm a 12ga generic RS man, and budget I/C's ... I don't think I'll ever part with the $$ for that stuff cos I'd rather spend the money on better components ...

 

[ckelly]

One thing I have never understood is why don't more sound cards have RCA outputs/inputs

I liked that case too - it looks great, and those rack hadles would look great with vintage equipment

The idea would be to make a MP3 "component", that would look and sound good with the system, it has to sound good, and it also has to be QUIET - so no overclocking and lots of heatsinks, and less fans - or quieter fans. That's one problem with PC's as sound sources.

I have a dumb question - what is a Raid 0? Remember I'm a vintage guy

Chris

 

[Walt]

RAID = Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks ...

RAID 0 is essentially 2 disks up in an array ... the data is split in two and written to the disks simultaneously.

So theoretically write/read time is halved as two disks are being accessed at the same time.

So RAID arrays are great where you require very high read access to produce seamless file access times.

The downside is that if one disk fails, the data off the remaining disk is also useless, so you still need to backup extensively.

Just a pretty simple explanation there - I could go into more detail, but you get the idea

There are some ultra quiet power supplies out now which are specifically designed for MP3 boxes, or HT boxes (PC operating as a DVD, digital decoder) ... more convergence of technology really.

 

[THOR]

Here is the perfect MP3 box

http://www.directron.com/ss50.html

Sit it on your entertainment stand it has TV out so you plug it into your TV.

Add some memory, a big HD, and a CPU, and it has PCI slot so you can add a real nice soundcard. Put one of the ATI usb remote control things on it and it would be perfect.

You can even put a DVD player in it and have a DVD/MP3 player

Heres more info they also have an AMD version

http://www.shuttleonline.com/spec.php3?model=ss50

http://www.shuttleonline.com/spec.php3?model=ss40

http://www.spacewalker.com/english/mcs_detail_info.asp?number=182

http://www.pcpowerzone.co.uk/reviews.php?id=106&page=1

http://www.viahardware.com/ss40g_1.shtm

http://www.lostcircuits.com/motherboard/shuttle_ss50/

http://www.tbreak.com/hard/othr/shuttle_fs40/index.html

If I ever get a job I am building one of these little puppies!!

 

[ProAc_Fan]

For sound cards you should be checking out the ones from M-Audio. They make much nicer cards than Audigy or anyone else for that matter. They're not cheap but they are worth every penny. Especially for you Thor because of all the MP3's you seem to like to listen to.

 

[bully]

I suddenly feel so much older now


pete

 

[Walt]

Nah Pete - you're only as old as you feel ...

Heck, you're here talking the talk with us on these fan-dangled forums aren't you?

 

[Walt]

Wait - I forgot, with your back and all you probably are feeling your age right now