Why You Should Build a Music Server

!±8± Why You Should Build a Music Server

Are you an avid collector of music?

Imagine accessing your entire music collection using a single remote control, or browse album covers without getting up from your chair. No more disc flipping. Look up your favorite tracks within seconds or create play lists across your entire music collection. Your precious discs reside in a safe place to prevent them from getting scratched.

All of this and even more is possible with a digital music server. Virtually any modern computer (PC or Mac) plus cheap hard-disk storage is powerful enough to act as a music server that can handle thousands of discs in loss-less uncompressed quality.

Build a reference digital audio transport that can compete with players at any price!

More Benefits of Digital Music Servers

According to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), sales of physical discs have been constantly declining in the past 5 years as consumers are flocking to downloadable MP3 files. There is evidence to suggest the CD era is drawing to a close although physical discs and vinyl will certainly coexist with computerised systems for some time.

Here's what you will be able to achieve by setting up a music server:

Turn a computer into a reference digital audio transport that will astound you Stream music to multiple rooms in your home Navigate through your entire music collection within seconds Create global song playlists Listen to worldwide internet radio stations Listen to music purchased from online stores such as iTunes or Linn Records Utilise digital room correction Digitise your analogue record collection Independence of failing mechanical CD transports.

What About Sound Quality?

A properly set up computer-based music transport can perform just as well or better than even the most expensive CD transports-at a fraction of the cost. That's because your music resides as bit-perfect data files on a hard-disk.

Once properly stored, your music is no longer subject to read errors typical of CDs caused by scratchy surfaces, vibrations or non-centrical discs. The resulting high-quality error-free digital output stream can be translated into an analogue signal by a digital-to-analogue converter and then amplified.

I generally design all my products to support the latest digital media products such as the Squeezebox, Sonos music system, or Apple/PC computer transports right out of the box.

But I believe this is just the beginning of the next revolution in digital audio! Once your music is digitally stored on a hard-disk, it opens up previously undreamed-of possibilities. Now you can even perform digital room correction and future upgrades become simply a matter of a software update.

Before dismissing all of this as a hype, bear in mind that professional mastering studios have long used computers for their daily work. These pros know why!

What You Need to Get Started

You basically need a receiver with a set of digital inputs in the SP/DIF format (look out for coaxial or optical Toslink inputs on the back of your amplifier or receiver). Your receiver would then translate the incoming digital signal into an audible analogue music stream. Audiophile listeners probably want to go with a dedicated external digital-to-analogue converter (also known as "DAC") which can be connected to virtually any preamp or integrated amplifier. Many external DACs already come with USB or Firewire inputs which comes in handy if you want to use your Laptop as the music source. In addition, you probably want to purchase a large external harddisk to store your music. I would recommend planning for the worst -- so do back up your music frequently. Better safe than sorry.

Example Setups:

PC/Macintosh as Source

If you prefer the flexibility of computers and don't mind setting one up in your listening room, this appears to be a great choice. Simply connect the digital SP/DIF output of your computer's sound card to one a high quality digital to analogue converter. Your music would reside on the computer's internal hard-disk or on an external USB hard-disk or NAS (Network Attached Storage) drive. For playback and library management software you have the choice between Windows Media Player, Foobar or Media Monkey on Windows platforms.

Laptop or MP3 Player

Establish a USB connection between your laptop/MP3 player and a digital to analogue converter with USB capability. Any audio file can now be played back in high quality through your stereo system.

Streaming media devices are quickly gaining popularity as you don't need a computer in your listening room. They look and work like a home audio device and can be plugged into your home stereo system just like any CD or DVD player. Your music and the actual server can be located anywhere in the house so there's no issue with noisy computer fans. Streaming media clients pull your music remotely from the server either via wired or even wireless LAN connections. Any computer or laptop can become a streaming server.

Some of the major players are Logitech Squeezebox, Transporter, Roku SoundBrige and the Sonos music system.

Apple Airport Express

If you're already using Apple iTunes to manage your music collection and want your music to be streamed wirelessly in high quality to your home stereo system, then Apple's Airport Express might be an alternative.

This device provides something like a "wireless digital output". Simply connect its optical output to a digital to analogue converter for sonic bliss!

How Do You Convert Music into "Digital Files"?

For new music, your first option is to buy albums or single titles directly as data files from an online store like Apple's iTunes. But be wary of lossy-compressed file formats.

MP3 quality below 320kb/s isn't desirable for an audiophile. Another recent high-quality alternative is Linn Records, Linn's very own online store which even offers true studio master quality file versions without copy protection.

For your existing music archive, you need to extract or 'rip' your CDs into data files first. All you need is a computer equipped with a DVD drive and some free software.

Although the software does most of the work like tagging songs and albums as you rip CDs, it's still a bit of a tedious process though and might take some time to finish.

But fortunately you only need to do this once for each album.

Although Windows Media Player and Apple's iTunes get the job done, more demanding audiophiles might prefer Exact Audio Copy because it's known to produce bit-perfect results. I strongly recommend you download and use this software for high-quality audio extraction.

If you don't want to do all the work, there's help from professional service companies who will rip your entire CD collection in just a matter of days.

Regarding file formats and quality levels, I generally recommend sticking with loss less audio formats such as WAV, FLAC, WMA Lossless or Apple Lossless.