Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Stereo Olive OPUS - Too cool....

That's what external drives are for.

I know this will come as a shock to many of you, but some people simply don't enjoy spelunking computer innards as a hobby. Likewise, some people also already have stand-alone DVR functionality that need not be integrated with a computer.

I'm about in the middle of the pack on these things. I am perfectly happy with my DirecTivo service at the moment; I have no prospects for HD and the boxes record and time-shift with amazing ease. Likewise, while I understand that buying a little shiny disk and having that "property" (ha!) is going to become anachronistic in my lifetime, it is still the main mechanism by which the highest available audio signal is conveyed to consumers and experienced by listeners.

It seems to me that we're at an odd point in the history of consumption of intellectual property - smack between buying a "thing" (book, LP, CD, etc.) and when networking and electronic commerce are so pervasive that this kind of content virtually appears from the ether.

Until then, the practical problem experience by me, Mike and others have seems to be:
a) we like shiny disks, because they continue to be the highest fidelity available
b) managing the content on a bunch of shiny disks is cumbersome to the point that it impedes our ability to enjoy it
c) ripping shiny disks to a central location that is easily managed takes time and can compromise fidelity.

Now, I have deeply appreciated the expertise all of you always so collegially provide relative to geeky stuff, including the merits of various audio formats (AFLAC, Empty-3, Egg Brutis, SHAV, et. al.). We have all - thanks to hard work, good fortune and indulging family members - amassed collections of wires, buttons, transducers, blinky lights, sand, glass, particle board and metal for the purpose of having the best quality audio/video experience possible within the constraints of our budgets and environments. I cannot make the leap to degradation of my shiny disks.

So, I need a lossless format. Which means a giant amount of storage. Storage - while coming down in price - is still not only expensive but noisy. So again, to maintain the sanctity of my listening experience and integrity of my data, I need a magically quiet machine and/or sophisticated networking, RAID5, technical expertise and money.

And there is still the problem of time. Ripping CD's to another device takes machine time and an infuriating amount of button pushing and disk loading. I'd rather be listening to music

So far, the device I am most intrigued by is the PC and Megachanger combination from Sony. I do not know how ISA-friendly it might be, but in the day of large-capacity external USB drives, it might not matter. The beauty of this thing is that I believe you can load the 200 disk changer, tell it to go rip everything in sequence, and go about savoring the joyful moments of your life. Golden brown AND delicious.

But, of course, it is overpriced. So, as with most problems not related to health and mortality, if you have the requisite amount of time and/or money, you can effect the desired change.

Time and money - that's all you need.

I agree about it taking a ridiculous amount of time to copy CD's to a hard drive.

Lets see... It took me 2 straight days of ripping to get through 50 albums.

I mean, I was working on my computer much of the time, but it was tiring.

To me that time is worth it vs. the time it takes to grab a CD, and drop it in the CD player.

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I know this will come as a shock to many of you,

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Tom:
That was a concise, well thought-out argument. I'm shocked.

Who are you calling concise? An academia, wouldn't those be fightin' words?

Mark, you are wonderful, living proof of one of the many colorful adages imparted to me by my Dad - "It's better to be a smart*ss than a dumb*ss".

A corollary to which is - you have to be smart to be funny. You're almost impossibly funny for someone with your evolved artistic sensibility.

btw, I'm still traumatized by the images of your ridiculously tidy work area.

This thread needs beer.

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This thread needs beer.

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Don't they all of late?

Hey man, I did my part.

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Not trying to start an argument and perhaps you have had some bad experience with some hard drives. But just what do you consider a short life span ?

We have had 6 machines online 24/7 for over 9 years now and in that time only had one hard drive failure, and that was on a fiber optic unit. I believe that any one that as any amount of critical data on a drive and has taken no precaution for a failure rather deserves what happens.

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That is pretty amazing. I wonder if it one of those devices that if left on and undisturbed the life span goes way up? Been around since the begining of computers both home and at work and I believe most people would say that hard disk crashes are not exactly unheard of.

The time required to put that much music on any device would prevent me from buying it if there was no fool proof way of backing it up including with that outrageous price tag.