I do not stream as I am not keen on subscriptions. I buy CD’s and downloads from Bandcamp when I cannot get a CD easily.
I just have a process where I rip my CD’s and then run them through MP3tag. It is all pretty painless and quick. I then copy the files to a USB HD.
Streamers can be a pain in the butt to set up, but once everything is working, they are great. I prefer the fact that I can command everything with a tablet.
The big problem with CD’s, is that once your collection runs into big numbers, finding an album is a pain unless you have a god filing system. With the iPad the database makes thins quick and easy.
No, only Melco. I’ve owned a Melco N100 and then upgraded to an N50-S38, which sounded far superior. Getting it all to work and managing it was very far from straightforward and required lots of reading around on-line. The supplied instructions were fairly comprehensive but things didn’t seem to work exactly as they said they should. I’m technically minded though I’m no IT expert but I found it challenging to set up correctly and even when up and running there remained ‘loose ends’. I just couldn’t be bothered in the end. Being retired now my aim is very much to simplify our lives and streaming was taking things in the exact opposite direction.
That’s true of course, and one of the reasons I opted to use a Melco straight into our Qutest DAC rather than to stream from it using a separate streamer across our LAN. What makes it unusable if one disconnects it from the Network is that one loses the control point, ie. an iPad. Yes you can operate it from the front panel buttons, but scrolling through hundreds of files on a tiny little screen whilst standing in front of it is not my idea of satisfactory!
We have owned the Moon 260 for sevreral years and it’s really excellent. Note that we have the transport only version and use a Qutest DAC. The build and finish is superb and, although I loath the expression, the sound is very analogue in nature and devoid of typical digital artefacts. It’s very musically involving, dynamic and punchy sounding without any nasties at all. I would certainly give it a listen.
The CDI was the first Naim CD player that we owned, way back around the early 90’s. We couldn’t quite afford the two-box CDS. It was really excellent. We eventually ended up with A CDS3 but I still think the CDS and CDI were the most musically involving CD players that Naim ever made.
Our collection is very small - around 200 CDs. We prefer to spend our time listening to stuff that we know and like rather than forever being on a quest to discover new music. Of course if we hear something we like somewhere then we’ll buy the CD (if available). But our collection is now fairly stable. I’ve never really seen much point in owning a very large collection of either music or films/TV programmes as we really won’t have time to listen to/view them all properly.
During a serious health scare a couple of years ago I asked my wife what she’d prefer to play and our system. She wanted CDs and vinyl. I bought the best sounding CD player I could afford - a TEAC VRDS-701 - and unboxed all the ripped CDs.
Two years on and health restored I have to say we still very much prefer the sound of our system with CDs and have begun seriously collecting physical media again to gives us the option of alternatives to rips/downloads. That said I’ve just double the size on my Melco storage. I’ve always been very happy to curate and metadata edit my music library. Sort of got the best of both worlds now! DGP
Sorry to hear about your health scare @DGP but glad to hear things are back on track now. Yes things like this can really make you take a step back and re-evaluate your priorities.
Which Melco do you own? I started with the N100 and then upgraded to the N50-S38. I have to say that I found the build quality of the N50-S38 very poor in terms of the casework. Flimsy resonant wrap-around metal case and front panel buttons that looked cheap and nasty and felt like they were made from tin. Maybe it’s just me, but for £5K I expected to have something that looked and felt better than a budget £200 amp from Richer Sounds!
I have a pair of Melco N1AH60 Mk2 - one I’ve modified with larger 4Tb drives (same WD Blues as originally fitted) and I’ve damped the very resonant casework on one of them. I’m using the Melcos rather as network attached storage as I don’t use them for UPnP really instead I use a headless MacMini, mount the Melcos as shared drives there and run Audirvana Studio with a galvanic isolated/reclocked USB signal from the Mac to a TEAC UD-701N streamer. (I like the DAC in the TEAC CD player so much I went and bought another in the streamer).
I’m surprised the N50 turned out to be a disappointment as I thought improved casework was part of the reason for the much higher prices for Melco/Dela product now. DGP
I think the top of the range models use different casework to the N50-S38. It sounded great, but as I say the build quality, at least of the casework, left a lot to be desired and certainly didn’t look anything like £5K’s worth of kit. The front panel buttons in particular had a cheap and nasty look and feel to them. In fact overall I felt that the much cheaper N100 was better built and felt a lot more solid.
One of the reasons I opted to stream directly from our Melco through our Qutest DAC rather than streaming from a separate streamer through our network. Streaming across a network is potentially frought with issues of one kind or another.
I went through a similar process in 2016. I just got fed up with staring at another screen when I was supposed to be relaxing listening to music. So out went the Unitiserve and NDX, 252 and 250 and in came a complete Rega system for both CD and turntable.
I too found it cathartic at least at first but after a year or too I started drifting back to finding new music on-line and having access to Hi-res material by getting an Auralic Mini. Fast forward seven years and I am now at a 300 system fronted by a Melco.
Yes Pete, you might have done a wise thing by moving back to CDs. The physical format is preferable to me especially for classical music as it includes accurate notes, translations of libretti, etc. I can’t be arsed to transfer my CD collection to digital files, I want to get on with listening to music and other more interesting things. I just use streaming to check out latest releases and recordings I don’t have on CD or vinyl. So I have discovered artists like Cinder Well, Lankum, Big Thief and King Gizzard and the Lizzard Wizzard which I would not have done without streaming. Also helps me select what to purchase on vinyl/CD. And what if the internet goes down ……….
I’ve tried a few streamers/servers over the years but am now back in the cd camp with a Shanling ET3 transport and Chord dac and have to say I’m much happier now than I was with any of the streamers
Recent events with Auralic disappearing with the potential to lose service (I know this isn’t the case but the lack of support for any problems would be) and the appalling depreciation that the computer in a box suffers (recognising the slightly naive take on the technology employed) make me reluctant to invest significant sums for the sq I’d like so the ability to preserve the investment in this way appealed as much as handling the little silver discs
Exactly my feelings. On the occasion where there is something I desperately want available only via download and not released on CD then I can burn it to a CDR. Not ideal - but at least I can listen to it.
No, there’s no wi-fi on Melco’s. It was connected via ethernet to the router and then controlled via an app on our iPad which connected wirelessly to the router. So disconnecting the ethernet line from it meant losing the ability to use a control app. I initially used the Melco app but later used JPlay which sounded noticeably better by virtue of minimising network traffic and therefore noise.
