Melco n1a2 vs unitserve / linear ps

i wanted to say Melco and Nds connected together by ethernet cable. Nds connected to the melco switch ( player).

It needs to be on a good shelf. If in full glass-shelf Fraim it needs its large front feet just peeking over the front of the Fraim glass shelf, otherwise it will sound slow and over bass-heavy with timing impaired I found.
Experiment - try it on a glass shelf even it is is a temporary ‘ball-nutter’ home-build one.

DB.

I have following set up (in order) : Netgear router, 20 m Supra Ethernet, Cisco 2960, Melco Ethernet, Melco N1Z 6TB, Vertere Ethernet to NDS .

My Melco is on the top shelf on the Brown rack so no problem to connect Ethernet cables. I have FraimLite but I have the Melco and the Brains on Fraim glass shelves with Naim ball bearings.

I am very pleased with the music coming out from the loudspeakers. I really like my Melco.

it’s on finite elemente cerapucks, on a lovan rack. So the support is good.
I found that the direct mode was set up by default. So i set up the other mode ( pont in french, bridge ?): the sound is more alive and involving now, when connected to the player melco switch ( to nds).
So i will compare vs all connnected to cisco 2960. But for now i feel the differences will be minimal.
How about the files share? i have no nas, so i don’t have to set up that?

I’ve left the file-share Melco option to ‘on’. I did try turning it off and think for the same reasons I prefer it ‘on’ - it also allows me to manage the files on the Melco like a shared network drive from my Computer (Windows 7 OS) - not that I do a lot of that but useful for editing Album artworks and changing folder names (as I keep different recording versions in different folder names).

DB.

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have you compared nds to cisco 2960 vs nds to melco switch ?
i know the melco player connection is recommended, but the cisco 2960 is not a cheap switch…
I am now comparing both connecting, but with Direct Mode disabled.

No I have never put the Cisco between the Melco and the NDS but will try tomorrow. I just followed the recommendations from Melco which for me made sense. I should be surprised if it make a positive difference. But who knows.

Right now thunderstorms

yes, it’s the melco recommendation. But they consider common cheap switches vs their switch player port. The cisco is in another league.
I am curious to have your feedback.

Congrats on the Melco. Yeah, ran into the same issue on a my FraimLite so the Melco sits on the shelf. Having the ethernet ports in the middle is not ideal.

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If the switch is not doing anything more that connecting the Melco to the NDS then it seems a bit of a waste of investment to use only the two ports to connect two boxes.

If it is being used for more than two ports then it is handling more traffic than just between Melco and NDS and it is hard to see how that may improve things - it may but the direct connection should be better I’d have guessed - but if not then you will know.

I’d think you should at least try to use it for a while as Melco suggest, as that is the whole point of it. The cisco switch is still just a professional grade switch that happens to work well with HiFi from what has been heard, but was not designed for that role specifically.

DB.

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i disabled the direct mode , and the sound is more involving now.
I am listening on the suggested player mode and will try again vs all to cisco tomorrow.
Thanks DB.

the player mode is not on now, but the second mode. The second mode sounds better on connecting to melco switch ( player) and all cisco connected. I have just now to choose between melco switch or cisco switch. No rush.

I’m confused. It’s the last thing I’d buy. A fancy nas, all fur coat and no knickers.

today i am hearing something better than i was used to with my past unitserve / linear ps. The instruments are a bit nicer and the sound is cleaner. However not night and day.
The unitserve combo was already a bit better vs the uniticore.
The prat is restored too ( not using the direct mode).

how can you change the wrong cover albums that are shown on my ipad? i couldn’t transcode from wav to flac on my serve.
So i transferred all my downloads on an usb stick and downloaded on the melco. Around 75% cover albums are right. But not all…

There are two methods I’ve used that are supposed to work and one I find always works:

1. The easy way is to try replacing, if a WAV file, the ‘folder.jpg’ image in the album folder with the one you want it to show - I don’t find that works most of the time, for some reason, when using Twonky Server on Melco *which I prefer the SQ of) and Naim ND555 (and probably NDS), but worth a try as easiest.

2. I use a metadata editor - there are several free ones, but Melco came with a trial version of Songkong on it so I use that as it works great and you get to use it once on each album for free before getting the very cheap lifetime license if you want to use it more on the same album. Using this I’ve even, just for experiment, changed all the songs of an album to show a different picture from the album photo-shoot session, so you can do what you want - but generally I just get the main Album artwork right.

…there are other ways for sure that others better experienced than me can advise on.

DB.

i will try the songbook. They ask a number license…i must check what it is.

You can use it without license for free to edit any album once.
__SK%20MD1

Select ‘Edit Song Metadata’ - once one you select the abbum.
Then drop the Album artwok into the ‘dropbox’


And select all the tracks you want that picture to appear on.

Replace Artwork:

Then press ‘save’ at the bottom.
__SK%20MD5

DB.

i went on the songbook for melco support. A bit complicated i must confess. Will look it slowly later …but it’s not straightforward.
PC world…not for all. But i can enjoy my music, even with some wrong cover arts :smirk:

I never read the manual - I just played with the above until it did what I wanted.
I don’t use or require 99% of the functionality - just nice to have correct Artworks.

DB.