Hi, I’ve recently bought a UnitiStar to replace my NAC272/180/UnitiserveHDD and want to make sure I don’t mess up my existing MusicStore and downloads.
First question is, are there any detailed instructions from Naim on how to use the UnitiStar with NAS and/or existing libraries on a MusicStore? The UnitiServe instructions have loads of detail on this, but for the UnitiStar I can only find the quickstart guide and the interactive guide online, both of which are pretty superficial. If anyone can point me to something more detailed on using the UnitiStar that may answer the following questions for me.
The actual questions I’m hoping to answer are:
Is it correct that the UnitiStar can only rip to a MusicStore that is “local” - meaning a connected USB drive or SD card?
I don’t plan to keep my UnitiServe as well as the UnitiStar, so what is the best way to migrate that library to a local MusicStore? Is it as simple as copying the contents over the network once the local MusicStore has been defined, or is it more complicated (I recall that MusicStores don’t like content that hasn’t been ripped directly to them - or is that a misunderstanding)?
Does the UnitiStar have an automated backup function like the UnitiServe?
If there is no backup function, any suggestions as to how best to manage this (backing up to a NAS)?
Hi, my suggestion would be to keep it simple, and copy the Unitiserve music folders to either a USB hard drive or a NAS, preferably the latter if it’s a large library.
I would first transcode your files to FLAC on the US before you part with it if you have WAVs. This will ensure future compatibility and make the data transfer process a bit quicker.
The UnitiStar has much more limited ripping/serving flexibility than the Unitiserve, which is itself more capable than the current UnitiCore that replaced it.
I suggest hanging on to the Unitiserve until you are quite sure that the UnitiStar is doing what you want, especially as UnitiServes aren’t worth much these days.
Thanks David. Interesting to hear that the UnitiServe is more capable than the newer UnitiCore. Do you mean that there are fewer functions and options, rather than anything to do with sound quality?
Presumably there wouldn’t be any difference in the quality of ripped file you get between the UnitiServe and the UnitiStar? (or UnitiCore).
Rips from the Star will be fine. It’s the functionality of the Core (and Star) that is strangely likited compared to its predecessor, and I think that is what David is referring to.
Do you have a backup running on your Unitiserve? If so you must already have a NAS, in which case you can just run a UPnP server on it if you’re not going to keep the US.
The sound quality of all of them is near enough the same. But the Core doesn’t have transcode functions that the Unitiserve has and its metadata editing is somewhat limited, which is mainly a problem for classical music. The Star has a reduced subset of Core capabilities and there are various ways that what you can do with Star rips is limited compared with the Core.
If you are going to lose the Unitiserve, then you do at least need to make sure that the rips it made are in flac before it goes as this will be your last chance to make that happen, which has big implications for the portability of your rips absent the Unitiserve.
Yes, I already have a NAS with the backup to the UnitiServe. Although it looks like it has only backed up the WAV folder, not the FLAC one so I’ll need to check everything is actually copied over.
As no-one has mentioned it I take it that the UnitiStar doesn’t have an automated backup function like the UnitiServe. In the absence of the automated back-up, do people just do this manually or are there clever ways to get this done automatically?
The Unitiserve will save your CD rips as either WAV or FLAC depending on how you have it set, not both. What the backup won’t include is the downloads folder, you need to put a separate backup in place for that.