Hi
I want to put my cd collection onto a nas drive , never used one however my second issue is my laptop has no cd slot , what would be the easiest way to accomplish this and have any of you had to it this way ?
you can get a USB external CD drive for around Ā£20 from various places, eg Amazon
dBPoweramp to do the ripping - Ā£29.
MP3Tag to correct any metadata issues (you can also correct metadata in dBPoweramp, before ripping) - free
Synology or QNAP NAS wired to your router by Cat5e ethernet cable. - Ā£300 for a dual bay caddy + Ā£100 per Western Digital Red 4TB HDD.
@suzywong thanks sounds easy enough
So am I right in thinking Ethernet to nas and keep steamer on WiFi or both on Ethernet
my preference is both on ethernet. OTOH, one of my (Raspberry Pi based) streamers is via Wifi; the other three are wired. All work fine.
regarding the NAS, QNAP and Synology are the weapons of choice, both are good. FWIW, I use Synology. I suggested a dual bay caddy as being more flexible (see below) but a single bay Syn caddy can got for roughly half the cost of the dual. Western Digital Red drives are claimed to be āoptimisedā for NAS/bulk storage - I use them with no problems. 4TB will keep you going for some time!
Some thoughts on Backing Up your hard-earned (ripped) data.
Your primary backup will be the CDs youāve just ripped, and which are now safely stored in your loft, garage, shed etc.
Another option is to fit a second HDD into your dual bay caddy and āmirrorā them. This will help if one HDD dies, but if the caddy blows up then you may lose both.
An arguably better solution is two single bay NASs and set up a regular backup regime from one to the other. More robust, but then your house might burn down. However I think youād have bigger issues than worrying about your CD collection.
Yet another option is offsite backup to the cloud. Possibly the best of the lot, that is, if you trust 'em to look after your data!
Or any combination of the above. FWIW, both my NASs have twin drives mirrored.
Another off-site option is to get an external HDD drive, and copy (Sync) all your Music (and photos) to it each month, and leave the drive at someone elseās house, eā¦g Mums/Childrenās/Work
As long as you do not use port forwarding or enable uPNP on your router then a QNAP or Synology NAS will be fine and give you flexible backup options. In my case, an automatic weekly backup (using the built in QNAP backup app) of my shares (including a dedicated music one) to Google Drive.
Thank guys Iāve just bought a synology with dual 3tbās
New venture starts
Synology a couple of HDDs, Asset and dbpoweramp is all you need.
No fancy Melco or Core required.
Thatās exactly the plan
So how does dbpoweramp work or do I get perfect tunes?
I have my music on Synology DS218Play
It runs Minimserver and Bubbleupnp
I also have a Zen Mini MK3
While the Zen Mini has no RAID you can stick a USB drive to backup.
If I didnāt need to use bubble to feed my 272 with Qobuz, then I would just get the zen mini as it does everything.
For ripping I suggest dBPowerAmp (Ā£29). It will automatically acquire metadata from tāinternet, and if any corrections are needed then you can fix most within dBPowerAmp before ripping. Another useful program is MP3Tag (free/donationware), for fixing post-rip metadata issues.
I donāt have Perfect Tunes.
I have Perfect Tunes, but donāt use it these days.
All thatās needed for ripping is dBpoweramp
Itās good for editing metadata as well although I prefer Mp3Tag (open source)
Just to say, MP3Tag isnāt free anymore on MACās, but is available through its app store. Still well worth the cost though
Reference 17 I see it now thank you all
Iām looking at the trial version of Perfect Tunes at the moment, and running it to check out some rips. Not sure that itās worth the normal price of Ā£26, but they are offering a 50% discount.
Ah-ha, maybe Apple & their licencing stuff (again)
The Windows is still āopen sourceā with hints of donations, which I do, but I donāt donate each & every time an update link get pinged up.
I wasnāt sure if that was the ripping program it looks like an extra so Iāll go with the reference r17 and try that
Mike, mp3tag is āfree to useā on Windows (for the time being, at least) but it is not āopen sourceā as the author does not make the source code public and freely modifiable. For now, the Windows version is supported by voluntary donations.
In any case, itās a great tool and my go-to tag editor, especially for making bulk changes to large numbers of files.