Unitiserve "Album Artist" view?

Hi everyone, I have recently acquired a second-hand Unitiserve and am experimenting with it alongside my Synology NAS running Asset. My preferred view on the Asset is “Album by Artist”, does anyone how I can get close to this view on the Unitiserve?

Just to clarify, I am still using the Synology NAS to store the files (FLAC) and using it as a “Scannable Network Share” on the Unitiserve. My rips were all done using dBpoweramp.

Out of interest, what do you hope to gain by using the UnitiServe?

As you will use Naim app , you will have the possibility of searching by artist, or album, or recent additions, or even genre.
Globally the same if you use the N-Serve app ( if the Unitserve is the player).

If you look at an artist, you go to an alphabetical list of all their albums. Does that not allow you to find the music you want?

Hi hungryhalibut
I love the aesthetics and the industrial engineering of the UnitiServe so will place it on display close to my SuperUniti and hide the Synology out of sight. Also, inserting a CD in the UnitiServe is so much more satisfying than using my rickety USB CD drive.

Hi frenchrooster
When I sit down to listen to music, I don’t have a particular artist or album in mind. I prefer to just browse my cover art and pick something that takes my fancy at the time.

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Hi ChrisSU
As replied above, I don’t have a particular artist in mind when I sit down to listen. I prefer to just browse my cover art and pick something that takes my fancy at the time.

Then you open the app, go to albums and browse by scrolling up and down. Pick one at your fancy.

It is not quite clear what you want beyond that???

In your opening thread you said you wanted to search using album by artist. People tell you how to do it but now you say you just want to search by album. Anyway, using the Naim app you can do both, so it’s all good.

I once had a Serve, and got rid of it because using a Nas sounded better, and metadata handling is far more flexible. I’d strongly advise to to set the serve to rip to FLAC. You can then set it to transcode to WAV on the fly, which will sound better on your SuperUniti. To do this, you use the ‘decode’ option in the desktop client.

The Unitiserve offers loads of options when it comes to catalogue, so yes, you can display an artist’s albums. The Naim app is quite helpful here. Using a tablet with a sufficiently large screen will also display the cover art nicely.
May I in return ask how you got the NAS with the “Scanable Network Shares” running? Mine show as offline.

Hi everybody, please note that I am not trying to first go to the artist and then scroll the albums for that artist. This is the reason I used quotation marks in original post, Asset calls this view “Album by Artist”. It lists all my albums but their cover art and groups together all albums by the same artist. For example, I see all of my Carole King albums one after the other, preceded by Bruce Springsteen and followed by Cat Stevens - all with cover art.
I hope this better explains what I am trying to achieve, but happy to send some screenshots if I can work out how to do this.

Hi Segalmatt, if you start a fresh thread I would be happy to share my limited knowledge. You should also get some more expert replies from others.

Hi hungryhalibut
I had already set the Unitiserve to rip to FLAC, from what I have read WAV is not nearly as portable between devices. Thanks for the advice about transcoding to WAV on playback, I hadn’t considered that.

You can find the setting in the desktop client. Now I’ve read your subsequent posts I understand exactly what you want to do, and I don’t believe it’s possible using the serve. Instead you have to search via artist and then choose from their albums.

Having owned a Serve, and now using Asset on a Qnap, I’m baffled as to why you would want to use a Serve. It’s so out of date and inflexible that it adds little value, other than ripping the odd CD. But if you like it for some strange reason…

Thanks hungryhalibut, I had feared that it wasn’t possible but perhaps someone else might come up with a solution that gets me close. As for liking the aesthetics of the Unitiserve, there is beauty in good design and for me, that makes up a significant part of the enjoyment; not strange at all.

If the Unitiserve won’t give you what you want, you can always use it for ripping and storage and run a different UPnP server on your NAS assuming you can find one that suits.
You need a backup in any case, so if you put all your music on the US and backups on the NAS you have it covered. A server on the NAS will find your music files on either drive.

Hi ChrisSU
As mentioned previously, I already have Asset running on my Synology NAS. I will leave that in place as a fallback option in case I can’t come to terms with the Unitiserve’s server limitations. The Synology NAS is great as a backup; not just a separate physical disk protecting against hardware failure, but also to backup to the cloud. My biggest concerns are the risks of fire, flood and theft which is neatly addressed by the cloud backup.

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