My Music Server! - Page 5

David, incredible work.  I'm sure it's very enjoyable when you want to kick back and "explore".  The 'as sideman' category, ingenious.  I've just ordered an Apple Remote, I'd actually forgotten about Front Row before reading this thread.  Now I can finally get away from my desk!  I'll eventually buy a cheap used ipod touch to use as a remote as I really feel staring at a screen takes away from the listening experience.  How did you get the 'as sideman' category to work exactly?  Is it a smart playlist or manually done?

^ I was afraid of that.  = ]

David, can I ask why you don't use one of the 'audiophile' players for Mac?  (Amarra, PM, etc.)  As far as I know they are all incompatible with Front Row.  = /

VERY impressive! I WANT! lol

I spend a lot of time organizing my music (I feel it's very important for listening to music...especially if you have a lot of albums), but I'm nowhere near your level of customization. Very cool!

Quote:

Originally Posted by DavidMahler 

I guess I'm not sure what the point of those are.  There are some bugs in FR but I can use other FR like programs like Plex and still use my navigation system.  I get bit perfect playback from the Mac using this so I don't see at all how another program would enhance anything at all.  The DAC and transport would be the same, so maybe I'm not sure what the point of those options are except for someone who doesn't want to make a system like this. 

 

Is there something I'm missing? I'd be curious to know if I am.  I wish FR was a little more audiophile friendly in terms offering a meter and some minor features like that, but in terms of it sounding any different, can it?

I recently demo'ed the new Fidelia and found iTunes/FR to be, just by a hair, smoother and warmer than Fidelia.  I prefer iTunes/FR.  The difference most definitely isn't worth losing the convenience of FR as a UI.

But since you have your setup dialed in so perfectly to your liking, I don't see any reason to switch.  

Side-note: Enjoying the new Apple remote.

This is the greatest and meticulous way someone has ever done his music library. To do it for 6500 songs (Telugu, Hindi and English), it took six months of my time. Doing it for 12,000 CDs, I bow to thee!!

Outstanding!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

I am inspired

David, you must be single.  My wife thinks I spend too much time fiddling with my music as it is and I don't have anything as elaborate as you do.  I don't have much need for the organization you have.  I usually shuffle by album though my library (3500 CDs).  I do which I had more information on sidemen. 

I'm curious about how you listen to classical music.  Do you listen to albums or just to a single piece from a playlist?  If single pieces, how do you listen to short pieces like Chopin waltzes?

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigshot 

In my Classical library, I join tracks into complete pieces as a rip. All the movements of a symphony get joined into one piece. If it's a series of short pieces, like Chopin Mazurkas, I rip them all together. If I ever need to find a specific Mazurka, I have my CDs. Shuffle ability is most important to me. I would rip my hair out if shuffle just pulled up the second movement of a symphony.

I don't want to be limited to just shuffling by album and have to play through a whole CD before getting to the next one. I want overtures and shorter pieces Used to fill out the length of a CD to stand alone.

I've waffled back and forth on this.  In the days before iPods shuffled by album, or didn't do gapless playback, I ripped everything as one track.  A CD like Karajan's Mahher's 9th is horrible without gapless playback with it's 20 or 30 tracks.  Since iPods have done shuffle by album and gapless playback, I've ripped albums tracks as is, but I sometimes modify album names to isolate a piece or to make a piece that spans disks play as one.  A good example of this is the Rosalyn Tureck II from the Great Pianists of the 20th Century set.  For most of those CDs, I tag the album with a disc 1 and disc 2.  For Tureck's, the album includes the Goldberg Variations that overflows the first disc and includes the first six tracks of the 2nd disc.  I've coded all of those tracks as one album, and the rest of disc 2, which includes the French Overture, Italian Concerto, and 4 Duets, as a second album.

I almost always play with shuffle by album with either iTunes or my iPod, which contains around 60% of my library.

Quote:

Originally Posted by DavidMahler 

Hahahaha, to the first comment. 

 

I'm not married but I'm not single and my girlfriend thinks I'm "crazy", but moreso for my headphone expenses and collection rather than my music server. 

 

 

My wife just doesn't like the time I spend tagging my music.  To her the crazy is why someone so into music would marry someone who's deaf.

Very impressive!
It's amazing how much time you've invested in your server ... I have a modest collection around 1.5TB now and organizing is painful to say the least. Hardly get a chance to listen to any of the newer stuff after the organizing - and I don't even bother with the album art nor the tagging.

I was so impressed with this thread, I started doing a better job organizing my music collection using itune but my year old ASUS was not up to it .

 Good news: most have been backed up into external drive. 

Thanks again, for inspiring me