[smial1966]

Using Google Maps it's about 150 miles or 4 hours drive from Cardiff to Milton Keynes. If you have a Smartphone there are free navigational apps to guide your journey. Otherwise print out a route from Google Maps.

Greetings from The Emerald Isle.... I will be in Cardiff on said date, just wondering how far by car to Milton Keynes. Without Sat Nav!!

 

[smial1966]

Can we try and be a bit more eclectic in our musical suggestions and avoid the ubiquitous Eagles, Diana Krall, Norah Jones and all of the other overplayed sonic verbiage that permeates audio shows. If I hear Hotel California yet again I'm likely to spontaneously combust!

 

[Turrican2]

Please, some Steven Wilson or porcupine tree, always great test tracks!

 

[smial1966]

Now we're swinging from an inspired sonic tree - awful pun I know. Nevertheless a refreshing change from the audio test-track norm.

Please, some Steven Wilson or porcupine tree, always great test tracks!

 

[Amictus]

How late does the UK Head-Fi meet run to usually? I have to work Sunday mornings...

 

[Takeanidea]

10-6 with an earlier start for those who wish to set up would be the norm - the times may vary slightly between that but that allows for a huge amount of listening time of a lot of wonderful kit

 

[Amictus]

Thanks! Good to know...

 

[twst]

long time lurker but i'm up for coming to a meet,

subbed

 

[CraftyClown]

Anyone had any more thoughts about test tracks?

 

[glassmonkey]

Good idea @Middy. Whichever tracks we use would obviously need to be from the same master. @Glassmonkey's suggestion of the 2L tracks at least gets around that. Personally I'd like a bit of variety, including a rock track perhaps. Interesting suggestion, reckon we can probably get something sorted.

One thing that could be done, is setting up a music server for the event, then anyone with a laptop and a wifi connection could play the track list.
 
If we are looking for some more varied stuff, some tracks I like below, not all audiophile grade recordings:
 
Rage Against the Machine - Freedom (the whole album is very good technically, Freedom has lots of good stuff to listen to)
Boys Age - I am a jester (weird Japanese garble dream pop with excellent arrangements and indecent cover art)
Be'lakor - Abeyance/Remnants (audiophile metal, sounds excellent)
Lucy Dacus - Strange torpedo (I love her husky voice and witty lyrics)
Amber Rubarth - Hold On (the whole Sessions from the 17th Ward album is audiophile gold)
Kuniko - Pleiades Melanges (percussion in space, amazing recording)
Anamaniguchi - Prom Night (this has lots of overlapping sounds that can get muddled easily and the female vocal is very sweet naturally, so can verge into saccharine with wrong emphasis)
Animals as Leaders - Kascade (very technical speedy guitarwork)
Julia Holter - Everytime boots (spectacular album from last year, Have You in My Wilderness)
Why - Strawberries (bass, and sparkle)
Andy Shauf - The magician (had to include something off my favourite album of this year)
Bjork - Black lake (big soundstage and varied instrumentation with wild level variations)
 
Nobody posted for a while, so I thought I'd throw down some favourites with reasons--if I have any reason.

 

[Takeanidea]

Killing in the Name of - Rage Against the Machine
Spring from The Four Seasons Revisited - Max Richter
Homeless - from Graceland - Paul Simon
 

 

[Turrican2]

One thing that could be done, is setting up a music server for the event, then anyone with a laptop and a wifi connection could play the track list.

If we are looking for some more varied stuff, some tracks I like below, not all audiophile grade recordings:

Rage Against the Machine - Freedom (the whole album is very good technically, Freedom has lots of good stuff to listen to)
Boys Age - I am a jester (weird Japanese garble dream pop with excellent arrangements and indecent cover art)
Be'lakor - Abeyance/Remnants (audiophile metal, sounds excellent)
Lucy Dacus - Strange torpedo (I love her husky voice and witty lyrics)
Amber Rubarth - Hold On (the whole Sessions from the 17th Ward album is audiophile gold)
Kuniko - Pleiades Melanges (percussion in space, amazing recording)
Anamaniguchi - Prom Night (this has lots of overlapping sounds that can get muddled easily and the female vocal is very sweet naturally, so can verge into saccharine with wrong emphasis)
Animals as Leaders - Kascade (very technical speedy guitarwork)
Julia Holter - Everytime boots (spectacular album from last year, Have You in My Wilderness)
Why - Strawberries (bass, and sparkle)
Andy Shauf - The magician (had to include something off my favourite album of this year)
Bjork - Black lake (big soundstage and varied instrumentation with wild level variations)

Nobody posted for a while, so I thought I'd throw down some favourites with reasons--if I have any reason.

I can help set up the sever, got a spare router that can act as a NAS. I was thinking about also bringing my little synology ds416slim to feed my squeezebox. I could share that over the wifi too.

 

[CraftyClown]

Setting up a server is a lovely idea, but you may not need to go to that much trouble. All we need to do is set up a shared dropbox folder.

 

[Ancipital]

Setting up a server is a lovely idea, but you may not need to go to that much trouble. All we need to do is set up a shared dropbox folder.

 
I would be very careful relying on venue external networking to stream your audio. I've seen that bite people in the ass very badly (Audeze deciding to use venue Wifi and Tidal on a bunch of machines that were constantly stalling was the worst).
 
Also, last I checked, stuff in shared dropbox folders counted against the quota of everyone using it (which is a pretty clever wheeze on the part of Dropbox), rather than just the quota of the account that wrote the file; this may have changed, but it's still a bit of a gotcha.

 

[CraftyClown]

   
I would be very careful relying on venue external networking to stream your audio. I've seen that bite people in the ass very badly (Audeze deciding to use venue Wifi and Tidal on a bunch of machines that were constantly stalling was the worst).
 
Also, last I checked, stuff in shared dropbox folders counted against the quota of everyone using it (which is a pretty clever wheeze on the part of Dropbox), rather than just the quota of the account that wrote the file; this may have changed, but it's still a bit of a gotcha.

​A selection of 16 bit, 44.1khz files shouldn't take up much space at all. Besides, I imagine most people will want access to them well in advance of the meet, as we will want to become familiar with the tracks and how they sound on our existing gear, therefore they can copy the tracks from the shared folder and then disconnect from the dropbox share so they don't affect their quota.