From USB HDD to NAS cutting out the middleman (PC)

[CaptainCapricorn]

I listen to music pretty much all day in my home office. For a few years this has been achieved by ripping CDs to FLAC stored on USB attached HDD via my laptop. I use Foobar2000 for ripping and playback. I also have a second terabyte USB attached HDD which I use for backup.

The audio signal was sent via USB to a Cambridge Audio DACMagic thence onto a NAD C326BEE.

This was working well for years until, recently, I started getting audio stuttering as if something was interrupting the processing of the music. I moved from a USB connection to the DAC to HDMI-converted-to-SPDIF without much improvement. I spent a while trying to diagnose the problem on the laptop (a high end i7 with far more RAM and processor power than I will ever need), I think it's aproblem with way Windows v8 works. Anyway, I'm not interested in diagnosing the PC problems any longer, I want to be able to use my laptop for whatever I want to use it for without affecting the sound quality of my music.

So, the time has come to take the laptop out of the 'path'.

While I am absolutely not a technophobe this area is completely new to me.

I'm pretty sure what I want is a NAS (especially as I would like to, eventually, access the same music store from my house's main Audiolab based sound system).

So, I thought I'd start off (relatively) inexpensively in case I make any 'rickets' along the way 🙂

OK - I'm getting to the point now - woohoo !

I am thinking of buying a QNAP TS-212P with a WD 3TB Red drive and transferring all my FLAC files to that. Can I then connect that directly to my DACMagic - which has USB and SPDIF inputs (it's quite old) ?

Or do I need a streamer of some kind ? The QED uPlay Stream looks like good value for money ?

Any other suggestons for a 'starter' setup, just so I can get used to the technology.

Literature on these NAS's all seem to reference Apple or Android devices for controlling the file system and/or organising music on the NAS. I don't have easy access to such a device (I don't actually like or have need of mobile phones - sorry, but there it is) but I have laptops coimg out of my ears 🙂 I know I will be able to access the files on the NAS from my laptop (it will appear as a mappable drive, right ?) but how do I control what music is being sent to the DAC or Streaming device ?

I'm guessing that's why I need the streamer to control the music plucked from the NAS and sent to the DAC/Amplifier ?

You can tell when my understanding runs out by the level of naivety in the above questions 🙂

Thanks for any help you may be able to provide.

Cheers

 

[Anderson]

I don't have any experience with setting up NAS but what I would suggest is that you get to the bottom of the stuttering before you spend any money. You could have a problem with your laptop, external drive or your home network. Best to figure out what the problem is now than spend a couple hundred on a NAS only to discover something is wrong with your router.

 

[CaptainCapricorn]

The problem is specific to the laptop I am using to play music via Foobar2000. The same problem does not occur when I use different laptops to play music and the same problem occurs (on the same laptop)with JRiver and MediaMonkey - so there is no problem in any other component. I have spent hours trying to work out what is wrong with my laptop and got nowhere. Life is too short and the laptop continues to work well for all other applications (I mainly use it for Python development and statistical physics modelling).

I could just use a different laptop to play music and I have considered just buying a cheap laptop to use stand alone for playing music. That would be a really cheap solution but it doesn't look to the future.

I have been wanting to make my digital music storage available to my main sound system which, currently, only has turntable and CD sources but makes an awesome sound (Audiolab 8000 CD, pre, power triwired into Ruark Crusader II floorstanders).

So, I actually want to go down the NAS route (or similar). Eventually I will want to buy high(er) end componets but I just need some advice to get started before shelling out the really big bucks.

I can get the QNAP NAS, 3TB drive and the QED uPlay Stream for abut £250. I'm OK with that, but is that what I want or am I misunderstanding something somewhere ? How do I control playback of music using that setup ?

Cheers

 

[cheeseboy]

might be better off looking at a synology that you can plug directly in to your dacmagic and use the playback software directly on the synology.

 

[Craig M.]

might be better off looking at a synology that you can plug directly in to your dacmagic and use the playback software directly on the synology.

+1

I use a Synology NAS, using the Synology Audio Station software you can send audio via usb to a suitable dac, or via your network to laptops/pc's/phones/tablets, you can also use Airplay from it and send audio to an Airport Express and use the Airport Express to either give you an analogue out or optical into a suitable dac. I find the remote app for a smart phone/tablet the best way to control it but it can also be controlled via a web browser on your laptop. It can also be set up to stream audio/video to remote locations via the internet, so you could access your content when away on holiday, etc. Very easy to set up and more or less silent in use.

 

[CaptainCapricorn]

Thanks for the advice people.

To get specific for a minute, I should go for ...

Synology DS214PLAY (or ?) with a 3TB WD Red HDD (at least to begin with, I will add another once I've sussed what I am doing). And that is all I need to begin with. This NAS device will have a USB-out port from which I can connect it directly to my DACmagic (which has USB-in). I will be able to run sowftware on my laptop (via browser) with which I can control what it is I am playing through the DAC.

If I've got that correct then I think I'm all set 🙂

Cheers

 

[cheeseboy]

Thanks for the advice people.

To get specific for a minute, I should go for ...

Synology DS214PLAY (or ?) with a 3TB WD Red HDD (at least to begin with, I will add another once I've sussed what I am doing). And that is all I need to begin with. This NAS device will have a USB-out port from which I can connect it directly to my DACmagic (which has USB-in). I will be able to run sowftware on my laptop (via browser) with which I can control what it is I am playing through the DAC.

If I've got that correct then I think I'm all set 🙂

Cheers

like all things, in theory, yep that's it 🙂