iPods, music on computers - where to begin!

[admin_exported]

Due to a change in personal circumstances I am having to put my CD collection onto my computer - I plan to run iTunes (as even I can use it) from an external 1TB hard drive from a macbook pro. I will also need a decent sized player for car, work and away from home use - plan was to use apple lossless and an iPod 160GB but having read stuff on the forum I am now more confused than ever!! I want the best possible quality as I will be running this through my HiFi via digital optical from the macbook. I would love any recommends or hints - just remember I am not a techno whizz and the collection is around 1200 CDs! Charlie

 

[Anonymous]

Cheers for the hints fr0g!

I do have my HD - currently RAID 0 but it is actually 2 500GB so I can mirror, but I was considering backing up separately as well. Error correction is already ticked! The DAC sounds like a great add on and not something I had considered - does adding another box not lose something or is it all good?

I like the idea of putting everything on the iPod as AAC but have not figured out if I can put my lossless/WAV stuff onto the pod and convert it without having to have 2 copies in iTunes - any one with any ideas to manage it?

 

[Anonymous]

Hey frog.....what's so good about Helium Music Manager in your opinion? I'm looking for an iTunes replacement which I hate with a passion. Have contemplated writing my own which I probably will get round to at some point (watching Dexter just takes up too much of my time at the moment) so want something that isn't such horendous bloatware like iTunes......

 

[Anonymous]

I use Media Monkey http://www.mediamonkey.com/.

I strongly suggest you have a look. It is a complete replacement for iTunes, but it does so much more. I got it originally to batch edit my ID3 tags, but soon realised how powerful it is. The basic program is free or for a few beans you get the Gold version. It is fully customisable with user written scripts (very basic and easy to do) with which you can get it to do pretty much any music file related task you can think of.

There is an extremely active and extensive user forum with scripts listed for an ever growing number of tasks that you can just download and install into the program. I really can't recommend it enough.

 

[Anonymous]

If you can stretch to a Sonos set up you have the easy to use, hi quality solution.

I have a 1Tb NAS in a RAID 5 config which has my iTunes stored in Apple Lossless (ALE). For portability a 160Gb iPod. No need to convert.

The Sonus takes your NAS ALE and distributes them to wherever you have a zone. You can link a Sonos ZP80 via optical cable to your hifi. QED as my maths teacher used to say..

 

[professorhat]

[quote user="fr0g"]I wouldn;t fit half my CD collection on a 160GB iPod with Apple(DRM enabled) lossless[/quote]

Please, this post is just a question, not an insult! Do you need half of your CD collection on your iPod? I'm just interested, as I can't understand why (unless it's a small collection). I like having only a small subset of my music on my iPod - say, maybe 600-900 songs on my iTouch (not everything needs to be in 320kbs format!) leaving plenty of space for video. This way, when I plug it back in and it syncs again, I get a load of different music - it keeps things fresh! I just find it hard to see where you would need more than 600 (or even 900!) tracks of music within a period of a few weeks... (unless you were a DJ that used your iPod for this). Surely, even if you hear them all and it starts again, it must have been a while since you heard the first track?

 

[John Duncan]

What's so wrong with iTunes? Does what it says on the tin, track searching is instant, not all that bloaty as far as I can tell (compared to WMP anyway), job done. And you need it if you're running an iPod anyway (unless you go around the houses).

 

[Anonymous]

I have an iPod and I've never been near iTunes. As I said in my earlier post Media Monkey wipes the floor with iTunes, is free, half the size and infinitely more powerful. You can use it to sync to any MP3 player you have - I have a 30G Creative Zen, a 60G iPod and a 2G Sony player and they all sync seamlessly. It works as a media player and I use it to service my music library of 12,000 mp3s, including batch ID3 tag editing and renaming. You can rip and burn cds with it too. I really can't imagine using any other music software.

 

[professorhat]

[quote user="fr0g"]Apologies if it came across as insulting...[/quote]

No, no - didn't mean you were being insulting, was just phrasing my question so it didn't seem I was... if that makes sense?!

Anyway, I see what you mean about having a large drive, might as well get all your music on there. I've always been a Shuffle man myself (prefer small size to capacity) until I got given a Touch. I love it, but now I wish it had more space to get videos on there... yes I was given the 16Gb version just weeks before the 32Gb version came out - Grrr!!!