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pc vs mac, eac vs itunes

Multi part question: (1) Thinking of going to a musicserver rather than a wall full of cds. I have not been a mac user and would lean toward a pc based system. However, I have not completely closed off the mac option. Main concern is not degrading or changing the data. I have heard that EAC is the best option to insure this and I am wondering if the mac options will ensure the same integrity. I am not concerned with cost of external drives, my plan is to store on a number of external drives and make backups to a spare set of external drives. Looking for feedback on comparison of EAC with a mac option (or is it possible to use EAC with a mac?). (2) Goal is to be able to access everything from sitting on the couch. Any suggestions - both pc and mac based - would be appreciated.
musicnoise

Showing 5 responses by musicnoise

musicnoise OP
377 posts
 
Sufentanil: I plan on dedicating the hardware to the music system, i.e., no other uses but for music.
musicnoise OP
377 posts
 
How much memory required per CD (or per 1000 CDs if that is easier) to store in WAV or AIFF? How much to store in a lossless compressed format?
musicnoise OP
377 posts
 
Sufentanil: You raise an important issue as to going with a RAID. As between RAID and concantenating individual drives (JBOD) RAID is probably a better idea. My understanding is that RAID or JBOD has the primary advantage of allowing the system to see one large partition rather than a number of different partitions. Say that one had, for eg. three external 1 terabyte drives (with the artists separated alphabetically i.e. A-H drive J, I-P drive K and Q-Z drive L) and was willing to simply look at the respective drive to grab the music, would the only advantage of having the single large partition be that you didn't have switch between drives, or am I missing something more fundamental here - such as software limitations in accessing the music held on separate partitions.
musicnoise OP
377 posts
 
Sufentanil: As my music collection is too large for one 1TB drive I am considering using two such drives and saving copies of those two drives to two external 1TB drives as backup. Is there any reason that this is not feasible? Will playback software be able to automatically search across both drives to search for an item with or without having to tell the software which drive to look at? In other words, what do I gain or lose by having two drives - two partitions as opposed to one large partition?
musicnoise OP
377 posts
 
Al: You hit the nail on the head as to one of my concerns. The more common and generic an item the better the chance of being able to replace it when it fails. If I can avoid the more specialized system parts and still accomplish the same end result without giving up too much along the way, that would be my route.
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