mdmeinmd

Hello All! Have not posted for quite some time - have been a lurker for the past months as I try to decide what move to make when it comes to moving toward a computer-run system. My questions concern external hard drives - which are recommended and is a wall-wire or bus driven drive preferred? I am looking to purchase a late-2012 MacMini and would like to use an external hard drive for storage (1.5-2 TB). Would be connecting the external to the MacMini with either Firewire 800 or Thunderbolt cable, but would like the external to also have a USB 3.0 port for quicker data transfer between back-ups (or would a USB 2.0 be fine for these purposes?). From reading the forum and doing some on-line research outside the forum, I see that the Oyen MiniPro and the OWC Mercury Elite Pro (or Mercury On-The-Go Pro) are talked about quite a bit. Other externals I have seen include the Lacie USB 3.0/Thunderbolt, Lacie USB 3.0/Firewire800 models, and the Western Digital MyPassport Studio USB 2.0/Firewire800. Are any of these preferred over the others? Also, am I making a mistake by thinking of using a bus powered external instead of a wall-wire. From what I have read here the 3.5" form factor externals tend to be nosier than the 2.5" form factor externals, so thought using a bus model would be best. Finally, with regard to hard drive used for the external enclosure, is the Western Digital Green series of drives considered top notch in terms of being quiet? Are there better alternatives? Would appreciate any advice and thoughts. Thank you. Jay

Posting Audacity graphs (waveform, spectrogram, and frequency profile) for all 11 tracks from Talking Heads: 77. All tracks are more dynamically compressed than my compact disc version from the '80's. Half of the tracks have very little going on over ~22kHz. Hope some of you find it helpful if you are thinking about purchasing this album from HDtracks. Jay

Heard back from the good folks at HDtracks. They are willing to offer me a downloadable album for each of the Talking Heads albums that I am dissatisfied with (read: that were not as advertised). Was hoping that the reply would have information concerning the origin of the poor quality Talking Heads album downloads, but none was given. Will post plots for these three albums - "Talking Heads: 77", "More Songs About Buildings and Food", and "Speaking in Tongues" in the (suggested) appropriate forum in the coming days. That way others will know what they are about to buy. Jay

Ah, I did read the "True Stories" threads, but I was duped by the glorious sound of the "Remain In Light" album. Still have not heard back from the folks at HDtracks. I really don't want a credit - just want some 24bit/96kHz Talking Heads' albums and information concerning the source of their files. What is strange about these albums is that some tracks do appear to be 24bit/96kHz while others do not. I will use "Talking Heads: 77" as an example. Here are the Audacity graphs for track 1: All looks good (although the dynamics are a bit compressed). Tracks 2, 4, 5, and 9 also look good. Now let's look at track 3: Tracks 6, 7, 8, 10, and 11 look much like track 3. Makes one wonder where HDtracks is getting these files from and who is running quality control. Looks to me as if half the tracks are legit while the other half are not. I asked HDtracks for source information and legitimate 24bit/96kHz files for all tracks on this album. We shall see if they reply and, if they do, whether they credit me for the fraction of the album that is not "as advertised" or provide me with the information and legit files. Will post files for "More Songs About Buildings and Food" and "Speaking in Tongues" in the coming days. Jay

Hi all! New to CA, and have found the site a great resource. This is my first post so please bear with me. I recently purchased four Talking Heads albums from HDtracks - Talking Heads: 77, More Songs About Buildings and Food, Remain in Light, and Speaking in Tongues. Each of these albums is sold as audiophile 96kHz/24bit files. Upon listening to each of these albums, I found only Remain in Light to sound superior to my old compact disc versions (Note: my compact disc versions of these albums are not the 2005 remasters but the mid-80's issues.). I ran all album files in Audacity. A large number of these tracks appear to be not as advertised, i.e. not 96kHz/24bit. Furthermore, many of the files had compressed dynamics and exhibited clipping. Was not expecting such clipping or dynamic range problems - these are advertised as audiophile quality! Concerning the specifics of each album... Talking Heads: 77 - no clipping found, but dynamic range compressed on all files. Tracks 3, 6, 7, 8, 10, and 11 (more than half of the tracks) show no signal above ~22kHz. Track 11 waveform and spectrogram... More Songs About Buildings And Food - clipping found on all tracks except tracks 1, 8, 9, and 10 (of 11 total tracks). All tracks except 2, 3, and 5 show no signal above ~22kHz. Track 11 waveform (red lines indicate clipping) and spectrogram... Remain in Light - this album sounds fantastic! I have no problems with any of this album's music files - no clipping, great dynamic range, and all read as 24-bit/96kHz. Track 8 waveform and spectrogram... Speaking in Tongues - dynamic range is poor across entire album (9 total tracks), with tracks 1 and 4 having clipping. Tracks 1, 2, 3, and 4 have no signal above ~22kHz. Track 1 waveform (red lines indicate clipping) and spectrogram... An issue I have with all of these albums is the lack of information regarding the source. This has been mentioned in other threads numerous times, and it would be nice if HDtracks indicated where these "audiophile" quality files originate from. An extreme example of this is track 8 on the Remain in Light album. The HDtracks version is 7+ minutes long whereas all other versions I have found are ~ 6 minutes in length. Would be nice where this version came from. I have asked HDtracks to address my concerns in one of three ways: (1) provide me information concerning the origin of the high resolution files for these three albums - not just a simple assurance - so that I can be sure they are in fact the 24-bit/96kHz they are listed as being; (2) provide me with true audiophile quality versions of these albums; (3) credit my account for the cost of these three albums (or some fraction of the cost). I have yet to hear back. Jay