antubaro

I do like the editorial. The industry works for us not the reverse. It is Sunday afternoon, I preparing the slides for a symposium in Florence next October while listening to a Fagiolini HiRes file of Monteverdi's The Other Vespers on Devialet Pro 440 monos fed by a dedicated MacBook Pro running Roon connected to a pair of Wilson Duette. This is what music is for me, my audio equipment is just a way to make me connect best to the music I love. Background music? Yes, I am a busy academic surgeon and I rarely have time to listen with nothing else to write or read. It is neither right or wrong, it is just my way! Nice work Chris, keep going! Andrea

I have iTUNES running on a dedicated Macbook Pro, music files are stores on a 2 TB hardisk connected via ethernet, another HD connected via firewire works as a backup. The disk connected via ethernet is very quiet and it is used to play music (the one connected via firewire is more noisy). Although the NAS disk is set as the address for the music library, iTUNES often loses the link and it goes back to a default address that is "music" on the Powerbook hard disk. Does anyone knows why and how to fix it?

In the absence of a USB input I suggest you try the Bricasti using the VESTA firewire to SPDIF interface from WEISS that is still the best interface if you are MAC based! Andrea, Rome

One of the issues that is rarely discussed when talking about NAS in audio is their noise and their cooling system.<br /> What is the noise of Drobo's NAS?<br /> I have a number of LaCie NAS, some are terribly noise (you can here the nosie from another room), others are quite silent.<br /> Did you measured the Drobo noise?<br /> Andrea Tubaro

Hard disk noise is the results of different factors. To make a long story short, the hard disk noise and the cooling system play a major role. Unfortunately, portable HD without coling are subject to crashes. NAS systems guarantee better data security using RAID and keep better control of HD temperatures but the cooling systems are responsible for most of the noise. NAS systems are professional storage systems and do not care about making noise but rather about data security. There are possible ways out. One is to move the NAS system far away from your listening room (e.g. in another room) or to use a noisy but secure NAS system to maintain your files and a quiter, less secure sytem to play the files. Unfortunately, high definition files (24 bit/192 KHz) take up to 4 Gigabyte compared to 700 something MB of a CD. The issue of noisy HD is still open and the problem still stands. With best wishes, Andrea

Thanks you Chris! Never thought about it but I will experiment and get back in the forum with my experience. The Auralex system looks fine to me! Although I am just a surgeon, I think the point is to measure the frequency at which the system resonates and look for the proper insulation system. I will ask some friends working in the world of physics to understand how to measure the resonance frequency. Best regards, Andrea

One of the real issues in liquid music is the noise of storage disks, a most neglected issue on the industry websites. Noise data are available for one LaCie storage system but what about the rest? The more we go into professional gear the more these systems are noisy because of the cooling systems. I think we need to identify the quite systems (

I am finally getting happy with my Transrotor Z1 + Decade Cube from Lehmann Audio, Meridien CD transport and dedicated MacBook Pro with Amarra/iTunes + VESTA interface from Weiss + Audio research DAC7 + Threshold T2 + Threhsold T50 + Wilson audio Duette .. but the hard disk is still noisy. Whatever I tried was noisy and even 24 decibels are too much while music is not flowing. I manged to get the hard disk (firewire interface) in a different room that opens into my music room: better but not ideal yet. What is the frequency of a hard disk noise? I was about to download a spectrum analyzer and to the measurement myself but I wonder if anyone already did this kind of measurment. Once I know the frequency I can by the appropriate insulation panels. Thanks, Andrea Tubaro, Rome, Italy

There are CDs with 24 bits files such as XRCD from JVC, how can I rip these files on a Mac? If I use iTunes it will rip files with 16 wordlength. Thanks! Andrea Tubaro, Rome, Italy

Same problem from this side of the ocean! I installed Amarra on my PowerBook Pro dedicated as a music server but the software keeps closing on its own (a first windows opens [Amarra Music Software] than the vertical window of the software open for a fraction of a second and I get a message saying that the software has closed itself unexpectedly). It is not a problem of this particular laptop as it does the same on my other MacBook Pro. Has anyone got the same problem? Thanks! (not to Sonic Studio!) Andrea Tubaro Rome

A question to those saying that quality of USB cables does not matter. If quality of the cable does not matter for digital signal, for example USB cable, why do we spend money on high quality SPDIF cables that transfer a digital signal (plus the word clock) from the CD transporter to the DAC? A simple question with a not necessarily simple answer. Andrea PS: please do not use too much slang in your posts otherwise life gets difficult for us Europeans

I have always been using iTUNES with error correction to rip my CDs and transfer the file on a Quadra LACIE 2T disk array running in RAID 1 but I wonder whether other softwares like MAC (highly recommended for file format conversion) or Perfect Copy (running on Windows) are any better and are worth the effort (particularly for Perfect Copy). What is everybody else experience? Andrea

I use a USB cable from Revelation Audio Labs to connect a Macbook Pro to my AR DAC7, the cable is a bit expensive but in line with the price of any decent audio cable. The improvement over a standard USB cable is impressive in my system (Threshold T2, Threshold T50, Wilson Audio Duette, BCD signal cables and Crystalspeak reference cables). Andrea

The point is well taken. The native resolution of CD is 16/44.1 and iTUNES should be set accordingly, right? In this very confused world of computer audio (I started playing around with a Squeezebox in 2006) somebody wrote that is better to set word length at 24 rather than 16. I will do some blind tests and let you know. There's a lot of confusion out there and the specialised press is even more cofused! I also listen to vinyl records but do people know that many 180 grams vinyls are made from digital masters? High resolution audio files soumd great in my system. Congratulations for a great web site and Happy Christmas! Andrea

I have a Macbook Pro connected to a Audio Research DAC 7 through a USB cable (Revelation Audio) to play (using iTUNES) standard 16 bit 48 kHz files ripped from CDs uncompressed and a Toslink cable (van den Hul) to play 24 bit, 96 kHz files downloaded in FLAC format from sites likewise Linn Records. I have set MIDI options to USB output, 24 bits/48 kHz. Does MIDI setting affect the Toslink optical output? Andrea