Kevin

Thanks for joining the thread Notung. My comment was based on your video which on a second viewing makes it clear that I should be able to find most anything in a personal music library. What I was wondering was how the search is implemented - can I type in search criteria or would I need to refine a layer at a time as seems to be the case. For instance if I wished to torture my work colleagues with the Aria of all twelve of my copies of the Goldbergs would I need to find each album then individually put the track into a playlist or can the fields be utilised to achieve this. Another example would be to compare the Kyrie of the Latin Mass over time and potentially over the life of a composer. Potentially develop a playlist of the Kyrie from various Requiem? I will still be trying your software as it looks to be far and away the best thing for classical. I presume that I could attach metadata to a downloaded file manually? Simply using your fields to make the process consistent? I am excited by all this. You have probably given me the excuse to finally begin setting up a music server. Kevin P.S. bad luck on having problems with your server over the weekend. I hope the coming week treats you more kindly PPS Sonata site is up - questions answered.

Hi Kal, The site is still down - there is a Youtube video briefly demonstrating the interface. I would need to download the 30 day trial to really comment - would also need to purchase a windows machine as we are a Mac household. The promoted ability to locate music with the metadata is the biggest attraction. The video does not show anything complex being done but it would seem that a search could be refined to find a particular recording and then potentially a playlist created of say first movements of American orchestras playing Coplands third. Realistically I can't see my way clear to have a play with this for a month or so - hopefully there will be a bit of opinion around by then. Kevin

Hi Chris, I think this may be the product that would let me get into the world of music servers and computer audio. Nineteen fields of metatdata should mean that I can locate a specific piece, performer, year etc rather than rely on my memory of what is where in a collection of more than 2500 classical cds. There is a fair bit of hires classical music available as downloads - it would be useful to see how Sonata deals with them. Compilation albums also would be interesting to see how the information is dealt with as the same level of data is required for each of the performances. The Sonata server is down at the moment. I discovered the site last night and have had a fairly good look - will be very interested in your expert's review. Kevin

CG - I do not wish to hijack this thread but could you possibly point me to some of the information regarding brain pattern differences and audio perception. I have long suspected this may be the case. Kevin

Thankyou markr, souptin and Eloise. I have found it difficult "cutting to the chase" with computer audio particularly with respect to sound quality. I did read through all the Nova pages regarding their memory player but all I could think was "Isn't this a computer?" Also part of my problem is that I am out the loony end in regards to audio with respect to sound quality. I simply have no practical way of comparing approaches to the issue of combining the practicalities of a server and sound quality and am therefore reliant on forums to gather information. Once again thankyou for your replies. Kevin

Hi - new to the site but long term interest in high quality music at home. I have been playing with audio systems for the last 25 years and have recently become interested in computer based audio mainly due to the functionality of a server. I have been perusing opinion on the internet, have read most of this site and am beginning to develop ideas on what should give me a good sound. I would have to say I am a bit of an idiot with computers and I do not really know if I am even asking the right question. Basically we would look to set up a system with a dedicated Mac to a Minerva DAC. I have seen it suggested many times to utilise the Mac as a head unit and have all the music stored on offboard drives. I can understand the principle of the cpu doing the minimum possible but do not understand the disadvantage of utilising music files on the Mac as well as an offboard drive. Which brings me to the second idiot question. Does the music file load entirely into RAM in the head unit and then get played from there? If someone can point me on to a primer regarding data flow in a music server setup I would be most grateful . Kevin