jtpolk

Thanks for your reply. Sharing how you handle this gave me some good tips. Being an old fuddy-duddy programmer, I am in the process of laying out my documentation on how to handle as many variations as I have music sources and some that I don't have. The baseline is that now I am replacing the album release date into the iTunes Year field, and moving the remaster or hi-res download release information down to the first item in the comments. That is firm, and I have done it with my latest purchases (Stevie Wonder's Talking Book, Rod Stewart's Every Picture Tells a Story and especially three Spyro Grya albums released in 1979-1980, but ripped from 1994 CDs). Luckily, I do not have that many albums to manage, as I have only been purchasing music actively for the past couple of years. Again, thanks for your insights, they have helped me. enjoy!

How do you handle, in the metadata, in iTunes in particular, releases where the album was released in the 1950's or 1970's, yet the date in the metadata is set for 2010 or 2012. Compilations are another matter, and the release date of 2005 of an album for an artist's work spanning decades is acceptable. This was brought into sharp relief when I downloaded Rod Stewart's Every Picture Tells a Story, released in 1971, but has a date reflecting it's remastering, 2012. Other examples... The Eagles, Hotel California, 2011 Jackson Brown's Running on Empty, 2005, McCartney's Band on the Run, 2010 Digital Remasters all, even though the albums were released in 1977 (Hotel California and Running on Empty) and 1973 (Band on the Run). Then it gets ridiculous with two Blue Note releases. Herbie Hancock's Maiden Voyage (recorded in 1965) and John Coltrane's Blue Train (released in 1957). They both have the Year set to 2012. This remaster dating makes a hash out of creating a playlist in iTunes of something like Jazz of the 50's, or Rock/Progressive Rock of the 1970's. Since I have discovered that the release date in iTunes is read only (Doug's Scripts for iTunes has this information), I was thinking of altering the Year to the correct value for Release Year, then putting something like "2012 REMASTERDATE" at the beginning of my comments field. I am using latest version of iTunes on iMac running Mountain Lion, my imported music files are in Apple Lossless format.

...realism. I had no idea they were recorded so well. Almost sounded like different recordings than what I'm used to from the old CD’s. Depends on the age of the CDs. I was surprised while looking up The Doors in Wikipedia that all Stereo versions (45/LP) were recorded at 3.5% slower than the 45 mono and mono LP, which means the version I listened to at home for many years on my old Marantz receiver/speakers, and Garrard TT was different. I am guessing that these versions are the correct speed, but I have no way to compare (the albums, Marantz receiver/speakers and Garrard TT went away after after 14 years of service. In any case, I have been enjoying listening to The Doors and look forward to HDtracks releasing other Doors albums.

The difference is that there are very specific requirements regarding temperature, humidity and light. For instance, you have to watch out for heat and humidity, extreme rapid or temperature or humidity changes, and UV light. According to the China Lake study, which includes some archival discs, though not all, they all failed the data integrity tests, if not being completely unreadable with a DVD reader after the tests. All of the M-Disc discs were readable and all passed the data integrity tests. The M-Disc considerably mitigates the strict requirements for current archival discs that they be stored in a cool, dry, clean air, dark environment. Not having a reflective layer at all seems to be the distinct advantage. No gold, no aluminum, just holes or pits. However, these pits or holes being burned do have one negative: burn time. Right now they max out at 4x. Of course if you are storing archival discs, you will take care to put them into just such environments anyway, but what if that environment fails? Even after your best efforts? From what I have read, the M-Disc survives, while the others would fail. Here is the URL for the long paper on how the study was done: http://www.millenniata.com/chinalake (link to PDF of full report at bottom) Here is URL to care of Kodak discs (direct download): http://www.preservationdisc.com/pdf/ProperCare.pdf Why am I so paranoid? As a child, we had a lot of books, photos, newspapers and records (old 78’s). My father figured out what seemed to be a great way to store them so that they would not be damaged while we were moving about the oil patch. He put them into an airtight, water proof giant old freezer. It did well for years. But then, somehow, the roof leaked, and seemingly had been leaking for years - we just had not been around. Then, at some point it seems, the seal of the freezer leaked, letting in moisture. Came the day when we found all the books a sodden mess, the photos of my grandparents, other family photos smeared away, black with mold, the newspapers solid black bricks and the records glued to their covers. I remember holding one book I had loved as a child bending in half, smearing my hands with black mold, as I tried to retrieve it. I was upset. So the whole concept of having a product that can take a lot of failure of environmental conditions, like the M-Disc seems to do, has a giant appeal to me, and the current archival discs do not pass the same test. As a retired SysAdmin and webmaster, I am a devoted follower of Col. Murphy. As always, fully cognizant of the fact that the discs will outlive the technology to read them, but also, if these are as durable as they seem to be, the technology might just be around longer for this one purpose, especially when they come out with Blu Ray M-Discs. I read somewhere that supposedly all it would take for some burners is a firmware upgrade to increase the head from the laser. enjoy!

I was really disappointed in this. If you want to have fun, turn Show Clipping on for something like Proud Mary. I have been very happy with most of my purchased from HDtracks, but some of the so called ‘hi-res’ files are just that, so called. I purchased this from them when it first came out and the first song was almost 1 GB. Seems that the first file was ALL of the files together. They quickly fixed the mess. That night I made 3 other purchases, if memory serves me correctly, and I was happy with the others. But, purchasing hi-res files, especially pop, rock and roll, does have some junk in the mix. Mostly good, but a few rotten apples make me sometimes hesitate to purchase. But then I do, and they are good, and more good, and even more good and then, ker-whap - a bad’un.

Maybe CD/DVD readers will have a longer life than we expect. Enter the M-Disc by Milleniata. According to the literature on the Milleniata and other sites, this technology creates discs whose life span is in the hundreds of years. It relies on the laser running hotter and drilling pits or holes into what they term a "rock like layer", instead of having the heat from the laser modify an organic dye layer. From what I have read, I can now, at home, create discs with the durability of a commercially purchased CD/DVD. For archiving my music and my photos this seems ideal, if I can believe the merchandising from the vendor, the study and the reviews. But from a careful reading, this seems much a much better archival media that a hard disc archival method or trusting a photosensitive dye. I mean, it is just a bunch of engraved pits - and their life span is not determined by electrons on a hard disk, or on a photosensitive dye. Also, while LG Electronics currently is going to have all of their 2012 DVD recorders have M-Disc technology built in, the technology is going to eventually include Blu Ray M-Discs' as well, so the 4.7 GB limitation will go up to about 25 GB per disc. Below are a couple of links about M-Disc, and would like to hear y'alls thoughts about this technology. And yes, I know, 1,000 years is hype, but something that lasts longer than a good photograph would be very welcome. M-DISC Millenniata Web Site: http://millenniata.com/m-disc/ Computerworld review (seems well done): http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9218881/Start_up_to_release_stone_like_optical_disc_that_lasts_forever

I like my iPad (and iPod Touch, looking forward to the update). That is good news that the iPad will output 24/96 music. But that does not gel well with the iTunes ecosystem. You cannot sync 24/96 music from iTunes into an iPad. I just tried it, to make sure memory served me right. The music that was 24 bits was refused because the dialog says that the iPad does not support that bit rate. I tried both 24/88.2 and 24/96 music (Yes - Fragile and Rolling Stones - Let it Bleed; hdtracks.com). I do have an application on the iPad called Flac Player, which does import and play 24/96, and it also outputs 24/96, though it uses a software implementation to do this, rather than a hardware implementation. enjoy Jimtom Polk

An easy way that I stumbled upon to add lyrics to songs is to use Songbird plus a Songbird add on named MLyrics (currently ver. 1.2.5). There was an older add-on for Songbird that has been discontinued - please note the older one does not work. Both Songbird and the MLyrics add-on are free. It will add lyrics for iTunes (ALAC tested) and FLAC files. I am only using it for the Lyrics, since I am getting everything else tagged when I bring the files into my system. Lyrics can be added song by song, as well as a batch method. After the add-on is installed, select and play the song you want the lyrics for in Songbird, and in the right panel will appear the lyrics. The program searches through 18 different lyric web sites, but not all are checked. For instance, it leaves Hindi lyrics unchecked. There is an option to search google if no lyrics found. Now, when this ad-on is installed, and it finds the lyrics for a song, there will be a little [OK] button. If that doesn’t work after it searches through the list of lyric web sites, it instead has a [WEB] button - click that and it opens a window in Songbird for a google search where you can find the lyrics, then copy and paste them into the left hand window. If you select some songs, then right click on them, the option appears to allow you to ‘Gather Lyrics’. A big window pops up, and it then goes through the songs, with check marks as it finds lyrics. At the bottom there is a sliver of a button, that says Accept Changes. Do that, and all the found files are tagged. Beside each lyric found, there is giant green check mark. Click on that and it switches to the don’t do it graphic (the circle with a bar across it - sorry, cannot think of the name for it). I have been using it to tag my iTunes files with zero problem - both in the batch mode, which I only found while writing this, and the individual method. The search web if no lyrics found works well with songs where the song is correct, but might have a different title, or the like. It also will tag up your FLAC files, as well as ALAC files - the only two types I have used it on. It is a lot easier than finding lyrics then cutting and pasting them into the iTunes info box. OH-sometimes the batch ‘Gather Lyrics’ does not close after you click the [Accept Changes] button. It happens occasionally, as it did to me. The only thing to do then is kill the Songbird. enjoy! Jimtom Polk