[cobalt-users] OT: Music Storage (was: lcd-menu)

[Rodolfo Paiz <rpaiz@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

> > Yes, would be nice to slot a RaQ into one's personal HI-FI system,
install a
> > nice sound card, load it of MP3, and use the buttons + lcd to play
music.
>
> interesting project. a bit expensive, though :-)

Suggestion for anyone interested: MP3 is a lousy format for *primary*
storage of music, given that the quality loss (however small) is
permanent. It is, however, rather nice for secondary storage (mobile,
streaming, etc.).

Following the steps of a friend, I have a small Linux server at home
with four 75GB EIDE drives in which are stored the contents of about 500
music CD's, in WAV format. No RAID, no backup, since I have all the
original CD's in a closet. Since each CD takes up, on average, 500MB,
the total is 250GB.

Each night a cron job runs that ensures all WAV files have a
corresponding MP3 file, encoded at 128 Kbps, which is about a 10:1
compression ratio. Thus my MP3 files take up about another 25GB, and I
have the best of both worlds.

Disk space is down to about $4.50/GB, which for me is cheap enough to do
this. To those with an even more limited budget, just wait for the price
to come down further. But it makes no sense to lose the quality of WAV
permanently just 'cause the cost is a little too high now.

This way, then: (1) *any* computer connected to your network (or off the
Internet if you travel) has access to your entire collection; (2) you
can listen to several songs off several CD's off several computers
without the single-laser limitation of most jukeboxes; (3) and you can
even listen to multiple streams of the same song at different parts of
the house.

I don't think the RaQ is the ideal medium for this. I run:

* Abit KA7/RAID Motherboard with AMD Athlon 800 ($350)
* Crucial 256 MB RAM ($250)
* Two (2) 20-GB drives for system in RAID-1 ($225)
* Four (4) 75-GB drives for data ($1400)
* Rackmount 4U case ($250)
* Intel Pro/100 Ethernet ($75)
* Creative Labs SoundBlaster PCI 128 ($75)
* Matrox G400 16MB ($75)

Prices are approximate. Total: $2700. About the same as a really nice
RaQ, but a *lot* more powerful. Runs Red Hat Linux 6.2. This is hooked
up directly to a pair of Altec Lansing ACS-44 speakers (w/subwoofer) in
my study, and the rest of the house gets to the tunes off the network.

------
Rodolfo J. Paiz
rpaiz@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:rpaiz@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>