I've been noticing that one of the many recurring themes on the this forum seems to be about how best to use a computer to archive one's music collection into some digital format. I believe that this type of question is one which lends itself rather well to discussion on an open forum like this one.
There are so many factors to take into account and several different methods of finding a workable solution, all with positive and negative sides to them, that only by having everyone's ideas and opinions heard can one make some kind of intelligent decision on how best to proceed.
I'll try to give a brief outline of what I understand to be some of the factors and methods, but please bear in mind that it is in no way meant to be an all inclusive list - your input is needed and most welcome.
What I see as factors are:
1) Usability - this encompasses things like portability, compatability and, of course, ease of use.
2) Sound quality - what digital format will the archive be in - lossy compression (mp3, wma, etc) lossless compression (flac, ape, mlp, etc), uncompressed (16 bit/44.1kHz wav) or high resolution (24 bit/96kHz wav)?
3) Stability - how stable and "future proof" is the archive format, both the hardware and the software formats.
4) Cost
What I see as methods are:
1) Hard disk archiving using the digital file format of one's chosing.
2) CD archiving via Red Book audio
3) DVD/CD archiving using a different digital file format, say as lossless compressed flac files.
4) DVD-Audio archiving (see thread Home Brewed DVD-Audio Discs)
5) SACD archiving (see thread Tascam DV-RA 1000 DSD recorder review)
I think that should be enough to get things moving, now let's see what we can come up with.
I've been noticing that one of the many recurring themes on the this forum seems to be about how best to use a computer to archive one's music collection into some digital format. I believe that this type of question is one which lends itself rather well to discussion on an open forum like this one.
There are so many factors to take into account and several different methods of finding a workable solution, all with positive and negative sides to them, that only by having everyone's ideas and opinions heard can one make some kind of intelligent decision on how best to proceed.
I'll try to give a brief outline of what I understand to be some of the factors and methods, but please bear in mind that it is in no way meant to be an all inclusive list - your input is needed and most welcome.
What I see as factors are:
1) Usability - this encompasses things like portability, compatability and, of course, ease of use.
2) Sound quality - what digital format will the archive be in - lossy compression (mp3, wma, etc) lossless compression (flac, ape, mlp, etc), uncompressed (16 bit/44.1kHz wav) or high resolution (24 bit/96kHz wav)?
3) Stability - how stable and "future proof" is the archive format, both the hardware and the software formats.
4) Cost
What I see as methods are:
1) Hard disk archiving using the digital file format of one's chosing.
2) CD archiving via Red Book audio
3) DVD/CD archiving using a different digital file format, say as lossless compressed flac files.
4) DVD-Audio archiving (see thread Home Brewed DVD-Audio Discs)
5) SACD archiving (see thread Tascam DV-RA 1000 DSD recorder review)
I think that should be enough to get things moving, now let's see what we can come up with.