PS Audio Music Server In The Pipeline?

Paul have you had an chance to listen to the new Music server hardware yet?

magicknow

I would agree with Paul that CDs will survive quite a bit on the market (even if not for all artists or genres).

The question imo is more, if it will survive for you and why in comparison to other alternatives ā€¦

It sure will be interesting to see if CDs have longevity along the lines of vinyl. Most of us wonā€™t survive long enough to find out.

My thing, which is (sorta) parallel to my vinyl thing, is that Iā€™m old school enough to still want a ā€œhard copyā€ off-network version of my digital discs, of whatever format. The day is approaching (cue scary music) when someone will potentially employ the internet and/or power grid ā€˜nuclearā€™ option, and all our computers, music, data, etc. will fry in an instant.

Sheesh - I sound like someone from back when I was a kid in gradeschool and used to be drilled to cower under my desk in case of attack - like it would help. Northwest corner of the classroom for tornadoes, and just get under your desk and kiss your ass goodbye for nuclear attack ; )

It is perhaps much more comprehensible to hold onto vinyl, either because you have a TT rig you want to play it on, or because every time you upgrade that rig, the digital rips you could make from it would be superior to the prior rip. PITA!

Or - like my 23-year old daughter - my album collection is the only thing she has asked specifically for me to leave to her when I kick. Dang - musta raised her right : )

The ā€œbits are bitsā€ folks will likely be having a seizure, but Iā€™m going to hold on to my discs until they come and pry them from my cold, dead hands ; )

I envision a (near) future where thereā€™s a PS Audio server system with a ripper that makes a better sounding rip of my discs than the Mac Mini I used to rip much of my CD collection starting around 18 years ago. That drive cost Apple about fifty cents and wobbled like a politician.

Guilty, yeah. Nearly 4,000 among redbook cdā€™s, dvd-a, sacd, k2, xrcd, hqcd, hdcd, udcd whatever is good!

Iā€™d be willing to bet that Vinyl will outlive CDā€™s. It will never have the nostalgic attraction vinyl has nor offer the affordable sound quality superiority that many people associate with it these days. A quality music server can deliver music with better performance than any CD player. Would think PSAā€™s Octave will smoke the DMP. Seems the CD to HD/Music server is truly an evolutionary step . Donā€™t think the same can be said for the CD when it was were first introduced. It was a technical marvel - problem was music sounded horrible. Canā€™t say I miss the experience of loading a CD into a CD player. Loving the DS with my music server though.

I think for everyone owing a larger collection with a major part of recordings of the last 10-20 years, half of it is available as better sounding hires anyway, so when I read here how quickly folks are willing to spend ten thousands on new HW for better sound, they should be interested in this improvement of their albums, too :wink:

I always wonder that people spend so much money for a physical drive and even a ripper for one time use instead of going hires/files.

The jury isnā€™t in for me in that regard, as itā€™s entirely possible that the CD was mastered decades prior to the hires, and it could have at that point been the peak sound of the master, and in 16/44.1, sound as good or better on the DMP than a subsequent hires remaster. Plus - since the DMP, I donā€™t feel particularly motivated to buy it yet again, hires or no. I buy plenty of stuff I donā€™t own already in hires, and then burn it to DVD-ROM, in order to play it on the DMP.

Ripping implies that you have a physical copy - if you donā€™t have it, the decision is a lot easier.

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currently itā€™s an interesting phase with CDā€˜s, LPā€™s, streaming platforms and downloads, each not available in other formats. So someone not having all playback/ripping options available can be limited in music selection.

More than thinking of the survival of each format Iā€™m eager about the development of availability of music and which format artists and labels choose to publishā€¦

yes that better mastering on CD which is not legally available as file is possible i.e. in case of old releases of audiophile labels etc., youā€™re right!

And interesting youā€™re burning hires on DVDā€¦I didnā€™t think of that option. Not convenient but possible and for sure great sounding then.

The think the issue of sound quality when it comes to CD vs HD playback has more to do with the dedicated servers lack of jitter and noise. Not talking about using a noisy computer but something along the lines of what Aurender is and the Octave will be. My ripped cdā€™s sound significantly better on my server than they do on my transport via DS. I believe Paul has mentioned a number of times that this would be the expected outcome. Not anti CD I just like the Server|HD format a lot more and thereā€™s no reason to look back.

Paul said ripped sounds better than physical before the DMP came out and the opposite after. Not that I donā€™t believe it, I just think it is mainly a question of the varying digital lens quality which so far seems unsurpassed in the DMP and will soon be unsurpassed in Octave and maybe Bridge III and maybe a newer physical player as I expect it ( although Paul mentioned at the time of the DMP, that it would be the last physical player)

So whatever one prefers, he will find a way that sounds good enough. For me convenience and availability of hires were reasons enough to move towards streaming from server ā€¦ others prefer their discs for other reasons. My collection is so big, I couldnā€™t even store them anymore. Due to the availability of ripping services, I donā€™t see the need of ripping hardware, as this process is only done once.

Right - sorry if I was suggesting there be a ripper. I read that stuff, so should have known better. Itā€™s just that somehow, I wish for a Digital Lens on my ripper, so I can then throw the discs away ; )

Sure seems as though even a cheap USB drive and good software like Exact Audio Copy would get everything off the disc written to the file. No need for a finely made spinner to rip, in my opinion and experience.

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Thatā€™s I love to hear that a upgraded DMP was coming out would make the decision whether to get DMP easier for me.

Great thoughts but totally impractical because everything inside DMP would have to be scrapped and replaced. Weā€™re taking an entirely new tack to get what we want.

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Yes, I had a brief half an hour of listening on unfamiliar music and then another 30 minutes comparing a CD through DMP to the server. The server was so much better than DMP that I questioned the source and then everything died. So, I am not yet prepared to make a definitive statement. Letā€™s just suggest what I have heard so far is quite promising. We just have to make sure it is tit for tat when comparing.

Yes, I understand, bits are bits.

Iā€™ve not been clear about what Iā€™m thinking. I would like an augmented-bit version of my discs.

Letā€™s take a CD for example. On the current DMP, the spinning CD playing back sounds better than a bit perfect rip of that same CD played back through the USB input, despite the fact that both go through the digital lens.

If I move to a fully non-disc playback system at some point, I still want my CDs to sound at least as good as they do now via the DMP. Yeah - possibly the Octave will do it as well or better, but letā€™s say for the sake of argument, I donā€™t want to have to buy the Octave, use either discs or a DMP or DMP II, etc. I want an upsampled rip that encodes the magic the DMP is doing to say, DSD 128ā€¦

Does that make any sort of sense?

It may be that the only way to have that sound is to have the DMP hardware in one form or another for playback.

Agreed - EAC and a cheap computer is all you need for ripping. For backups - an inexpensive automated solution or cloud storage like Google Drive is also cheap if youā€™re afraid your house is going to burn down. One thing I do miss is liner notes and original art work. Similar to holding an album in your hand. Would be great to get that on the iPad seamlessly when I choose music to listen to. I havenā€™t spent a lot of time exploring that but Iā€™m sure itā€™s on the horizonā€¦

Kaleidescape Premiere does that, if you wanted to go in that direction.

https://www.kaleidescape.com/ipad-app/

Thatā€™s great info thanks - Iā€™ll check it out.