CD Music Collection Save to Hard Drive etc

bwatt72 on 20/12/2023 - 18:17

I have a very large cd collection going back 23 years which I have paid monthly to and dec 2022 was the last of them and company has now gone digital.
I’m still very old school I like most things physical be it movies, music or games.

My large cd collection I was thinking if something happened to them damaged etc I never get these back.

I also still like to buy CDs and have both options digital and cd format so what I used to get provided to me on cd I want to make my own CDs to keep adding to it.

As i have been getting the digital CDs now since January 2023 i would like to make the last 23 years all digital also.
It will take me some time as I get three double CDs worth each month over a 12 month period.

The downloads I do now on the music are flac don’t ask me what it is but supposed to be good quality.

So my goal is to get this 23 years of CDs into digital format, I take I would just instal them to my pc then onto a hard drive.

Can you recommend a hard drive to get as i am sure I read on here that some hard drives go funny after so many years?
Is there a certain brand I should look for or get?
I have no idea how large or gb this collection would use. But I take as it’s already on cd I not get any better than what it already is on cd as long as it’s not lesser quality.

Obviously I’m currently downloading my digital CDs with flac and this year I am adding a lot of stuff but it sure is eating up my pc gb.

It be nice in the end to have all my cd collection of this particular lot as said which most are in cd format just this years ones to make into cd and obviously convert the larger cd collection into digital.

I think putting on a hard drive I can connect to my pc and play music through this or my laptop and then Bluetooth it etc.

Also as an extra back up would it be a good idea to back it up somewhere storage that I can even access when I want it even play through that option as well?
But I be happy just to store it safe if need be. But I assume it would be ongoing costs to do this.

I will continue to add more each month until one day I stop or not longer get it.

Would I need any kind of software that might help me organise it or I would benifit from it.

Entertainment Computer Component Hard Drive Music

Comments

    • AustriaBargain on 20/12/2023 - 18:41

      Yeah, Apple Music too. With both if they are missing any albums or songs OP can rip them and add them to the streaming service. With Apple Music, maybe Spotify too, you can find any old ratty low bitrate mp3 and upload it and they will replace it with their high quality one using matching software.

      • SteveBuscemi on 21/12/2023 - 23:48
        +7

        In terms of local file support, Spotify has always sucked in that department. It only supports mp3s, doesn't upgrade the bitrate, basically acts as a dumb music player locally, and only lets you stream on mobile if you put specific songs in a playlist.

        Apple Music does match/upgrade them, presumably still to 256k AAC, but it also wraps them in DRM (unless you pay for iTunes Match, if that's still a thing) but the other problem is its upload v. match detection has always been extremely iffy, matching wrong versions, censored versions, etc. (just last week I noticed a few of the songs off a very popular album somehow got replaced with instrumental versions). And if a song/album/artist has been pulled from Apple Music, you're not allowed to listen to your copy, either.

        And iirc Google and Amazon both killed their match/upload offerings many many years ago.

        I've spent 10+ years streaming through Spotify and/or Apple Music, but after recently dealing with older songs and albums yanked from streaming services, and some great sounding older albums replaced with inferior noice-reduced remasters-that-aren't, I've resurrected my old music collection, bought some more recent stuff, and thrown it all into Plex which, thanks to the PlexAmp app, has been fantastic.

        • AustriaBargain on 22/12/2023 - 00:00

          Apple Music is lossless now actually. I have uploaded some m4a lossless rips, I actually don't know how to tell if Apple Music delivers them losslessly or not, my ear is not refined enough to tell the difference. And even if Apple pulls a matched version, which I didn't know they could do, you can still add your own version to Apple Music. I've uploaded all sorts, like bootlegs and band camp albums and stuff.

          • SteveBuscemi on 22/12/2023 - 00:34
            +1

            @AustriaBargain: Yes Apple Music has been lossless for a while now and upon checking you're right, Apple Music can actually stream a matched song in lossless, iTunes Match does not.

            But specifically the scenario of 'your old ratty low bitrate mp3'…

            a. Anything unmatched is inherently always going to be at your original upload quality. It has no matching upgrade.

            b. If your songs 'match' Apple's, and you don't care about DRM and are happy paying an ongoing subscription fee to listen to the upgraded version of your own low-bitrate originals, which is the only way to get the crappy 128k Napster -> lossless Apple Music upgrade, you're back at the existential question of why you bothered to upload them in the first place.

            And c. Perhaps you misunderstand my problem. Obscure stuff it knows nothing about is fine, but I have uploaded my own unmatched copies of songs, most over a decade ago, eg. they show in my iCloud Music Library as original "MPEG Audio" files and not matched "Lossless Audio, AAC Audio" files, but for a handful of albums, somehow the Apple Music app has fingerprinted the songs retroactively, and will no longer let me play them, saying they're not available in Australia.

            The only solution to that is to delete those albums and re-add them whenever you find them…presuming you still have them and weren't relying on the cloud as your storage medium.

            iCloud Music library was always a bit of an unreliable mess but with the very concept of maintaining your own library being an ever-increasing niche and with all the cruft and complications that occured merging it with Apple Music, I just couldn't recommend it to anyone with a clear conscience in almost-2024. If maintaining a personal collection is important to you, get a NAS, use a file-level backup solution like Backblaze vs a streaming service's legacy music locker feature, and stream from your house.

          • G-rig on 24/12/2023 - 10:10

            @AustriaBargain: Check out Darko Audio's YT channel. depending on your hardware Apple isn't always lossless. Seems a bit finicky still. Just have to research your combination of gear. Definitely doesn't offer hi-res I don't think.

            Yeah Spotify.. have never been interested in that unless they can deliver CD quality at least. Spotify Hi-Fi may never happen, and most users are casual ones that don't care about SQ (or adds) and just stream on phone and BT speakers.

            Tidal is my go-to for streaming, fantastic setup now that Volumio offers Hi-Res Tidal Connect.
            Got it streaming to a RPi4 - DAC - Studio Moniotrs (& sub):
            https://files.ozbargain.com.au/upload/213835/109358/pxl_2023…

            • AustriaBargain on 24/12/2023 - 10:23

              @G-rig: Apple Music does have high res now, for some music. But yes you need right hardware. All airpods, except the new usb c one, won’t do lossless for example.

              • G-rig on 24/12/2023 - 10:33

                @AustriaBargain: Ah that's good news. Take a while to get the ideal setup and gear hey.

    • mskeggs on 20/12/2023 - 19:09
      +32

      Not going to rain on you guys parade, but Spotify and the online services are not very useful outside pop genres.
      There is so much classical, jazz, world, indie etc. music missing, and will always be missing because the record company that released it folded in 1986 or something.
      Streaming is good for Tay tay, but I’m guessing OP is into classical or some other niche which is deep and wide and unserved by the streaming services targeting the profitable 95%.

      • cashless on 20/12/2023 - 19:43
        +10

        This is absolutely correct. There is so much “weird, out there, non mainstream” music that is not available on streaming services. The streaming services like to make out they have everyone covered, which as mskeggs says may be 95% of the population.
        Unfortunately that might only be about 50% of published music.
        There are plenty of folk out there that like only music not available on streaming platforms

        • fantombloo on 20/12/2023 - 21:23
          +4

          Just this morning I was eating some cinnamon almonds while driving, somehow reminded me of the song Cinnamon by 80/90s Aussie band The Clouds and I thought I'd give it a listen after all these years. Spotify couldn't help, had to go to some fan on youtube. Lots of stories like this.

      • AustriaBargain on 20/12/2023 - 21:32
        +2

        When there's 20 different significant recordings of Romeo and Juliet then yeah I wouldn't expect Apple or Spotify to bother chasing them all up. I wish they would though, every conductor does it different…

      • mrvaluepack on 21/12/2023 - 23:23

        You'd be surprised at Spotify's range. If not there is always youtube. Can always find everything there.

        • mskeggs on 22/12/2023 - 09:49
          +1

          I pay for both services, I’m well aware of what they offer.

      • rentonc on 22/12/2023 - 14:30
        +1

        Is this the wisest guy on ozbargain!?!
        All killer, no filler.

        • mskeggs on 22/12/2023 - 14:50

          Don't waste your time listening to that old guy. Doesn't even have a tick toc channel.

    • bwatt72 on 20/12/2023 - 22:37
      +7

      Nope not the stuff I get

    • Jaxy on 21/12/2023 - 11:26
      +7

      You will own nothing and be happy.

      • mskeggs on 21/12/2023 - 13:46
        +7

        I see this posted around, and I think the sentiment is misplaced.
        It isn’t about personal ownership, it is about control and access.
        I don’t own the beach or the river, but I am not unhappy about that because I can visit the beach or swim in the river.

        I don’t own the cricket, but I can watch the Aussie games for free, and I don’t own a dinosaur skeleton, but I can go look at one whenever I want.

        The idea that owning something is required is very American - because it is all they have in their broken society. But I can own my CD collection, and still lose it if I face medical bankruptcy or elevated crime rates because of poor social safety nets.

        Ownership is often actively against your ability to be happy. That pharma-bro bought the one off Wu Tang album, so ownership has specifically ruined that, where a more society focussed copyright law could have given access to the music for everyone.

        • TheRealCher on 21/12/2023 - 17:37
          +2

          Damn straight….Wu Tang iz 4 the children…

        • belongsinforums on 22/12/2023 - 23:24

          Yes, he is bad for buying something for sale. Wu tang is completely blameless for not releasing it.

          • crentist on 23/12/2023 - 17:00

            @belongsinforums: There's a backstory to the album detailed on reddit. A bit speculative, but apparently it's pretty much a fan-made album by some dude named Cilvaringz, which RZA then wanted to bury with this bizarre release method.

            Story goes that this dude spent years producing a self-funded classic Wu Tang style album (alongside a regular job), including paying the members well and getting good verses out of them. The whole time basically in obscurity (and in forum posts), because who cares about some random dude making a knock-off Wu Tang album in his spare time. There's already a crapload of Wu affiliates no one has ever heard of.

            Except this was happening while RZA has been getting more experimental, losing favour with other members, and basically producing duds for years. And it slowly comes to light that this random dude is turning out some great classic RZA-style work, and it might turn out to be the best Wu Tang album in years.

            And so RZA doesn't wanna be shown up by some accountant or whatever he was. And there's a very good chance the album could be another unknown Wu-affiliate no one ever listens to. So after years of zero involvement, he approaches with this strange offer, where it will be called an official Wu Tang album and then hidden from the world. So RZA gets to slap his name all over it and avoid the shame, and Cilvaringz gets a little bit of credit, pride, and likely the only chance of recovering even a single dollar from all the money he has poured into this whole thing.

    • SpicyStew on 22/12/2023 - 14:05
      +1

      no ownership option available, lifetime subscription required.

    • G-rig on 23/12/2023 - 01:39

      Lol Spotify isn't even lossless and may never be.

      It takes a lot of hours ripping, tagging and applying replay gain to CDs. I had a very good surely in the late 2000s, the software isn't as good these days but id google it and will be plenty of answers.

      Just get 8tb would be plenty

    • HeWhoKnows on 23/12/2023 - 23:28
      +1

      I dont think OP is interested in Spotify or apple music at this stage.

      In summary…….
      FIRSTLY.
      OP wants to know how to rip thier music CD collection to either MP3 (320kbps) or Flac, both of which offer high quality reproduction. Flac is lossless but I doubt anyone will notice the difference compared with MP3 @ 320kbps. Besides many digital media/music players read MP3 by default but dont support Flac unfortunately. OP needs to be aware of this restriction.

      See here for more information about ripping to Flac or MP3:
      https://multimedia.easeus.com/audio-editing/how-to-rip-cd-to…

      SECONDLY.
      And best place/way to store it.

      To answer OP's questions

      FIRSTLY.
      Any CD burning software will rip a music CD to MP3 and most to Flac.
      - Apple's iTunes rips to MP3 and their own lossless format (m4a).
      - AnyBurn can rip to both MP3 and Flac.
      - Windows media player can also rip to both MP3 and Flac.
      All are Free. There are plenty more around.

      • Ashampoo Music Studio does an excellent job and whilst its normally $30 to buy, you can check out what it does, download it and use it for FREE right now (be quick) from their giveaway page here:
        https://www.ashampoo.com/en-us/music-studio-2023

      SECONDLY.
      Any permanently installed hard disk on a computer with backup on a portable drive. Hard disks can fail over time with prolonged use so the backup hard disk should last much longer.

      • G-rig on 24/12/2023 - 00:33

        If you are going to bother ripping CDs definitely don't rip to mp3 (lossy). Back in the day I did, then re-ripped then all again to FLAC (lossless). Plenty of free batch converters around if you want to later convert a set to mp3 (for portable devices etc).

        Agree keep a copy in a few places. In reality I've never had a HDD fail and have seperate storage drives to SSD OS drives, and only access rarely.

        Ps. I wouldn't bother with Spotify either, not even lossless. Tidal can be had at pretty reasonable prices in various countries but not as cheap as it once was. Worth getting a trial at least.

  • mrdean on 20/12/2023 - 18:27

    Sounds like a big job, I'm not sure it's worth it. How many CDs?

  • Ozbar Gain on 20/12/2023 - 18:31
    +10

    If ripping to FLAC you might have to work on ~500mb per album. That should help you figure out how big a hard drive you need. And get two, one to backup to if you want to make sure you don't loose your FLACs if the hard drive ever fails

  • Benicio on 20/12/2023 - 18:33
    +7

    Just be aware hard drives fail all the time. You really need to have the entire collection backed up to at least 2-3 drives AND access them every so often.
    I used to have a full catalogue of music going back to the 90's but hard drives crashed, computers died and technology moved on.
    If you google "music catalogue software" you will get plenty of software options that have auto scanning options. When I upgraded my old computer I lost all that cataloguing work I did.

    Almost all music can be found online somewhere. Just get a spotify or apple or youtube music subscription and enjoy the convenience.

    • HeWhoKnows on 24/12/2023 - 00:09

      One copy on a separate (files) hard drive installed in a computer and a second copy stored on an external portable drive should suffice.

  • Miami Mall Alien on 20/12/2023 - 18:51
    +33

    First off, what the hell kind of service is this that sends you monthly orders of CDs? Genuinely curious here… this sounds straight out of a 1987 mailing list for a magazine subscription.

    Secondly, ripping CDs to digital formats properly is crucial for preserving audio fidelity (meaning error-free rips with bit-for-bit accuracy). Using Exact Audio Copy with a high-quality lossless codec (FLAC level 8) is recommended.

    Thirdly, any important data should be backed up using the 3:2:1 rule: 3 copies of data (1 live and 2 archival), on 2 different kinds of media (e.g. HDDs and cloud-hosted storage services) with one copy being off-site (e.g. the cloud-hosted backup).

    If what I'm saying to you sounds like gibberish, I would honestly recommend outsourcing this project to someone who knows what they're doing as you don't sound like the most tech-savvy individual (no offence).

    • mskeggs on 20/12/2023 - 19:02
      +5

      In the old days (you know, 2009!) there were services you could post(!) your CDs to and they would rip them.
      Later, some cloud software asked you to insert the CD, it took a RSA checksum of the disk, then added the disk to your account online as you had validated you owned it - this wasn’t foolproof.
      I have no idea if these still exist, I ended up just ripping or pirating my CD library, and I have Spotify (and I guess, Youtube music) but I really like having “my” music stored locally on my devices so I don’t have to fool around with dumb stuff like Spotify being reluctant to play album tracklists in order or getting confused over cover versions.
      It’s also nice not to be worried about going offline on a trip or being surveillance.

    • AustriaBargain on 20/12/2023 - 21:35

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Record_club

      Damn I must be getting old. You never saw the ads for $1 records, but the fine print says it actually turns into a subscription at like $20 a month?

    • Jaxy on 21/12/2023 - 11:28
      +1

      First off, what the hell kind of service is this that sends you monthly orders of CDs? Genuinely curious here…

      Somebody's too young to know about Columbia House.

      • Minimum chips on 22/12/2023 - 10:59
        +4

        Kids these days think Columbia House is a sub-genre of South American club music.

      • G-rig on 23/12/2023 - 01:52

        Yeah I used to be in a cd club when Myer had a service or company 3cds delivered was pretty good

    • Fobsessive on 21/12/2023 - 23:10

      This is the answer.

  • mskeggs on 20/12/2023 - 18:55
    +12

    I have a lot of music from CDs, many that aren’t on Spotify.
    The process is to insert the CD in my computer and “rip” it to FLAC.
    You don’t mention how you listen to your FLAC music, so I guess it is via the computer?
    A lot of programs that can play FLAC also have a menu option to ‘rip’ a CD to save it as FLAC files.
    I strongly recommend you keep a copy of the FLAC files on both your computer and another hard drive. They won’t take up too much space, although 72(!) CDs each year adds up.

    It is likely your CDs each take up about 500mb or less in FLAC files, so you can estimate 23 years of CDs might even fit on a 1Tb disk. I suggest you buy a 2Tb disk so you have space for the future - they can be had for around $75 at Officeworks etc.

    Because it would be a disaster to spend 15mins ‘ripping’ each of your CDs to disk, and then the disk died, I would buy two, and keep copies on both. (I would also probably backup to the cloud, but step by step!).

    Keep one of the disks at work or someone else’s house in case your place burns down!

    When you are ready to go, plug in your disk, set up your software to rip the CD and save it to the new disk, and set it going. It will take about 10-15mins to convert each CD to FLAC, so I would say just set it up and go do something else - switching CDs every time you wander past.

    It is time consuming, but not hard.

    When you are finished, you might also think about getting a little iPod-style player (FiiO make good ones) and you can copy all 23 years on to that - it is very cool having every CD in a player the size of a deck of cards.

    • Mugsy on 20/12/2023 - 19:16
      +3

      Good instructions!

      By my calculations, if he had three double CDs per month, that's 6 CDs per month so 1,656 CDs over 23yrs so definitely time consuming to rip.

      It's been many years since I ripped my CD collection to MP3s but at the time, what ever I used was able to figure out my CD albums and name the files accordingly. Hopefully they have something similar in today's software. Made the ripping process much easier as I use to find the file naming process the most time consuming before it was automated.

      Edit: I know… Why MP3s? I just can't be bothered re-ripping my CD collection. Nor do I want to use anything other than Winamp with my Onkyo skin.

    • AustriaBargain on 20/12/2023 - 21:40
      +5

      Probably easier to join a site like redacted or whatever they are calling oinks pink palace these days and download all the perfectly ripped flacs. If you own the CDs then it's virtually just format shifting with fewer steps.

    • Joey2scoops on 21/12/2023 - 07:52
      +1

      I ripped all my CD and DVD to hard drives. That was not always easy but I got it done. I've got all the original disks for safekeeping but that is useless unless you have the technology to play them put aside as well.

      • Mugsy on 21/12/2023 - 09:08

        I still have my DVD player in the cupboard… my wife keeps trying to throw it out. I'd have it set up if she didn't complain about it using up space too.

        And that's why I will have a study and my own personal media room at the new house (she gets to set up her own art studio downstairs and the rest of the house to do up as she pleases).

        • Daabido on 24/12/2023 - 10:31

          I hope you're only paying for the mortgage based on the percentage of the house you are allowed to personalise.

    • NelgCip on 21/12/2023 - 10:16
      +1

      I went through the same exercise awhile back. I ripped all my CDs into my laptop and then back it up in the hard drive. I then connected the hard drive to my router so that I can stream through my sound system.

  • mskeggs on 20/12/2023 - 19:14
    +2

    OP, if you are interested in music that isn’t mainstream, there is an app called Soulseek that specializes in connecting fans of less common music. It shares the music folder on your computer and you can see the music folder of others - so if you find the Grateful Dead live recording of Portland 1986, you can look at the sharer’s other files and often discover similar music.

    A lot of it is live recordings and other free niche stuff, but there is some copyrighted things, so be sure to only share things you are sure are free to share.

    • TooSerious2 on 20/12/2023 - 19:21

      Grateful Dead fans should also check out the Tapers Section app to access archive. org on android.

    • cashless on 20/12/2023 - 19:59
      +2

      This thread is inspiring me to digitise the 200 or so CD’s I have laying around & rarely play.
      I was already looking at “exact audio copy” as the software to rip the music & getting it transferred across to my nas.
      Backing it up to cloud hadn’t occurred to me until reading this thread though.
      Good advice being given.

      • Mugsy on 20/12/2023 - 20:45
        +3

        Good luck with digitising your collection.

        I found I listened to my full music collection more after ripping it. The ease of accessing each album or individual songs and being able to easily create my own playlists made all the difference.

        Can't say that I've been converted to streaming/Spotify/Youtube music though. There's something about not having to rely on an always on internet connection or not paying for extra internet data to access content I already own that I prefer. A USB stick with a collection of mp3 files on it plugged into my car has worked well for me for years now.

    • skidexa on 22/12/2023 - 16:25
      +1

      Man soulseek been around 15 20 years haha. I rememebr finding the hardest to find songs on there. Plus i remember those chat rooms and trying to leech off people without sharing much. Fun days

  • soan papdi on 20/12/2023 - 19:21
    +2

    Depending on your budget, I think Dropbox's Smart Sync feature is ideal for this situation. Essentially you mark a directory for smart sync. The Dropbox client will upload it to the cloud, then leave a stub behind on your hard drive. When you want to play it, the client will downloaded on demand. So your local music apps will think it's a local file but you're backed up in the cloud.

    I would highly recommend subscribing to another cloud service, like Google or Microsoft and enable automatic replication from Dropbox. This way you're probably spending a few hundred dollars a year but don't have to worry about broken hard drives.

    https://assets.dropbox.com/documents/en-us/marketing/SmartSy…

    • AustriaBargain on 20/12/2023 - 21:42
      +4

      Dropbox is wayyyy overpriced. OneDrive is the smart money imo, if you have five other people to share it with then you can get premium office 365 and 1TB OneDrive each for less than $20 a year.

      • Mugsy on 21/12/2023 - 00:45

        OneDrive Family subscriber here too… though I'm also the provider of OneDrive for my parents and my wife… there's 4 accounts there already (two for my wife as she has one for studies + iPad and one for her phone's camera roll). I'm hanging onto the last spare account as I'm sure my wife will need it as soon as her current camera roll account is full. It's still cheaper than individually buying the 5 current accounts.

        • smpantsonfire on 22/12/2023 - 11:54

          Bro, how many photos does she take 🤣

    • maiuspala on 21/12/2023 - 11:39

      I havent tried to uploa music or movies tomcloud for ages, but back in the day they wouldnt let you, always had to rename the file type (mp3 to doc or whatever) to prevent piracy

  • nuker on 20/12/2023 - 19:33
    +3

    NAS plus single large WD Elements drive as cold backup.

  • Protractor on 20/12/2023 - 20:18

    Good luck. You are onto it.

  • garetz on 20/12/2023 - 20:31
    +3

    I use Exact Audio Copy, rip 1 cd of 70 mins, then multiply the resulting flac sizing you get from that 1 cd by the amount of cds you have.

    That is how much space you will need, you should also get another disk to create a backup, you would have to lose all that effort and time.

    The only problem with exact audio copy is its very unforgiving when it comes to surface scratches and gives you errors.

  • jonathondriver on 20/12/2023 - 22:51
    +4

    I did this exact thing a few years back, ripped my entire collection to disk. It took a few months. I had something of a bookmark of where I was up to and just went through, one by one adding a new disk each time I walked past. You'd be surprised how effortless it is really you just need to be organized about it. Lots of software will also retrieve album art and track names etc as it rips so your files are labeled with album covers.

    • Subere on 21/12/2023 - 10:08

      Same. Ripped everything to FLAC with EAC and also sleeved my CDs because the jewel cases were taking up too much unnecessary space.

      • PeterSnoot on 22/12/2023 - 19:00

        It FLAC still the best format to use? I remember that is was regarded as so years ago when I contemplated ripping my collection before something more attractive caught my eye.

  • bwatt72 on 20/12/2023 - 23:20
    +3

    Brain overload wow so many options don’t know where to start.
    Had the company not gone digital maybe I was the remaining few left that got the CDs as I was told most was digital and was no longer cost effective to keep it going.’
    They have always had there site where you could have downloaded or listened to your music each month.
    But I prefered the CDs and honestly still do but it’s now in digital. I have been downloading them in lossless and flac.
    I currently have 9 months of CDs downloaded music which has probably even more songs on the USB. Never thought to check the gb etc used on these usb.
    I just downloaded oct and November months on another usb stick I have.

    But most of my collection is on cd format and it once crossed my mind to make them digital and not just have cd format of it.

    I got tons of other CDs but this particular ones goes back years as I said and I want to keep them backed up as well as still have the CDs available as once they are gone it be hard to replace.

    So it might be good me looking into good hard drives if there is such a thing and here was me thinking saving stuff to hard drive was safe thing.
    I wonder the few hard drives that I have with In un replaceable pics are still on there.
    I thought hard drives was the go always told to back up etc.

    • freefall101 on 21/12/2023 - 00:37
      +3

      No harddrive will last forever, the key is to have a solid backup system. A main drive, a backup drive and a cloud drive is the easiest and great solution. If the main drive dies, you restore from your backup. Cloud is excellent for backups because storage services don't lose data - they spread it over so many disks with built in protections that they should never lose your data (short of someone nuking a couple of data storage facilities).

      It also helps protect against ransomware. If you install a dodgy bit of software it'll usually encrypt your backup drive along with your regular drives, making a backup worthless. Cloud backups are a bit better.

      CDs are about 700mb each, so 1TB of storage will store 1,400 CDs or 1,860ish hours of music. Loseless compression will bump that up to 2,000 cds or so pretty easily.

      I currently have 9 months of CDs downloaded music

      By 9 months do you mean 9 months of 24 hours a day playing? I.e. about 6,480 hours worth? Probably around 4TB worth of data at a guess. I'd go with 8TB storage, 8TB backup drive (simply use windows backup, select the folders you want to backup, store them to the drive). Then look at your cloud storage options at this will be the expensive bit.

      It might be worth looking at network storage rather than both drives on the same computer too (because if it shorts out, you might lose both drives at once).

      • bwatt72 on 21/12/2023 - 01:08
        +1

        The CDs I would need to check each one but there is three but if I remember two are double CDs and one single.
        But now it’s online i get lots more songs even upto 100 in one category so it’s a mixed bag now since it’s digital.
        But I’m able to play these songs online download them and save them but after 6 months they are gone as they just keep adding. So it’s not as If i can go back after 6 months and get again. Where as my CDs I can as they are physical.

        So it’s obviously in my interest having paid all this money into them them I save thin in various ways. More so my last 11 months of them as everything before that was on cd.
        The putting the CDs ones into digital format is an after thought and just be good to get them all in once place without digging through tons of CDs.

    • chris666 on 31/12/2023 - 21:59

      Flac and 2x hdd to back up will be fine

  • bbinc on 21/12/2023 - 09:21

    Such admirable dedication and many good ideas above, which will likely inspire me to action - thank you. Some thoughts FWIW. I was going to transfer my cassette collection and LP’s to CD. I had the technology and software to do it, but that all changed before I got it all done. Not to mention scanning photo negatives with a Nikon scanner no longer supported.
    No-one has mentioned RAID. I’ve a Synology twin disk RAID which I started with 2 x 1TB, upgraded to 2 x 2TB, now it’s 2x 4TB. I’ve got various backup drives, 2 and 4TB, and have difficulty keeping track of what’s where.
    Point is it now seems to make more sense financially and organisationally to go with a cloud service, and not be continually backing up old backups as the discs get old. My photo storage cloud service advises however to keep the originals on a physical device. Which means backing that up. Etc. Meanwhile my negatives keep fading.

    • bwatt72 on 21/12/2023 - 10:11

      So how much does cloud cost and what other similar options are there?
      Is going clound a good starting point or would putting on hard drives first be best.
      Are recommended 1tb and above hard drive cheap these days and any particular brand to head towards?
      I do have a spare wd elements 2tb hard drive sitting still in a box not even used yet, I have some older wireless ones I think I got for Xbox but would need to dig them out see what they are about I think they are 500gb each.

  • pharkurnell on 21/12/2023 - 09:33
    +1

    Once you have done all the hard work, I'd be happy to keep a copy here at my place….

    I also have a many 100's of cd's I'd like to copy, I started few years back doing it, but gave up at somewhere around 35,000 mp3's. which are still on my NAS which I havent powered on for year or so.

  • KaTst3R on 21/12/2023 - 10:35

    Looks like you are gonna spend an entire xmas weekend ripping CDs. One CD ripped to FLAC is about 300-500mb. Assuming for the past 23 years you received 1 CD a month. So that equates to about 276 CD or so. The total space required is just 140gb. You just multiply as required. Even if you have 5 times the amount, your total space required is no more than 1 terabyte. So any 1 to 2 TB modern solid state portable drive (like Samsung T7) will be more than sufficient. If you just rip the files, copy in once and the read the songs off it occasionally, these things in theory should last you a good 10 years. It's lifespan is dependant on the amount of data you write on it. So writing less than 2TB should still give you more than 99% life left.

    You wanted a secondary backup. This can be in cloud. If you have Microsoft office subscription, that would come with a OneDrive storage. If not, then just get a good old spinning mechanical drive like a Western Digital Element. If you dont access it often, these should also last a long time.

  • SlickMick on 21/12/2023 - 10:37
    +1

    If you're happy with CDs, stick with them. There was a time when we were backing up data from hard disks to CDs. Neither are reliable long term, you need a way to replace a damaged one. For music that's available elsewhere, that might not be a problem (just re-purchase it)? If it's rare, then you could rip it to a hard drive, then regularly back up that hard drive.

    • johnno07 on 21/12/2023 - 23:46

      If it's rare, then you could rip it to a hard drive

      This would be my recommendation. You probably don't need a lossless copy of Thriller backed up in triplicate. Truly weird and wonderful stuff should be though!

  • bargain huntress on 21/12/2023 - 11:16

    Youve gotten good advice here for a system of hard drives, cloud storage and writable cds

    I do all

    A possibility id like but havent found yet is getting a cd commercially made. They last much longer. But tricky to find someone

  • jonkvh on 21/12/2023 - 15:58

    Couple of things, I use only WMA for lossless, less problems across devices & with storage of the discs, get them out of the jewel cases they come in & put them in CD album holders/sleeves.

    • bwatt72 on 21/12/2023 - 17:21

      Ain’t flac better quality? What sort of problem does flac get as these past 11 months they are downloaded as flac.
      I take if I was to or wanted to I can’t change the flac to wma? What’s the difference and the meaning of each out of interest.
      In regards to the CDs they used to come in plastic sleeves but are cardboard sleeves now or up to end of 2022. And what’s the reason to remove from jewel cases as some very older ones did have this.

      • SteveBuscemi on 21/12/2023 - 23:57
        +3

        All other things being equal, lossless is lossless, be it FLAC, ALAC, or WMA (provided it is specifically the Lossless variant), but I can't think of a single reason why you'd forego FLAC except maybe to avoid installing a codec or other playback software. Back in the day WMA Lossless was 10x slower than FLAC and usually 1-2% bigger filesizes as well. FLAC is open source, standard, and used everywhere (even MacOS/iOS has supported it out-of-the-box for years despite ALAC being a thing.)

      • jonkvh on 22/12/2023 - 10:07

        Cardboard sleeves are fine, the CD's in jewel cases deteriorate over a long period of time, takes at least 10 years to happen. Also, I meant WAV not WMA. Damn!

    • johnno07 on 21/12/2023 - 23:54
      +1

      I use only WMA for lossless, less problems across devices

      It's been a LONG time since I've considered audio formats (this whole thread is a cosy trip down memory lane) but WMA being better than FLAC in terms of compatibility sounds a bit odd to me - given FLAC is non-proprietary, open codec while WMA is, well, the opposite. I would rely on FLAC for archival purposes, rather than be at the mercy of Microsoft.

      • jonkvh on 22/12/2023 - 10:03

        I've had devices that won't play FLAC but 'never' had a problem with - edit - WAV not WMA. I know what the argument is for FLAC but it's just what I've found in the past.

  • Charity on 22/12/2023 - 01:21
    +1

    Hard core CD collector here. I have almost every CD made from 1982 and 1983. Plus many more.

    Firstly, your CDs are already digital. It is the OG digital format.

    Yes, use Exact Audio Copy. Get your settings right before thinking about doing your entire collection. The software has a learning curve if you’re serious about making a true 1:1 archival copy.

    Lossless is lossless. Flac, apple lossless, wave, it’s all the same quality if you have done it correctly. The only thing you are changing is the file size. You should be able to convert from one to the other, and back again, and end up with the exact same file. If you can’t, it wasn’t lossless.

    Finally, enjoy the process. It might take years. It’s taken me decades and counting. And I savour every second. Read the liner notes of all favourites. It is so interesting and rewarding. Those early CDs truly came from a different world, in contrast to a Spotify file. Perfect sound forever! Especially with 1980s discs, you can literally see the difference when you compare the waveforms of the same song on your computer. They will look different and sound different too.

    Btw, having said all that if your collection mainly consists of CDs made this century - don’t bother! They will sound basically, or literally like Spotify anyway! But if your CDs are from the time when Japan and West Germany were duking it out to make the best product possible -at any expense- then yes go ahead and copy them all. It will be such a treat and so rewarding. Good luck!

    • johnno07 on 22/12/2023 - 02:13
      +1

      I have almost every CD made from 1982 and 1983. Plus many more.

      Interesting! What sort of quantity are we talking here? Curious how many of these old discs have fallen victim to disc rot.

      • Charity on 23/12/2023 - 18:31

        Did have 10000s a decade ago, but now down to 1000s. Honestly never counted an exact figure. Disc rot is not a thing. Sure if you live by the sea it might be, but the CD was literally designed to last forever - if one doesn’t abuse them. Exactly zero of my 82/83/84 CDs have rot. One 1982 disc cracked in half but that was a flaw from the factory lol. It was a 82 “Japanese gold face”, Barbra Streisand’s Guilty catalog no. 35DP-7 disc for the record lol.

        • Ayanami on 23/12/2023 - 21:14
          +1

          I'm not into this sort of stuff but I am seriously impressed by your passion. Envious almost.

        • G-rig on 24/12/2023 - 10:45
          +1

          Barbra Streisand

          .. no loss haha.
          I only collect music I like not everything ;).

    • Carussell on 22/12/2023 - 09:05

      Wrong on the CD format, they are not OG.
      CD's are wav audio files = uncompressed, whereas OG format does use compression.

      • johnno07 on 22/12/2023 - 10:31
        +4

        Ah @Charity actually meant OG as in "Original Gangsta" as opposed to OGG Vorbis. Though the confusion is not unreasonable!

  • enforcer on 22/12/2023 - 06:29

    Creating "perfect" rips from a reliable guide can be quite slow and tedious. I'd probably suggest to re-download the releases you want in FLAC. Bandwidth and data consumption isn't much of a limiting factor these days, and it'll be so much quicker and easier than ripping. You might find some CDs in your collection with physical damage that wont play nice so re-downloading might be your only option, thus it's worth knowing your options for download, and I see no issue doing it like this when you already paid for the CD - aka license to listen to that music.

    The only time I might rip my own CDs now is when I've got a different edition than what I can find to download (different mix/mastering, song order, bonus tracks, etc) which may have some sort of special meaning to me.

    Whichever way you go, consider that rip "quality" at its highest/most pedantic levels has hardly anything to do with listening quality any more. Private torrent sites might strive for bit-perfect copies, but it might be hard to keep your head above water with ratio requirements. FLACs from other, more readily accessible sources like Soulseek typically don't meet those same standards, but should (generally speaking) sound exactly the same as your CDs because they should (generally speaking) be the same audio data.

  • steeevo on 22/12/2023 - 06:35

    Many years ago I helped a family member with sometginf equivalent. They had a long running collection of classical music CDs they wantes to store.

    At the time we bought a mini pc which had VortexBox installed on it. When you put in a CD it would automatically rip it to FLAC and mp3, add in all of the meta data and store it on a hard drive. We had it run into a NAS with built in redundancy.

    If memory serves it was either able to play the music too, or we in a sonos speaker. Been many years.

    I did a quick google and it looks like it is old, but you can still download the distro for vortexbox so it could be an option. Alternatively try seeing if there is a specific replacement for it out there.

  • TightLikeThisx on 22/12/2023 - 07:42

    Idealy you would want to store your files on a NAS and set up a number of mirrored hard drives using the ZFS or BTRFS file format that store your data. ECC RAM in this machine would be a bonus.

    Then you upload your collection to a digital archiving cloud service like B2 storage.

    The NAS will provide you with failure of a hard drive and it will allow you to stream your media remotely. Archiving your collection in the cloud will protect you if the NAS gets totally destroyed or stolen.

    You can build a NAS yourself using a computer or buy one off the shelf. The ongoing cost of my suggested solution will be power costs for the NAS and cloud service fees.

  • idonotknowwhy on 22/12/2023 - 09:36

    If you don't know about NAS and storage technology, it's worth checking out https://old.reddit.com/r/DataHoarder/

    Watch out for silent data corruption. Bits can be flipped by cosmic rays, etc and you won't even notice.

    Edit: If you can afford the costs, maybe for the rarer content, you could consider having a copy stored on OneDrive, etc

  • Daddy Chill on 22/12/2023 - 10:15
    +1

    Pics or ban

    • Daabido on 24/12/2023 - 10:36

      Sorry, looks like you're banned.

  • apple2016 on 22/12/2023 - 10:17

    So my goal is to get this 23 years of CDs into digital format,

    The best option would be Roon.
    You would need a Roon Server or Nucleus. You can either buy one (Expensive) or build one (Depends on your build, it could be cheaper or expensive).
    Then you need a Roon license. You can get a monthly , yearly or a lifetime one.
    You will still need to convert the CD's to digital format and import them to Roon.
    Once this is done you can use the Roon app on your phone/table/pc to play music from your server / any streaming service you have to most roon compatible speakers / DAC's/ Streamers etc.
    The advantage of Roon is that it indexes your collection , gives details about artist, album etc
    It also shows you the tech details like bitrale etc.
    It is a bit of work to setup and is expensive, but once its setup, its the best.

  • RefusdClassification on 22/12/2023 - 11:05
    +1

    Some advice to a fellow collector. Congratulations on being a data preservationist in a streaming ago. There is a community for us on Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/DataHoarder/

    I would recommend purchasing DbPowerAmp to use for ripping and Mass Conversions. Mp3Tag (free) is great for metadata operations. Media Monkey (free version available) is good for cataloguing your music, playing it back, finding specific files, rating and categorizing your music. Also rip your CDs to a lossless format since formats like Mp3 and Aac damage the music. Flac is the most popular lossless format; Monkey's Audio (ape) can produce files 5% smaller on the second highest compression setting (don't use the highest setting; seeking is too slow).

    If you have a large music collection you will need a large hard drive; possible an 8TB Western Digital Blue will meet your needs at a reasonable price. But you must buy another of the same size to backup your collection to. You should run backup drives maybe once every 6 months for an hour or so. If you need a larger drive wait for an OzBargain deal on a external hard drive to appear; you can either keep the drive in its housing or rip it out to put inside a PC's case or a Nas. A cheap alternative to a Nas is a Mediasonic PROBOX (available with space for 2 or 4 HDDs).

    There used to be tools available that let people rip music from streaming services so they could save a permanent copy. I assume they are still around.

    • RefusdClassification on 23/12/2023 - 15:15

      You might be able to get away with just a smaller 2.5 inch 4TB hard drive; it could be large enough to fit your collection on. Just plug it into a USB port when you want to listen to the music.

  • trapper on 22/12/2023 - 11:34

    How many CD's do you actually have?

    It will be far-far quicker and easier to just download already ripped copies of everything you want.

    If you have some rare or weird stuff that is hard to find then just rip those ones yourself.

    • bwatt72 on 22/12/2023 - 12:22

      These don’t come already ripped they come in cd format specially made which I pay monthly for. They was available orginally at some point to download but that’s long gone. You get 6 months to do so. So all them years back I can’t do that anymore.

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