Does anyone use NAS DRIVES or streamers like SQUEEZEBOX to their amps?

I have about 450GB of music on EHH; 24BIT flac of zep classic records vinyl etc; basically my whole pc which i have been ripping for years(now sold every lp i ever owned).

The receivers i looked at wont take the USB HDD straight into front(only Onkyo's ) will so i am looking to stream.

any suggestions.info would be appreciated. The guys at the audio shops knew very little.
if anyone is an expert PLEASE email me [email protected]

 

The squeezebox is the obvious answer you can connect it with RCA's to your receiver and then use it to connect to your NAS that's what I do in my system. The other alternative is get a USB enabled DAC and then connect that to your hardrive and onto your receiver.

I'm using a 1965 Fisher 500c so age is no impediment to playing digital music.

 

I dont want to buy Nas and squeezebox; i am already going over budget to get a receiver.

Couldn't the SB stream contents of laptop via wireless network?

 

Yes it can. It will work just fine with the computer you already have.

 

I use a Squeezebox Classic to stream via Wi-Fi from an older Windows XP machine. Works real well. The server software for the SB runs much better on a pc than on a NAS. Or so I'm told. Your mileage may vary.

 

If you get a Yamaha Aventage all you have to do is download Asset UPnP to your computer and it will stream through your network your Flac files.

 

I use the Sonos to stream music from my PC to my amp. There is a Sonos Connect (formerly ZP 90) that connects to my AVR in my living room via either analog or digital (I use analog). I also have a second Sonos box Sonos Connect:Amp (formerly ZP120) that has its own amp and drives my bedroom speakers directly.

The Sonos works very well for me. It is a little more expensive than the Squezebox I believe. I think there are some functional differences between the two but I have been happy with the Sonos. Sonos does not stream hi-rez files though (unfortunately).

 

The Logitech MEDIA SERVER software is compatible with Windows, Mac, etc.

I stream from a ReadyNAS since I want more than a terabyte and I don't care to keep a computer on or in the listening room. If your computer has windows, for example, then you dowload the software and connect an SB Touch to your pre-amp (replaces CD player). The touch is $250 on Amazon in the US. I don't know about streaming directly to a wi-fi ready unit, but ask member SamS.

 

I use a Synology NAS which runs the SB server. That connects via Ethernet connection to a Netgear router/wireless repeater, which the Squeezebox Touch also connects to via Ehternet. Then the Touch goes via SPDIF into my dac, and then into my integrated amp.

Squeezebox has been a great way to forestall any decision on having a dedicated music server. And the NAS/Squeezebox combo fits easily on my shelf and is on at all times and ready to play, without having to have a computer on and running the SB software.

I also used to connect wirelessly, which was fine, but I prefer the wired connection.

 

You don't want to hook up a USB HDD to any receiver. Even if you can get to recognize the music files, navigation will be a total headache.

You just need a Squeezebox. It connects to your receiver via standard digital or analog jacks, and gets the music/files over WiFi from your computer, or NAS (running the server software - LMS).

 

So is there any particular NAS manufacturer you would recommend that can run the server software? I'm really leaning in this direction since I don't like having to run my computer every time I want to stream music to the Squeezebox.

 

Here's what I did - when my existing PC Hard Drive was nearly full :-

- Bought a Squeezebox Touch on Amazon Sale for £135 (know you can't get them for this price now but maybe you can pick one up secondhand).

- Got a Seagate 2TB external USB Hard Drive from Amazon for about £50 and copied all my music from existing Hard Drive to this. Installed the Logitech Media Server on PC and pointed it to the USB drive where my music is.

- The Touch is in my lounge connected to my Hi-Fi and connects to the PC (which is in another room) wirelessly.

- I use the excellent Squeeze Commander App on my cheap Chinese Tablet to give me control from the sofa of my whole 3000 plus albums.

- To improve sound quality still further I bought the superb Beresford Bushmaster DAC for £185. You don't need a DAC to get started though as the Touch has a very good internal DAC.

To be honest I am overjoyed with this relatively cheap system. I am listening to more music than ever with this setup.

 

I use a 4 tb MyBook LiveDuo (I have 3500 or so CDs and vinyl rips). I had to spend some time on the internet figuring out how to get it to talk to the Squeezebox but eventually found a forum at Slimservers. Essentially you have to load Logitech Media Server on the MyBook. Then I found a patch that lets the Squeezebox play 24-192 files. I get the occasional bit of weirdness because the hi-def patch is unauthorized. Every once in awhile the SB will hang or the display goes blank but that's only when I'm looking for a song. It plays the music perfectly.

 

Buffalo Linkstation would probably be a good option to explore: http://fieldnetworks.com/slim/linkstation.html

 

Okay, I set up a Buffalo Linkstation Pro Duo (2 3TB hard drives mirrored). Is there a more user friendly way to install Squeezebox Server on the NAS that a techno neophyte like myself could do?

 

Just a note to all those with their music collection stored on RAIDs or NAS drives. Make sure you have at least one, and preferably two backups of the drive. At all times. Drives fail. Controllers get corrupted. Plan your backup solution as if you know that you will have drives fail - because they will.

I store my iTunes library on a Qnap NAS, streaming via a combo of Sonos and Airport Express, depending on the room and system.

 

This question was originally asked over a year ago... but the new Marantz 8801 will accept a USB in the front, and the rear... and will play both 24-96 and 24-192 flac files. With the front panel of the 8801 flipped down, you have two rows (lines) of information displayed, so you can navigate around the USB device without having to turn on an external monitor. You can also easily switch back and forth between USB inputs, with the 8801's front display and the Marantz remote.

Granted, you can not view everything in an album folder all at once. So if your searching for a certain song buried deep in a box set, the search can be challenging with only two lines of information displayed. But if you have your USB folders and sub-folders set up intelligently, navigation can be a breeze.

Lastly, I would echo Daz's excellent advice...

"Plan your backup solution as if you know that you will have drives fail - because they will."

 

This article is several years old. Will this still be applicable to the latest Buffalo Linkstation Pro Duo, or do I need to downgrade the firmware?

 

Never mind, everybody. I was reading the back of my Linkstation box and, lo and behold, the NAS comes with the Squeezebox server built in! This must be new for this release. Sweet!

 

Man, I didn't realize how long it takes to transfer just under 1TB of music files from my external hard drive to the NAS. I started at about 9:00 yesterday morning and I still have 1.5 hours remaining on the transfer. Is this because the NAS is automatically saving the data on both hard drives (since I have the system set to Raid 1)?

 

CRISIS MODE: Apparently, the ****ing Squeezebox Server on the NAS does not support ALAC. 95% of my entire ****ing library is ALAC. So do I have to convert it all to FLAC now????? There is simply no way that I have time to do this.

What a waste of money and time this was.

 

Anyone in the market for a gently used Buffalo Linkstation?

 

I considered that option since the Buffalo comes with an iTunes server. I instead opted to bite the bullet and convert all of my ALAC files to flac (approx. 30,000 files). This isn't as daunting a prospect as I initially imagined since I have the Reference edition of dbPoweramp installed on my machine. It comes with a batch converter which can be configured to take all of my ALAC files and convert them to FLAC while keeping the original folder structure perfectly intact. Just click and walk away. I did a test run with about a third of my library yesterday and it took about 4 hours for the conversion to complete. I'll be leaving for work shortly, so I will start converting the remainder of my before I leave for work today. Anyhow, I did a test run on the Squeezebox Touch using the Squeezebox Server installed on the Buffalo and encountered the following issues:

• Multi-disc albums are now organized in the Squeezebox Touch by disc (ie. Disc 1 and Disc 2 are seperate albums)
• Album art takes a bit longer to load into the Touch, resulting in a bit of rebuffering at the beginning of each album while the artwork is cached. This problem goes away if I turn off artwork on the Touch, however.
• 24/192 flac files are not recognized by the Touch even though I have the Enhanced Digital Output mod installed.

I don't know if these issues are fixable using the version of Squeezebox Server on the Buffalo or not. For the time being, I have gone back to running the server program on my computer while streaming the files from the NAS.

As for iTunes, since the Buffalo comes with a USB port, I will probably connect the external HD containing my iTunes library to the Buffalo and try to stream from the NAS to my iPhones/iPad using the iTunes server on the Buffalo. Baby steps....