iTunes Match

Macrumors.com is saying iTunes Match is now available for users in the UK.

iPads, CD Ripping & Light Switches

One of our first CD ripping clients has become a regular client, I think I know my way around his house as well as my own. On Wednesday I was up and down stairs (yet again) re-installing Sonos software so his music system would work again.

In the train on the way back I was thinking in a brick & concrete London home, where wireless signals travel badly, Sonos is just too complicated for the average user. When it fails it takes ages to get it up and running again. So I was interested to read in The Times today their “Interiors Special” - 10 trends that hit in 2011, this came in at number 4 “The trickle down trend : iPad homes”.

“Not long ago a complex array of control gadgetry was de rigueur in expensive homes, but today anyone can control their music, TV, lighting and heating with an iPhone or an iPad.” A pundit then goes on to comment on the super-rich “The prime market has seen the importance of frivolous centralised electrics wither in favour of simple old-fashioned light switches”. gets my vote. Pay attention Sonos, you’re beginning to look frivolous.

Brentwood - Thailand Floods Hit

When clients ask for their ripped CDs to be returned to them on a USB hard drive I normally buy one in Brentwood High Street. For years I shopped in our branch of Dixons but they closed earlier this year so now I rely on Argos.

Argos has been patchy for technology supplies but they do have the advantage of being competitively priced. I’ve just walked in and picked a drive, but not yesterday - they had no disc drives at all. Not a single drive. When I got back I tried to order one from the Argos website but that wasn’t possible, none available for order either for collection in store or home delivery.

This afternoon I had to drive into London to collect CDs so I stopped off in PC World on the way back. Talking to one of their staff about the reduced stock of drives they had and he explained the problem. Apparently 90+% of the worlds supply of drives are made in a relatively small area of Thailand, and they’ve been hit hard by floods recently. He pointed to a sign rationing drives to two per customer until supplies are back to normal.

So, if you want your music files returned on a USB drive we might struggle at least until Thailand has dried out. Wonder if the BBC has a weather forecast for the Far East.

Sonos & High Quality Music

If you’ve seen our CD ripping blog you’ll know we had a panic when the installer of the Sonos system for which we’d ripped several hundred CDs, had pointed to a post on the Sonos website to say AIFF files were not supported.

Here’s a footnote. I was contacted by our client on Monday. He explained that he’d been listening to his music over the weekend and thankfully it was streaming fine. He’s happy, I’m relieved. So we’ll continue to rip CDs for Sonos users, into AIFF, Apple Lossless or into AAC or MP3 formats. With confidence.

Christmas is coming, it's voucher time.

I’ll admit it, I’ve lost track of time. We’ve been so busy these last few weeks it’s been heads down, nose to the grindstone, backs to the wall. Just didn’t look at the calendar. CD ripping like crazy.

We have several amazing clients but one I think of each year is the lady who has bought a Christmas voucher every year for four years. On Monday she rang to remind me what time of the year it is, yes, it’s voucher time. This year we’ve added a bit of a twist, the chance to secure a 10% discount simply by paying in advance. You can take the discount either by paying that bit less for the voucher or by having an extra 10% of CDs ripped by us. Alternatively we’ll bill you after the project is complete.

Click here to read more about our Christmas vouchers.

NAS, USB and Wi-Fi

I’m putting up a longer entry on our Blogger site so I’ll be more concise here.

CD ripping can be slow, but nothing compared to the time it takes to get digital music files onto a NAS drive. So, if you’ve got a lot of music be prepared as it is likely to take many hours.

Remember that the published speed of your Wi-Fi was written by the marketing department, in real life data transfer rates are much, much slower. It simply isn’t worth the trouble to try to load a NAS drive over a wireless connection. Too slow, too prone to transmission breaks and you’ll be very unpopular with other network users who will think the internet has died.

Do it across ethernet cables connected to a router. Even consider buying a cheap router, it will save you many hours.

Home Automation & Technology in Manilla

Every so often clients ask us to visit their home or office to help out with their technology, usually some problem with computers and music, or their network. Typically they are in or around London and frankly there are time when, sitting in traffic, I wish I was far, far, away.

Manila?

Well, being realistic nobody is going to ask me to the Manila just to sort out a music server, specially when there’s a local specialist who can help you better. Looking at Dip’s new website for his team of technology support professionals in Manila.

Digging around on the site I saw a cute little portable music player called Playbutton. It’s a wearable music player, as the name implies, it looks just like a button (as in the American political campaign button) connected to headphones. It’s a great idea, just in America I’d look to customise the surface area - as the site says, the device opens up opportunities in retail and museums.

Manilatech, check them out.

Wireless? Less Hassle?

One of the jobs I’ve been putting off is re-routing the cabling we use to link our CD ripping systems. When we first started we had a couple of PCs, one went through the other and out to the internet via a simple USB modem. Then we got bigger so more machines and a wireless router.

When we left the house and moved out into The Hutch I carried on with using wireless USB dongles. Now we’re wanting faster, more reliable data access so each system is now hard wired into an Apple wireless modem we’re running as a bridge to the main building where our broadband terminates. And all of those cables have to be re-aligned.

What complicates this is the three sets of speakers somehow we’ve picked up along the way and now can’t live without. This has given me an interest in wireless speakers. At the moment there seems to be three options on how to link wireless speakers.

First, Bluetooth. You need to have suitably enabled Bluetooth PCs as a starting point. The laptops are MacBooks so they’re OK but a couple of PCs would need upgrading, eating up a USB port each time. Second, you can use Apple’s Airplay system to send your music (along with data) across your home wireless network. Apple’s isn’t the only wireless method of connecting and streaming but for us (and our clients) it’s the obvious choice.

The third option is to use a proprietary system - one mentioned recently is Kleer - which uses special senders and receivers to make the connection. The worst of each world? Possibly, you need to dedicate a port to a USB dongle style device but you’ll be able to stream more data, more quickly. If you’re looking for the highest quality this may be the route to take.

How many MP3s on a CD?

One of our clients asked a simple question - how many MP3s can I get on a CD?

He has a new car and the stereo will play digital music direct from a CD. So, how many can he put on each disc? Shouldn’t be too hard to answer.

OK, a standard CD with music, such as you used to buy in HMV, stores just over an hour, say 70 minutes. However in data terms that’s around 750 Mb.

MP3 music is in data file format so the roundabout answer is as much music as will take up 750 Mb. As a CD ripping service we rip at 256 kbps into AAC format, the equivalent in MP3 would be 320 kbps. In our format you’d get much more music in digital format, around 7 CDs worth. As MP3 files the answer would be around 5 CDs worth. Roughly.

You could get more if you dropped the quality setting, so the music files are more compressed. The quality is worse, but that may not be a problem if the in car sound system is less than top notch. You could go down to 128 kbps for music and the sound might be acceptable.

If you were recording spoken voice (such as audio books) you can drop as low as 64 kbps and the quality will be acceptable, there just isn’t so much data in a speech compared to a symphony.

So, how many MP3s can you get on a CD? This CD ripping service says 5,7 music CDs or 12 CDs worth of spoken voice.

Ford Drops CD Ripping

OK, Ford Motor Company don’t rip CDs. We rip CDs, they sell cars.

Up to now it’s been possible to buy a car in which you could play CDs, but Fords are phasing that out from their range, in favour of an iPod jack plug and a Bluetooth port. So, where does that leave your CD collection? Stranded.

It’s another nail in the coffin of the CD. What can you do? The writing on the wall is clearly saying you need to get your music off CDs and into a digital format. That’s what we can do, it is the only way to release value from your CDs.

podServe - the Ford Motor Company of the CD ripping world.

Apple Drops CD Ripping

OK, that’s an hysterical headline, an exaggeration. But just a bit.

Apple has launched a couple of new computers, a great new entry level laptop and a replacement for the trusty Mac Mini. I have a great affection for both. I’m writing this on a MacBook and my main production machine is a trusty Mac Mini. Just love Apple and Mac. Very tempted by the new boxes when I saw them. But ...

Neither machine includes a CD drive. Looking at the Apple store they still list the add on of the superdrive (at $80) but the product description suggests in the case of the Mac Mini it only connects to the version running Lion Server. Don’t worry about the details just note that’s the most expensive variant.

For the typical Mac user, by the way I’m off to see one on Monday assuming their new MacBook arrives, this means they won’t be able to rip CDs. As a CD ripping service you might think this is great news for us, and indeed it may be, but it’s also yet another nail in the coffin of the humble CD, another barrier to realising value from all those plastic discs in all those CD racks.

FLAC CD Ripping

We are a customer focused business - if you want something we do everything possible to deliver. This brings me FLAC.

FLAC wasn’t part of our original service offering, mainly due to our focus on Apple, iTunes and music file formats compatible with that system - AAC, MP3, Apple Lossless and AIFF. However there have been requests, initially infrequent but more so lately, for FLAC and of course we don’t like to disappoint.

So, following tests, we now have a reliable platform so we’re confident we can deliver top quality results whether you want our standard formats or FLAC.

Music Compression, Streaming, an Apple Freebie?

Just put together some notes on music compression. How the landscape has changed over the years. Just suggested to a client that he buys a 1Tb drive. 1Tb - bloody amazing size. Does he need it? Probably not but it will just be a few pounds more than a 500 Gb drive, so why not?

OK, hard drives are silly cheap, what does that mean now that the far horizon shows Apples streaming music service heading our way? The freebie is that if they detect more compressed music in your library they will “upgrade” your stored tracks to the iCloud alternative of 256 kbps. So, does that mean you should switch back to ripping music at 128 kbps?

Err, no.

First the upgrade applies only to music players to which music can be streamed. These will be iOS devices - the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. Not the hard drive based iPod Classic range, these will continue to be synced via iTunes from the music on your hard drive. Apple isn’t offering to replace or upgrade any of that.

Second, when the service launches, people are going to be amazed at the volume of music that isn’t in iTunes Music Store. Yes, there is a vast amount under the Apple umbrella, but there’s a lot that isn’t. That which Apple doesn’t already have a copy of will have to be uploaded from you to them.

Third, mobile phone companies are going to hit the roof. In a year or two all those kids on the school bus home will be listening to music on their iPhones not from its store but streamed across the airwaves courtesy of Vodafone, Orange and their peers. Can you imagine how that will hit their capacity?

My mobile phone has an all the data you can eat feature, just wait till be start to talk about 6,12, or more hours of music streaming.

So stick with 256 Kbps AAC, or Apple Lossless, or AIFF. You won’t regret it.

iCloud? iHopeSo

For the last couple of years I’ve been predicting Apple would offer an option to let us move our music from local hard drives off into the cloud. As with all good predictions it’s eventually come true with yesterday’s announcements in San Francisco.

Earlier we’d seen offerings from Amazon and Google - essentially renting out space on their hard drives to substitute for space on your local PC or laptop. The advantage being you just throw at the cloud service all you’ve got and let remote experts take care of the data. Peace of mind, more disc space, greater availability; great features that most would find irresistable. In the USA, more later.

So yesterday Apple played catch up. They also, for many people, overtook. They offer fast, seamless integration into the current iTunes experience. When you subscribe to their service they’ll scan your iTunes collection and replicate that list on their giant servers. This will, pretty much instantly, make their versions of your music available on most of your other devices - your iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. This covers tracks you’ve purchased via iTunes Music Store.

Also, to cover music you’ve ripped yourself, for a modest fee ($25 pa) they will scan that music and match it with a copy they hold in their store and make that track available to you. For those who ripped at 128 kbps you get an upgrade to 256 kbps. Any thing that can’t be matched will only then be uploaded.

This is a very, very clever solution. First, it eats up a minute amount of space compared to the alternatives. Even the largest multi GB library is covered by a relatively small datafile - and that’s all Apple is storing. Think you’re getting 10 Gb, think again, more like 5 Kb and permission to access all those tracks that already reside on Apples hard drives. Buy a new album, zap, instantly available on any connected device (as long as its made by Apple). Second, the music industry will love it as I’m sure they will get a slice of your $25; and there’s nothing this industry likes more than money for nothing.

Finally, after years of lobbying, you’ll be paying a fee to the industry for the music you thought you owned when you purchased all those CDs. But hey, who’ll even notice?

Any downside? Well I imagine you’ll have to keep all your ripped music on your local computer so there will still be a need to back up that drive. If you fail or forget to pay your dues the service will delete your cloud music. Many people, having only a small amount of home ripped music, will be better off re-purchasing those tracks from iTunes Music Store rather than pay endless $25s - hey, the industry wins again.

What of services such as Spotify? If you buy music you might be better off with this type of service. You’ll pay more per month but you’ll get an infinitely large music collection. You can also access this via Android - a major advantage as despite the boasts of Jobs yesterday they are losing ground to Google on Android.

The big downside, at least just now, is us here outside the USA. We might get iCloud for data in the autumn but no date as yet for the music extension. And doubtless when it hits us $25 will become £25 (not £17).’

Faster CD Ripping?

One of the points we make to potential clients is that we save you time. Who wants to spend their precious private time stuffing CDs into a PC?

Of course, we want to save time too. We are always looking for faster CD ripping, as you would be if you were ripping your own collection. Maybe when looking at iTunes CD ripping settings you will have seen the term mentioning High Efficiency encoding. Maybe you thought (or hoped) that this would be an even faster way of ripping your music.

Sorry, it’s not. This setting relates to spoken word material. You can happily rip this at 48Kbps and get a good result. Compared to music there’s just not that level of variation in speech. If you take this route, and save a lot of disc space along the way, HE encoding will give you an even better result. Just don’t think it will work wonders on Bach or Blur.

Artefacts of the Last Century

I have been forced to consider the value of a CD.

Some eight years ago, when we started our CD ripping project, there were one or two places you could sell used CDs. At that time a main stream CD was selling at a considerable price. Even in those days people were shocked at just how little they could command once used.

Fast forward and what has happened. Carnage on the High Street retail landscape and there are now very few sales outlets for music CDs. In fact I can’t think of a shop that sells solely music, those handful left mix in video and computer games. Look in your supermarket and you’ll see CDs for three or four pounds, maybe even with a buy one get one free promotion too. Don’t forget, this is even taking into account the VAT hike to 20% we got hit with early this year.

Matched with the plummeting cost of new CDs there is the simple fact that today there are very few takers for CDs. Try and find anyone under 25 who thinks first of plastic rather than digital. It’s proven a deadly mix for the entertainment industry, hardly a day goes by without a new tale of woe from the once mighty names.

Here’s the blunt fact. You need to understand that in effect CDs are now worthless. They’re not old masters or fine wines, not even minor works by an obscure sculptor. They are artefacts of the last century - shiny scrap. What is to be done? Get with the march of time and technology, get your CDs onto iTunes in true digital format, enjoy them via an iPod or Sonos. Then chuck them on the scrap heap.

iPod Ear Bud Best Buddies

Just been reading the US edition of technology magazine Wired. They have a review of dual driver ear phones.

Even if you spend your money on a top of the range iPod Classic you still get a pair of basic earphones, which in manufacturing cost terms must be around 50p worth of equipment. OK, they still look cool even after all these years but they’re hardly the best way to enjoy your iPod and your CD ripping prowess.

Take a step up, get better ear furniture. Which is what this review does, looking at these dual-driver items you will get far better sound from the same digital audio files. Wired test four pairs, Galaxy Audio EB10, NOCS NS800, Ultimate Ears UE700 and Apple’s own In-Ear Headphones with Remote and Mic. Dolar prices range from $79 right up to $280 for the Galaxy offering.

The accolade of Editor’s pick goes to the Galaxy, not surprising as these are the most expensive. What impressed me is that even though the Apple buds are two years old, they stand up pretty well in comparison. Reading the review I’d find it hard to justify spending nearly three times the money, I think I’d go with Apple’s offering and enjoy the extra functionality.

Android Impact

If I were Apple I’d be worried. This week, and it’s a short week with the public holiday on Monday, we’ve had two calls about getting music onto Android smartphones. No, I’m sure Apple aren’t concerned about how many calls we get but Macrumors has posted stats showing that there are now more Android phones in operation in the USA than iPhones; and looking to buyer intentions Android now outstrips the iPhone by a significant margin.

BlackBerry and Pre have never had that impact on us. All of a sudden Android seems to have arrived with a bang.

The problem for Apple (and for us) is that you can’t use Apple’s iTunes software to sync your music with an Android phone or slate device. If we couldn’t offer and answer we were in danger of losing two clients. For us that’s a big deal, not so much so for Apple. So we went away and found a solution which is almost as elegant as iTunes, indeed respected technology blog TechCrunch called it “iTunes for Android”. CD ripping for Android now has its own new page, and we have two new clients.

As for Apple, you’ll have to ask them.