Downloading hires files-dummies guide

Posted by: ray sheldon on 08 October 2018

All,

I've owned my NDX for 20 months and have only ever used it for CD rips on my unitiserve and occasional radio. 

I guess I'm missing out on it's capabilities and I'm thinking of dipping my toes into 192/24 files(not that I'm an expert but I believe CD is only 16 bit).

Problem is, when it comes to I.T my knowledge is poor, well I am in my 40's....

I think this is what I need to do and would appreciate input to amend or add to my order of buying to storing on the US:

1. Choose album, turn Wi-Fi off my Windows 7 laptop and use network cable to connect to the network switch that's connected to NDX & US.

2. Download album to laptop(I've read it's best to download in FLAC)My US is set to convert FLAC to WAV in playback. My dealer talked me through that set up a while ago.

3. Store the download somewhere on the laptop, is desktop ok or do I save it to music folder or other....I don't know.

4. Open up network on my laptop, I have 2 folders.....one is a yellow folder with a green t-bar and says downloads. The other is a yellow folder with green t-bar that says music.

If I click on music, I get EX, HQ, LQ, MQ. I've figured out the MQ has the CD rips and the LQ has the parallel MP3 library.  Do I use the HQ under music or the downloads folder before moving forward?

5. When point 4 is answered....Open the either the HQ or downloads folder(which obviously both say empty), and then minimise the page so it's still open but is smaller on the laptop display. 

6. Locate the downloaded music and then minimise that page so that the folder and music file can be both seen on the laptop screen.

7. Simply drag the file into the folder.

Questions...

Does that immediately move the file into the US hard drive, does it take long?

Will the US file the new album just like CD rips, easy to find, album cover, artist, album name etc etc.

Does it matter that the cstream network cable will in theory be wrong way round. I.e. it's a directional cable that takes music from the US as apose to sending music to it.

Thanks in advance from an I.T thicko !

Ray. 

Posted on: 09 October 2018 by hungryhalibut
ray sheldon posted:

Oh, ok. I'll have a go if that hasn't worked.

I wonder once I open the nserve on the iPad if I can change cover?

You can’t. You need to use a metadata editor on your computer for anything in the downloads folder. 

Posted on: 09 October 2018 by ChrisSU
ray sheldon posted:

Oh, ok. I'll have a go if that hasn't worked.

I wonder once I open the nserve on the iPad if I can change cover?

You can't edit downloads in N-Serve, but if you open the folder on a computer, you should be able to save the same image as a .jpg if it doesn't show up. Or you can download the image again from an online source.

Posted on: 09 October 2018 by hungryhalibut

If you are downloading in flac, which is what I’d suggest, you can simply embed the cover in each file. Then you don’t need the folder.jpg. The Serve can transcode to WAV on playback. 

Posted on: 09 October 2018 by ray sheldon

Well it's still not showing in the app or the DTC. It does show in the downloads folder though using my laptop.

How long does it take to appear, it has been 3 hours now ! ?

Posted on: 09 October 2018 by ChrisR_EPL

It may not be a time issue, it may be waiting for an event to respond to which triggers the loading of new files. My NAS server s/w like many others is a Unix-based device, and doesn't respond to a Windows new folder or new file event, so when I add any new rips to the drive I have to restart the music server s/w to include the latest. I can't rely on it just happening eventually.

Never used the h/w you're discussing and I now run Minimserver on a Raspberry Pi as my server so the above may not be the case in your context. Worth knowing though.

Posted on: 09 October 2018 by ChrisSU
ray sheldon posted:

Well it's still not showing in the app or the DTC. It does show in the downloads folder though using my laptop.

How long does it take to appear, it has been 3 hours now ! ?

My record so far is several weeks! Usually it doesn't take that long though, and sometimes it's more or less instant. Why, I don't know? Sometimes the artwork will show in one view, but not in another, and sometimes it even appears in the Naim app when it has not yet appeared in N-serve. 

I've sometimes found that it helps to clear the UPnP cache (in Settings > Input Settings> UPnP) in the Naim app, and to refresh the cache in N-Serve settings. 

Posted on: 09 October 2018 by ray sheldon

I'm gonna have to restart the US in the morning as it's still not there in the downloads folder.

Perhaps the diffential back up at 4am may trigger the event, not that my NAS is turned on though,  only bother when I've a few CD rips to back up.

Not sure why my laptop shows it's there though?

Anybody dare try to explain that?

Posted on: 09 October 2018 by French Rooster

I have the unitserve too.  If I send separately each track from my pc to the unitserve, the tracks are appearing more quickly in the app.   If I try to send an entire album, it takes more time to appear and sometimes some tracks are missing.

I am using naim desktop client for the unitserve, to change or add the right covers.  If the album appears on the desktop client, i know it’s there in the unitserve.

Posted on: 09 October 2018 by Graham in Sussex

I had the same delay problem and noticed the manual says any folders have to be set up to be shared before copying to the download folder in the unitiserve. I started doing that on my Mac and the downloaded folders started to show immediately. It might be the same for folders from a PC?

Posted on: 09 October 2018 by ray sheldon

And the answer is.....Restart US and all is there working perfectly, metadata, cover and sounding much better than the original CD did.  And for those interested....REM's Automatic for the people. 

Posted on: 09 October 2018 by hungryhalibut

You really shouldn’t need to restart the US to get a new album to appear. My personal take on the US is that it’s a great ripper, but once one’s CDs are ripped it’s largely pointless. I use Asset on a Qnap NAS, and when I load a new album, either ripped on the laptop or downloaded, it shows in the Naim app in less than 30 seconds and is ready to play. Remember also that the files in the downloads folder are not included in the differential backup. You need your own backup arrangements for these albums. 

Posted on: 09 October 2018 by ChrisSU
Graham in Sussex posted:

I had the same delay problem and noticed the manual says any folders have to be set up to be shared before copying to the download folder in the unitiserve. I started doing that on my Mac and the downloaded folders started to show immediately. It might be the same for folders from a PC?

Are you sure about that? I don’t recall reading anything like that regarding downloads. Maybe you are thinking of shen you set up a network share or music store on an external device?

Posted on: 10 October 2018 by David Hendon
ray sheldon posted:

And the answer is.....Restart US and all is there working perfectly, metadata, cover and sounding much better than the original CD did.  And for those interested....REM's Automatic for the people. 

When I had a US my experience was like Chris's. The files would appear in their own good time which could be hours or more later. Restarting the US sometimes helped but usually it didn't. Forcing a rescan using the Windows DTC was a more certain fix, but I found it such an unfriendly programme that I hesitated to use it. In the end I abandoned the US and bought a UnitiCore where downloads appear in a few tens of seconds at the most.

The reason you can see the files with a PC but not in the nserve app or Windows DTC is that they are indeed there, but the US indexing hasn't picked them up yet.

best

David

Posted on: 10 October 2018 by Graham in Sussex

"Are you sure about that? I don’t recall reading anything like that regarding downloads. Maybe you are thinking of shen you set up a network share or music store on an external device?"

Yes, i think that is right as the manual says that the download folder is treated as a network share. I take that to mean that network share rules will apply to folders placed in the download folder. All I can say is that it worked for me instantly and solve a major headache. i do appreciate it might not work for everyone. 

 

Posted on: 11 October 2018 by David O'Higgins
ChrisSU posted:

Possibly, although I remember one of the worst I had was that bargain Lou Reed complete albums set, which I know some people (including you?) downloaded complete with metadata. Mine arrived as a long list of tracks, and I had to look up the discography on Wikipedia to split the long list into albums, add artwork, artist etc. I asked Qobuz why, and their response was so blunt and unhelpful they might as well have told me to F off.  

That’s not unusual!

Posted on: 12 October 2018 by ray sheldon

Well my next purchase saw the music available immediately after copying to the folder. Perhaps something just needed waking up in the US.

Posted on: 12 October 2018 by Bart
ray sheldon posted:

Well my next purchase saw the music available immediately after copying to the folder. Perhaps something just needed waking up in the US.

When I owned one I found it highly variable; sometimes new music was seen immediately, sometimes I had to force a re-scan.