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Quiet storage

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Posted on February 3, 2017 at 18:10:33
maxim
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 I need about 2TB of storage for my music database. Is there a quiet solution, to keep storage in the music room directly attached to my sonictrasporter that I use as a player?

Currently, I have a WD Elements external drive and it is so noisy ...

Or am I better off with a NAS in another room?

 

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Better off with a NAS in another room. (NT), posted on February 3, 2017 at 18:18:45
Kal Rubinson
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RE: Quiet storage, posted on February 3, 2017 at 18:33:54
AbeCollins
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 2.5" drives typically used in laptops are very quiet. Unless you put your ear right up to them you are not likely to hear them at your listening position. An external USB drive that uses 2.5" HDD technology will work great and cost very little.

USB SSD's will be totally quiet but at that capacity they can be rather pricey.

The other option is a NAS in another room but now you have another device on the network that needs to be managed. No big deal but it's not quite as straight forward as plugging in a USB drive.

Seagate 2TB USB HDD on Amazon

Samsung 2TB USB 3.1 SSD with USB adapter cable on Amazon. This one is about $750. They have a smaller capacity version at 1TB for about $400.



 

Or. . . a shared drive in another room, posted on February 3, 2017 at 23:43:07
Chris from Lafayette
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 Although, in general, storage is cheap these days, those SSD's can get to be pretty pricey once the capacity gets beyond a certain threshold. My own set up is to have a 4TB RAID drive set up as a shared drive in another room, and, since I store my files as (uncompressed) AIFF's rather than FLAC's, I can already see that I'm eventually going to need to go to 6TB in the not too distant future.

 

Your sonicTransporter is basically a music-only NAS, posted on February 4, 2017 at 06:14:24
Dave_K
 So why not just move it into another room?

 

No, it's a player!, posted on February 4, 2017 at 06:30:48
maxim
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 I connect it directly to my DAC and run Roon.

 

Are you talking about...., posted on February 4, 2017 at 09:37:13
AbeCollins
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Are you talking about drive(s) within or attached to a PC/Mac shared out over the network for other devices like music streamers located in other parts of the house? This is essentially a NAS, but often more flexible.

I have such a setup but I still keep it quiet locally. The Mac Mini in my office is quiet and it directly drives my office DAC and amp. Additionally, it acts as a NAS for my network music streamer down in the basement.

So my Mac Mini performs double duty in this regard (office music server and NAS) and I can also use it to rip CDs or download hi-res material. And of course it will also run some demanding apps like HQPlayer. Same functionality can be had from a quiet PC.

I've thought about going the dedicated NAS route but for me it doesn't really make sense as that would mean yet another device on the network to be managed when I have all the NAS functionality I need -and more- in the Mac Mini.


 

Yes - I wasn't clear, but that's what I was talking about, posted on February 4, 2017 at 09:49:08
Chris from Lafayette
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 The shared drive is in another part of the house.

 

RE: Quiet storage, posted on February 4, 2017 at 10:29:29
PAR
 As I run a Seagate HDD to hold my music library I thought I might add a comment.

If the OP wants total silence he won't get it from one of these. They are very quiet but not absolutely silent. I sit around 2m from mine when listening. I normally cannot hear it but on the odd occasion I am aware of a very quiet "shushing" sound. To minimise this I play the tracks from memory so that the disc is not spinning all of the time (memory in this case is the SSD of my server computer). Nevertheless there is the occasional brief "zip" sound as the HDD disc spins up to deliver the next musical tranche to memory.

I would also add ( having more than one) that the Seagate HDDs seem prone to corruption although Win 10 spots this and the fix is very quick and simple. Alas on one occasion I had to reformat the drive and reload the library from a backup. However if constant running of the drive is envisaged then a NAS with appropriate discs is a better choice as external drives are not built for that intensity.

One advantage if using external HDD drives is that many (3")have their own power suppply. All of the external SSDs appear to be powered from the computer's USB bus. Not a good thing for audio purposes about which much has been written. So the advice is to find a way of getting clean power to the drive e.g. using a dedicated PS. I am just about to do this myself as soon as I buy a 500gb SSD and an Aqvox PS. I only need 500gb for now and I am hoping that as my need for storage increases over time then price will come down.

I like the general idea of that direct connection of the drive compared to that of NAS due to simplicity ( I really do not want to get caught up in some of the NAS complexities I read about here, on CA and elsewhere). However a NAS is clearly preferable ( indeed unavoidable) if more than one user and more than one listening location is required.


 

RE: Quiet storage, posted on February 4, 2017 at 11:50:18
AbeCollins
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 Well, I'm pretty sure the OP was asking for a practical solution. Of course we go down that bottomless rat hole of extreme optimizations and tweaks but I don't think that's what he had in mind in this particular post. I believe I gave him the quick, simple, and practical options in a quiet HDD or silent SSD.

He may also be trying to justify purchasing a NAS and that's fine too.

What Seagate HDD do you have? Is it a 2.5" 5400rpm laptop style or a larger 3.5" 7200rpm unit?

If the OP wants total silence he won't get it from one of these.

I'm not suggesting that he will get TOTAL silence but 2.5" 5400rpm laptop style drives are extremely quiet, cheap as dirt, easy, and can't be heard by most people at typical listening distances, especially while listening to music. I've run them for years before SSD prices came down. Even w/o the music playing and "typical" being 6 to 10 feet away in my estimation, I'd challenge anyone to hear a good USB 2.5" 5400 rpm laptop disk. Of course if you're sitting right up by the HDD in front of you (maybe a desktop music setup), you may hear it. And of course you already mentioned "memory play" where the music is cached so the disk won't be accessing while the music is playing.

As for placing the USB HDD or SSD on a USB port, all one has to do is ensure that the USB controller is not shared by another device like the DAC, mouse, keyboard, etc. Very easy to do. Works very nicely with no hiccups. Sure one can worry and do more but at this point we're talking tiny incremental gains.

As for disks being prone to corruption that can be said of ANY disk. And it's not always the disk's fault. So the occasional check and backup is in order regardless of what disk is used. But quite frankly, 'corruption' was a bigger problem in the days of old MS Windows. I haven't experienced any such corruption since switching to Mac seven years ago, or with recent Windows 10.

"However if constant running of the drive is envisaged then a NAS with appropriate discs is a better choice as external drives are not built for that intensity."

There's nothing intense about playing music off a disk drive. It's primarily reads, practically no writes, very very little seeks, and the disk can be auto powered OFF after a period of inactivity. ANY disk would be loafing playing music. A 2.5" disk in a laptop gets a more intense workout doing mundane tasks like spread sheets, word processing, power point, browsing the web, editing photos, being bumped around, etc., yet they often last for years with no issues.

As for durable NAS disks, these are typically of the 3.5" variety and they are inherently more noisy than a 2.5" laptop disk (but quieter than other 3.5" disks). However, there's no reason one couldn't buy a "NAS disk" and not put it in a NAS. Just use it as an external disk. But I wouldn't. I'd still go with a quiet 2.5" laptop drive with USB (or Thunderbolt) interface.

"However a NAS is clearly preferable ( indeed unavoidable) if more than one user and more than one listening location is required."

I have to disagree. I do not own a NAS yet I have 5 listening locations in my home all being served up by one computer on my network with internal and external 2.5" USB disks and SSD. No dedicated NAS here and the networked listening locations include: Master Bedroom, Guest Bedroom, Family Room, Home Office, and Basement.

There are several ways to setup a digital music playback system and tweak it endlessly. I was offering up a couple practical solutions. The tweaks are up to the OP.



 

RE: No, it's a player!, posted on February 4, 2017 at 12:10:04
AbeCollins
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 Dave_K makes a valid point for the sonicTransporter's intended use.

" I connect it directly to my DAC and run Roon."

So why did you buy the sonicTransporter if you're attaching it directly to your DAC? You can do that with any PC and have more flexibility in the setup.

I would think that most sonicTransporter setups would be used as a Roon server working over the network streaming to an end-point like a microRendu or other network streamer. In this type of scenario the sonicTransporter with attached disks could be placed in another room.


 

What product do you own exactly?, posted on February 4, 2017 at 12:20:33
Dave_K
 The only sonicTransporter I'm aware of is the following music server product line from Small Green Computer:

https://www.smallgreencomputer.com/collections/audio-server

 

RE: What product do you own exactly?, posted on February 4, 2017 at 20:04:26
maxim
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 It is sonictrasporter i5. It runs Roon core.

https://www.smallgreencomputer.com/collections/audio-server/products/sonictransporter-i5

 

RE: No, it's a player!, posted on February 4, 2017 at 20:12:37
maxim
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 I can do that ...

but the simplest setup is to run Roon core on sonictransporter and connect music storage directly ... then I use LAN only for control.

maxim

 

RE: What product do you own exactly?, posted on February 5, 2017 at 14:03:43
Dave_K
 Note that Small Green Computer does not recommend directly connecting a USB DAC. For better sound quality, you could move the sonicTransporter to another room (perhaps where your router or network switch is) and run an Ethernet cable to a Sonore microRendu in your music room to feed your DAC.

 

RE: Quiet storage, posted on February 5, 2017 at 16:21:51
Old Listener
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 A Western Digital 2 TB 2.5 inch USB drive will do the job and be very quiet.

I think that the OP referred to a 3.5 inch Western Digital USB drive.

my blog: http://carsmusicandnature.blogspot.com/

 

This discussion, posted on February 5, 2017 at 17:50:58
E-Stat
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 seems to revolve around a question that is quickly solved by locating the drives elsewhere.

Which, like others who have chimed in, is my solution.

 

Ditto and ditto, posted on February 5, 2017 at 17:58:52
E-Stat
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 In the beginning, there was my office server continually used for many tasks, both personal and professional...

I maintain a powerful unit that just happens to provide remote NAS storage for players located elsewhere in (and outside) the house. With my LMS software, it also performs the FLAC decoding so that the streamers only see uncompressed WAV files.

I see no need for "dedicated local storage" especially since I leverage a common digital library for effectively five different systems.

 

RE: What product do you own exactly?, posted on February 5, 2017 at 18:49:43
maxim
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 Dave,

Where is this recommendation NOT to connect to a DAC directly? I have not seen it ... And what is the reason?

Thanks.

m

 

RE: This discussion, posted on February 5, 2017 at 20:34:32
Ivan303
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 This discussion has me wondering if it's time to unpack my RCM and go back to vinyl (where old people belong anyway as long as they can still get to their feet every 20 minutes or so).





First they came for the dumb-asses
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a dumb-ass

 

RE: Ditto and ditto, posted on February 5, 2017 at 20:40:48
AbeCollins
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Yup, it's all a matter how one wants to approach a solution for their own particular needs. In my case I don't really need a dedicated NAS as the Mac Mini also performs this role.

As you know, a typical consumer NAS is nothing more than a (often under powered) 'computer' with RAID disks serving up files via various network protocols.... pretty much all of which are also supported on general purpose computers.



 

RE: This discussion, posted on February 5, 2017 at 20:42:46
AbeCollins
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The sad thing about my RCM is that I used it for a couple months a few years ago to clean my favorite LPs and now it sits in the basement packed up and unused. It's still practically brand new.

Anyone want to rent my RCM ? ;-)



 

RE: What product do you own exactly?, posted on February 6, 2017 at 08:59:01
Dave_K
 Here is where I saw it:

https://community.roonlabs.com/t/what-do-you-use-on-a-sonictransporter-usb-3-0-connection/16732/11

And also here:

https://community.roonlabs.com/t/inputs-outputs-on-the-sonictransporter-i5/17831/2

See here for their recommended setups:

https://www.smallgreencomputer.com/pages/what-do-i-need

 

Thanks!! , posted on February 6, 2017 at 12:24:45
maxim
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Synology, posted on February 6, 2017 at 20:19:10
triodesteve
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 I recently bought a Synology DS213j from Synology's Amazon page. Its not the latest greatest by any means, but I did find an older review which published noise measurements. Right now I have it stuffed with WD Red drives and its pretty darn quiet. I may move it to another room eventually, but its really not necessary. I paid all of $95 for the refurbished unit which to my eye was brand new.
Mine is also connected to a Sonic Transporter

 

RE: Quiet storage, posted on February 6, 2017 at 23:01:25
Recorder
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 I have a 3.5" 5TB Western Digital Red drive in an IcyDock fan-less enclosure and it is extremely quiet. From 3 feet away I can just barely hear it spin up if I consciously listen for it.
Cheers,
Bill

 

Interesting indeed! -nt, posted on February 7, 2017 at 14:55:24
E-Stat
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 .

 

That pretty much sums it up. Done! Thanks - nt, posted on February 8, 2017 at 09:04:13
AbeCollins
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 .

 

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