If you;re going to the trouble of setting up a home network, it makes alot of sense to use a home server -- this will simplify storage and distribution of your media (audio, video and also pictures!) as well as provide a hub for expansion of services (eg. backup of PC/Macs in your house, secure access to your media when you are not home, etc.)

 Take a look at www.amahi.org - a flexible open source home server with alot to offer (am=nd more to come).

This is going to an interesting series of articles. I have spent the last 5 months researching this topic but from a different perspective. My goal was to devise a “performance oriented” home Audio Video network. By performance oriented I mean that a system which can delivery the very best audio and video performance in real terms.

nice article really i have some questions .

if i play a bluray direct from my  harddisc  with the power dvd 8 to my lcd with the vga cable do i have the same picture quality as hdmi .

if i use the dvi connection from pc  to my onkyo 605 receiver so dvi hdmi   is it possible to receive dolby 5.1 dts and better the new true surround that comes with bluray.

regards hans voorn (milano)

Hi, Hans

Answer to your first question: The HDMI connection should provide a better picture quality because you are bypassing two additional stages of video processing. However, there are further consideration, the qulaity of your graphic card, monitor & etc.

Answer to your second question: This depends on your PC hardware and the CODECs installed on you PC.

There are major differences between a general purpose PC & a PC built for HD media applications. 

Hi, Andrew

The disc drive does have an impact on the quality of sound.  Every single component (Audio/Sound card, PSU etc.) has an effect on the audio performance. I have not done extensive tests on this subject but as a general rule stay away from cheapies. Pioneer drives are pretty good. When copy music on to CD ROMs try to stay at low transfer speed i.e. don't go all the way to the maximum tranfer rate e.g. if the drive can write at 16x then stay at 12x or so. Use good quality media.

Whilst the article is a nice introduction to the use of our computing power to serve us with audio and video, one of the options I would like to see reviewed is the presentation of these services over a wireless network. I for one have my audio video equipment in the lounge and for the sanity of my wife and family, have my iMac in a third floor office. Hard wired connectivity is therefore not an option to me. I have tried Twonky vision without success (connected to PS3) so a dedicated music server/client that can connect to a MAC/PC in a review would be fantastic.

In support of Abbas, every component can make a difference in computing terms, cache in hard disk, spin speed, memory, cpu. So, if you want the best, be prepared to spend. A nice MAC pro with a good spec will set me back over £2500 so for the time being, it's other options I need. 

ok abass  thx man i will consult an expert in my country .think i have to change my pc .

Regarding whether the quality of the hard disk will affect sound quality, the answer is NO!  As long as it's reading the bits off the disk without errors, you'll be fine (and if you've got an HDD that's error-prone, it's probably about to die and should be chucked ASAP!)  As long as you're piping your sound data over a LAN (wireless or otherwise), the hard disk will have exactly ZERO effect on the sound. 

The only thing that might affect the sound is jitter, and this can only be a problem if you're piping the sound straight out of the digital (SPDIF) output on your soundcard - and the effect it has on sound quality will depend on the type and quality of the DAC you're feeding it to.  And, any effect it does have will be subtle at best - the sort of thing that's extremely hard to pick out in blind testing.

If you're piping it over the network, it will be packaged up into 100% data-accurate packets that completely eliminate any hard-drive-induced jitter.  You then might get jitter introduced by your Squeezebox/Media PC/console etc on the other end of the network, but that's another issue...

Hi all,

Glad you're enjoying the articles - Part 2 should be live soon, or so I'm assured!

To Fred Williams - we discuss home server apps in Part 2. The problem with Amahi is that it runs under Linux. Although a robust and powerful operating system, you have to be a bit of a 'techie' to make the most of it (although recent distros are a lot user-friendlier than the ones I started playing with years back!). However, all of the steps involved would take us out of AVReview's scope. We've concentrated on Windows, since that's what most readers are using. Macs and Linux do get the odd mention, though.

I would agree with some of the posters that the hard drive doesn't really influence the sound quality. All modern high-capacity drives are capable of sustaining data rates far higher than what's required to capture even 192kHz/24-bit audio, and have virtually-immeasurable error rates.

What gets the audio onto the computer in the first place is more important. The digital audiio extraction of early CD-ROM drives left a lot to be desired - thankfully, modern CD/DVD drives are much better in this respect.

Exact Audio Copy - referenced in the article - is a well-designed and robust CD-ripper program, and has given me no jitter problems (which audibly manifest themselves as lacklustre dynamic range, vaguer soundstage and poorly-defined high-end amongst other nasties) when doing a comparison between a CD transport and a PC (high-quality soundcard with digital output) using an external audiophile-grade DAC.

Best

Martin

Hello

On some of the ripping software there can be a facility to "equalise" audio output level. In my experience this tends to have a negative impact on the sound. Last but not least, always backup your hard drive!!!

Anyone who has tried an M-Audio Audiophile 192 sound card?