Edwood

Hmmm, neato. Microsoft released Robocopy GUI for friendlier operation. Utility Spotlight: Robocopy GUI

Does it work with WIndows XP? Looks like it's only part of Vista or Server 2008.

Well, I snagged another 2TB Seagate drive from Fry's. They dropped the price to $175 plus tax. So I went and got my other 3 drives purchases prices adjusted as well. I have a 3Ware 9550SX-4LP I snagged off of eBay coming, along with a 5 in 3 SATA hot swap drive bay. I'm have a spare 16GB Samsung SLC SSD I'll probably be installing the OS onto, rather than the slow ass dual 40GB Samsung 2.5" drives in RAID 1 I have in there currently. -Ed

Head-Case Datacenter Group Buy?

Ah, shit. Rest in peace, Mr. Kunzel. Really loved his conducting and direction of the Cincinnati Pops. I guess that's it for the collection I've been amassing.

Oh, since I'm not using an external amp for my speakers yet, I'm using the zone 2 stereo downmix output the DMC-1 has outputted to my old HK AVR 85. So, if I just need some sound out of it for when I have company over, I can turn on the old HK AVR 85 and have sound. Oh, the secondary zone audio thing is why the DMC-1 never shuts off since it can route and process audio even when it's "off". But they really should've included a basic power switch in the back near the IEC inlet. Perhaps when the warranty expires, I'll open it up and add one. But most of the time, I use the Smyth Realiser. I can have three headphone amps running off it independently. So, at least 3 people can listen with headphones to my system. Using my custom PRIR profile, of course, so it may or may not sound great since my ears are different from other people. I have the optical output from the Smyth Realiser going to my computer set up, where it is hooked up to my Grace m902's optical input. That way I can have the full Smyth SVS sound with my computer rig while I'm working and such. Minus the Tactile Transducers, of course, but it would be kind of difficult to work with my chair shaking and such. -Ed

Kind of difficult to quantify since I don't have anything else to compare to other than my old Receiver that is dying. (on the right of the DMC-1 in the pic above). Overall, better details, smoother response. LFE is not quite as punchy as my HK AVR 85, but it is flatter reponse, and not as boomy as my old receiver. More details in the LFE bass, that's even noticeable with the Tactile transducers. I think the perceived "punchiness" in my HK AVR 85 was that it was missing a lot of bass detail, and I have it cranked more, so only the loudest content is noticeable, and suddenly pops in. Where as with the DMC-1 there is more subtle LFE bass effects, and I can actually notice the "stereo panning" of the tactile transducers. (Smyth Realiser has stereo tactile transducers outputs) I really like DTS, much more dynamic and transient response than Dolby Digital. Can't wait to hear what Lossless formats sound like with this set up. (via 8 channel analog output from something like an Oppo BDP-83) One issue I've had with the DMC-1 is that it NEVER turns off. The so called "power" button does not turn it off, or put it any kind of standby. I simply turns off the displays. I measured it with my Kill-a-Watt meter, and it uses EXACTLY the same amount of power when on or in "standby". So, I use my PS Audio P300's power switch to turn off the power to the DMC-1. Not really a problem since the DMC-1 retains all of it's settings even with all power cut off to it. But the problem is I can't have my Smyth Realiser hooked up into the P300 since if the Realiser does not have power, it does not keep the Head tracker unit charged, and it automatically turns on, draining it's power. Annoying. The Realiser's Head Tracker Unit does stay off and charged up if plugged into any standard USB charger. But it would've been nice if Smyth Research put a small on/off switch on the Head Tracker. I prefer having the Realiser hooked up to my P300 since it's prone to noise, like ground loops, etc. It uses very little power, so running both the DMC-1 and Realiser on it does not cause it to heat up too much. -Ed

Is there a better Time Machine like back up program to use with Windows?

OK, I guess I'm going to have to suck it up and rebuild my Server. If I want to use Backblaze, I'll have to reinstall the OS as Windows XP since they don't support WIndows 2000. Now the question is, how reliable and maintenance free is Rsync? Was thinking of using the windows version, cwRsync. http://www.rsync.net/resources/howto/windows_rsync.html I'm not afraid of using command prompt. I just want it to be as hands off as possible once I have it set up. So here's my current plan: Personal Computers -> File Server (2x RAID Arrays) --Rsync to--> External HDD's (Primary Back Up) --> Backblaze (Secondary Emergency Back Up) What do you guys think? Seems to be the most cost effective. -Ed

I hate this part of their FAQ, because they don't mention that you can't back up a Shared Volume or drive at ALL with their service.

Yeah, but sneakernet is a pain in the ass. Since I work at home, I don't have a separate office that I can easily and repeatedly schlep an external HDD back and forth. I guess I can just live with the Windows continuing maintenance thing and have Backblaze back up a non-shared volume. Wish Backblaze worked with FreeNAS, backing up an external drive. Either way it's a hassle. Either upfront, or in the end.

Aw crap. Backblaze does NOT support backing up any networked, shared, or NAS drives. Makes sense, but makes an automated back up solution at home much more complicated then. This might rule out getting a QNAP device, or using FreeNAS OS. Backblaze does allow backing up a non-shared/networked external HDD or volume. So I suppose I could rebuild my server, keep using crappy Windows 2000 install, install Backblaze client, keep a back up of my files to another unshared volume/drive, and have Backblaze back up that part. Makes for a hassle, and eliminates the convenience of using Backblaze, as it will still require a lot of babysitting for me. Guess I need to think about this one more. Backblaze is designed for someone that uses a SINGLE computer they leave on all the time, with all of their data on it, with no real back up solutions. In other words, an idiot. I don't leave my primary workstation on ALL the time, so installing Backblaze on there is pointless. *sigh*

Oh, whoops. Forgot to update that I got the DMC-1. But will keep an eye out for upgrades in the future. Don't we always look forward to upgrading?

LOL, wow. That's awesome. How's the Backblaze service? $50/year for unlimited storage? Sounds too good to be true. At least they have their hardware end covered. I think I might end up going with a Cloud based back up to really cover my ass in a disaster scenario. Security and privacy issues are what have been holding me back. And reliability among other things. (reliability of the cloud hosting company, that is. Useless to have a back up at a company that goes bankrupt). -Ed

I'm not exactly sure if I like this show yet or not. I just keep watching it. Even though it seems it has no solid direction, like they're just making it up as they go.

Not very fire resistant, since I "cheaped" out and got the non plenum version. I had so much left over, I made speaker wires out of them. But, it is good to point out that a RAID array is useless if it gets corrupted and you lose data that way. Hence why I'm careful about the OS and RAID controller. All the convenience of RAID is completely useless with an unstable system. Knock on wood, I haven't had a single hardware failure. I've had drives lose their connection and I've had to manually rebuild the array. Fucking annoying and weird. -Ed

Where in my original post did I mention that I'm using the QNAP or my old Server purely as backup? I have well over two terabytes of data. Uptime IS important to me, and is also convenient. I really like the QNAP's ability to remote back up over FTP to another server, especially easy to do it to another QNAP NAS. With fires happening all the time in LA, a fire or an earthquake is likely most to take out all of my data at my home at once. Including my local back ups (not just my RAID arrays on my SERVER). I'm going to back them up at my father's office (in Ohio) with scheduled back ups. QNAP NAS's are appealing because of this functionality built in. Now back on topic. Yes, I considered the TS-439, but it doesn't leave a lot of room for future expansion. The TS-639 is the same as the TS-439, but with an additional fan for cooling and two extra drive bays. Pretty hefty price difference though. Only issue is the slow Atom CPU. It's energy savings comes at a performance price. If you want to use AES encryption on any of your RAID Volumes, it comes at a penalty to your Read and Write speeds, since the QNAP NAS's do not have dedicated hardware for AES encryption/decryption. So the wimpy Atom CPU has to handle it. I'd be interested in the TS-809 with it's 8 bays and 2.8GHz Core 2 Duo CPU. But it lacks eSATA port for back ups and also lacks jumbo frame support. Which is important to me because I frequently transfer several large files. -Ed

Yeah, I really like the flexibility and sheer feature set of the QNAP NAS's. Oh, and the ability to just chuck in some drives and have it automatically start building arrays with a few button presses is very very appealing to me.

I've been eyeing the slick all in one NAS boxes like QNAP TS-639. I wish it were able to do RAID 10, but I think I might just end up with two volumes (work stuff in RAID 1, media files in RAID 5). I really like the slick UI and ease of use. Of course it's not cheap. Otherwise, I could upgrade my old server. It's a Pentium M based mobo with an old 3Ware PATA 7410 RAID card with 4x 400GB Seagates in RAID 10. (OS is on the Mobo RAID 1 with 2x 2.5" drives) It's been pretty much rock solid reliable for years. Unfortunately, Windows 2000 as a server is a PITA to deal with, and not quite as rock solid as the hardware. I'm thinking of rebuilding it with adding a 3Ware/AMCC SATA RAID card (probably 9500S or 9550sx off of fleaBay). That way I can manage both RAID cards with the same 3DM2 manager. Will make for a crazy wiring mess. Not to mention I'll likely have to upgrade the old PSU as well. I already have 3x 2TB Seagates waiting and ready to go for the upgrade. They will be used for the RAID 5 Media volume. If I go with the QNAP, I'll have to abandon those old 4x 400GB Seagates. Not a big deal, I'll just get two more drives for the RAID 1 work volume. If I stick with upgrading my old server, I'm thinking of installing FreeNAS instead of Windows 2000 for the OS. Now the question is, is FreeNAS as stable as QNAP's OS? -Ed

I wired my condo with CAT6e. By the time anything approaches saturating that bandwidth, I'll have long sold this place and moved on. Oh, the irony. Yeah, WTF was I thinking buying that fucking expensive ass spool of Belden CAT6e.

Coming soon. Um........yeah.

Oh, the crying noobies at HF. "Waaaaaah, I hesitated too long, the price went up, and now I'm not getting a tighter spec'd chip that I wouldn't be able to hear the difference." -Ed

I want fully discrete so it can have a 2 minute battery life!

Grado can spend time on POS IEM designs, but can't be bothered to redesign a single headband assembly.

I'll get the next gen Zune HD if it has Burr-Brown PCM1704U-K DAC chips in it, and a decent amplifier circuit in it.