I have a lot of music cd’s that i want to load to My Cloud. What is the most efficient way to do this and be able to stream it on my i-phone & i-pad? Thanks
Rip them all to your hard drive and then drag and drop.
I did that with 2 cd’s. They play fine on my laptops, but when I access them on my i-phone I get an outline of a cloud with a question mark inside it.
You need to rip to a format supported by iDevices.
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Most efficient way? That’s tricky. But here’s a basic guide to what you need to consider.
You will need some ripping software to pull the music tracks off the CD and onto a hard disk.
The ripper will probably be able to fetch metadata (track names, artist, album name, date, genre, album artwork etc etc) from online sources. But be aware that this data is frequently wrong…
You will benefit from a media library manager to help organise your music, and manipulate metadata, change format, etc. This media library manager may include the ripper.
Ripping is a tedious task, and you do not want to do it more than once. So I would strongly recommend that you rip to a lossless audio format (that can perfectly reconstruct the file as it appears on the CD, with no loss of quality). I choose to use FLAC to do this. If you need to use a lossy compression format (MP3, AAC etc) to fit all your music onto a portable device, then transcoded to a parallel directory and keep the original FLAC files.
I would recommend you rip your music into a simple, three-level file hierarchy
AlbumArtist/Album/Track# TrackTitle
This echoes the physical hierarchy of your CD collection, so it’s easy to re-rip a CD if necessary.
The media library manager will allow you to view a logical sorting of your collection using the metadata.
I recommend prefixing the track title with the track number, using a leading zero format, as some media players only allow sorting by filename, rather than metadata, and the leading zero means that tracks are listed in the correct order (rather than 1, 11 … 19, 2 etc).
Once you have ripped your music, you can transfer it to your MyCloud. I prefer to rip to local disk, and add it to my MyCloud later, as I only have a 100Mpbs Ethernet, and ripping directly to NAS slows the rip down significantly.
Now that my library is completely ripped and moved to MyCloud, I add new CDs by ripping to local disk, sorting the metadata, adding artwork, doing volume analysis and compressing to parallel MP3 drive before I move the new CD to the MyCloud library.
You need to consider where to put your media on the MyCloud. If you put in in the Public share, anyone with access to your local network will be able to add, modify or delete your media. If you put it in a Private share, only specified users will have the access rights you give them. Whether you put it in the Public share, or a Private share, the DLNA media server, Twonky, will still be able to find it and stream it to DLNA clients.
There are many ripping and library management tools out there, depending on your computing platform.
I have an old Windows XP machine, and I use Exact Audio Copy for ripping and MediaMonkey for library management. MM will also rip, but I prefer the error correction reporting that EAC provides.
Once your CDs are ripped, and arranged in a nice physical library, you can get Twonky to make them available to stream to UPnP/DLNA media clients in your local network.
http://community.wd.com/t5/WD-My-Cloud/FAQ-Twonky-DLNA-Media-Server-Setup-amp-Use/td-p/858810
If you enable remote access to your MyCloud, you can use the WD MyCloud app to stream them when your away from home. You need to ensure your broadband link has adequate bandwidth to support streaming, and check that you won’t break any data volume limits in your service agreement. If accessing via a mobile phone connection (3,4 or 5G), you should check your data volume charging agreement; streaming gobbles data.
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I seem to have given your a more detailed answer than perhaps you were looking for…
Your problem with iThings not seeing your music is, as has been pointed out, down to the lack of support for the format you have ripped to. As it happens, I have been experimenting with remote access today, having copied some of my media to a remotely-accessible MyCloud. On an Android tablet, I can see and play the .FLAC files, and I can see the .JPG and .BMP artwork files, and some .TXT files, but it gives me a ‘?’ for a .LOG file, and for a script file with no file extension; it reports that there is no app to read these (despite the fact that they are actually simple text files).
This brings me back to the format conversion; as I suggested, I would always keep a lossless FLAC, but you might convert to AAC in a parallel directory. You might choose which of these formats you make visible to Twonky for streaming in your local network; you could enable streaming on the FLAC versions, and disable streaming of the AAC versions, but use these when accessing remotely with an iThing. Either that, or install a decent media app on the iThing that can play FLAC files…
You might also look at what the iTunes server can provide for your iThings in your local network. I despise iTunes, so have not touched the server implementation on the MyCloud; it might work brilliantly…
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Thanks for the info, it is a lot to take in and a bit over my head. When I rip to my computer it goes through Windows Media Player. Could that be causing the problem with my i-phone, i-pad not recognizing it?
When I rip to my computer it goes through Windows Media Player. Could that be causing the problem with my i-phone, i-pad not recognizing it?
It might be. Unless you have told it otherwise, Windows Media Player (WMP) will rip to a format called Windows Media audio, with the file extension .WMA I’m not sure if iThings will play WMA files; I know they will play AAC and MP3.
What file extension do your ripped files have?
WMP will rip to an uncompressed format (.WAV), but this is a poor format to use, as it doesn’t have good support for metadata (the bits of information that describe the music file). I would recommend looking at a media tool that will rip to FLAC. MediaMonkey is free, and it works the way I do.
I’m happy to try to help you understand ripping and media management; let me know what you think is over your head, and I’ll try to pitch my explanations at an appropriate level.
I will download MediaMonkey tonight and give it a try. I’ll let you know how it works out. Thank you for your help
iceref wrote:
I have a lot of music cd’s that i want to load to My Cloud. What is the most efficient way to do this and be able to stream it on my i-phone & i-pad? Thanks
If you are already using iTunes to rip audio CD’s then you should be able to copy the ripped content from your PC/Mac to the WD My Cloud. Make sure to copy the music files into a folder that has “Media Serving” enabled.
It is probably a good idea to change the way iTunes rips the audio files so as to allow the wides amount of compatibility. By changing the iTunes (or other program’s) method of ripping audio to “MP3” it will allow most media players and media devices to play the music file. See the following link for general information on configuring iTunes to rip in MP3 format.
How to Rip MP3s from an Audio CD with iTunes
If you have already ripped the music in the default iTunes format then see the following link for general steps on how to convert an existing song into the MP3 format.
iTunes: How to convert a song to a different file format
Once the music is on the WD My Cloud you can then use the WD My Cloud app for iOS (or Android) to navigate to the folder containing the music on the WD My Cloud, then select either the individual music file to play or select the Music icon (if it is available) which should list all the songs in that directory, from there you can select the music file. If for what ever reason the music file does not play then chances are its in a format the device (or app) cannot play.
Edit to add: If one is using Windows Media Player to rip audio CD’s one can change the rip settings to rip to MP3 rather than WMA or the default Windows Media Player format. See the following link for general steps.
Produce MP3 files from a CD with Windows Media Player?
To convert Windows Media Player WMA files to MP3 there are a variety of ways and programs to accomplish this task. One general way is described at the following link.
How to Convert WMA to MP3 Using Windows Media Player
Once converted copy the music as indicated above to a folder on the WD My Cloud.
Note: If copying over a large amount of music it will take the WD My Cloud some time (hours or longer) to process/sort the files into its internal database.
iceref wrote:
I have a lot of music cd’s that i want to load to My Cloud. What is the most efficient way to do this and be able to stream it on my i-phone & i-pad? Thanks
If you are already using iTunes to rip audio CD’s then you should be able to copy the ripped content from your PC/Mac to the WD My Cloud. Make sure to copy the music files into a folder that has “Media Serving” enabled.
It is probably a good idea to change the way iTunes rips the audio files so as to allow the wides amount of compatibility. By changing the iTunes (or other program’s) method of ripping audio to “MP3” it will allow most media players and media devices to play the music file. See the following link for general information on configuring iTunes to rip in MP3 format.
How to Rip MP3s from an Audio CD with iTunes
If you have already ripped the music in the default iTunes format then see the following link for general steps on how to convert an existing song into the MP3 format.
iTunes: How to convert a song to a different file format
Once the music is on the WD My Cloud you can then use the WD My Cloud app for iOS (or Android) to navigate to the folder containing the music on the WD My Cloud, then select either the individual music file to play or select the Music icon (if it is available) which should list all the songs in that directory, from there you can select the music file. If for what ever reason the music file does not play then chances are its in a format the device (or app) cannot play.
Edit to add: If one is using Windows Media Player to rip audio CD’s one can change the rip settings to rip to MP3 rather than WMA or the default Windows Media Player format. See the following link for general steps.
Produce MP3 files from a CD with Windows Media Player?
To convert Windows Media Player WMA files to MP3 there are a variety of ways and programs to accomplish this task. One general way is described at the following link.
How to Convert WMA to MP3 Using Windows Media Player
Once converted copy the music as indicated above to a folder on the WD My Cloud.
Note: If copying over a large amount of music it will take the WD My Cloud some time (hours or longer) to process/sort the files into its internal database.
That’s weird; I just replied to a post by Bennor, only to be told it didn’t exist…
My post was to say DON’T RIP TO A LOSSY FORMAT like WMA, AAC or MP3. You will regret throwing away the detail. Given the low cost of large hard drives, it is unnecessary. You only want to rip once, trust me; it’s a HUGE undertaking in time and effort. Rip to uncompressed format, and let your computer create transcoded, compressed copies as they are needed for a given player; transcode to a parallel directory or disk.
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cpt_paranoia wrote:
That’s weird; I just replied to a post by Bennor, only to be told it didn’t exist…
My post was to say DON’T RIP TO A LOSSY FORMAT like WMA, AAC or MP3. You will regret throwing away the detail. Given the low cost of large hard drives, it unnecessary. You only want to rip once, trust me; it’s a HUGE undertaking in time and effort. Rip to uncompressed format, and let your computer create transcoded, compressed copies as they are needed for a given player; transcode to a parallel directory or disk.
Yeah its weird, the post disappeared so I made a second one and it vanished too.
Only reason I suggested ripping to MP3 was for compatibly sake between multiple devices. One can rip at a high enough rate with MP3 that for 99% of the people they won’t notice the difference between the MP3 file and a non lossy format.
If the audio CD’s have already been ripped to WMA or the base iTunes format then one may not loose much by converting it to MP3.
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Ok, let me know if this makes any sense at all. I ripped a ‘Greatest Hits Album’. Like I said before, it plays fine on my pc and laptops. When I bring up the album try to play the songs on iphone/pad, they come up with a cloud that has a question mark in it. They all have a wma format after the title. When I select view all (a-z) from the upper right of music screen, three of the songs play but are listed twice, once in wma format, the other in m4a format. The m4a format plays, I am lost with this.
iceref wrote:
Ok, let me know if this makes any sense at all. I ripped a ‘Greatest Hits Album’. Like I said before, it plays fine on my pc and laptops. When I bring up the album try to play the songs on iphone/pad, they come up with a cloud that has a question mark in it. They all have a wma format after the title. When I select view all (a-z) from the upper right of music screen, three of the songs play but are listed twice, once in wma format, the other in m4a format. The m4a format plays, I am lost with this.
WMA won’t play because it is not supported on the device your trying to play the file back on. You have to convert the WMA file to either M4A, AAC or MP3 or some other iOS supported audio format.
Generally the iPhone supports the following audio formats:
AAC (16 to 320 Kbps)
AIFF
AAC Protected (MP4 from iTunes Store)
MP3 (16 to 320 Kbps)
MP3 VBR
Audible (formats 2-4)
Apple Lossless
WAV
Edit to add: One such way to convert from Windows Media Player WMA format into AAC or other Apple supported format is to install iTunes and having the iTunes program convert the file/album. One can also use iTunes to rip the audio CD into AAC or similar Apple device supported format. See the following link.
Thank you for the info. When I rip a cd to my hard drive, how do I choose between mp3 or wma?
iceref wrote:
Thank you for the info. When I rip a cd to my hard drive, how do I choose between mp3 or wma?
If your using Windows Media Player then see the following link on how to change the rip settings to another format:
Perfect, thank you so much for the info. I just looked at the article you referred. Do you suggest keeping the audio quality at the default setting or increasing it to 192?
iceref wrote:
Perfect, thank you so much for the info. I just looked at the article you referred. Do you suggest keeping the audio quality at the default setting or increasing it to 192?
For ripping CD’s you will have to experiment to see which encoding bit rate setting works best for you. Some will always say rip at the high rate possible. Its personal preference. It will also depend on what your ripping. If ripping audiobook type CD’s you can usually get away with a lower bit rate (64 or 96) than with music CD’s. Again you will have to experiment to find out what works best for you.
For music that has already been ripped to a specific bit rate then your generally limited to that bit rate or a lower bit when trying to convert from one file format to another. Meaning that if ripped at a bit rate of 128 you probably won’t gain anything by converting to a bit rate of 192 when making the conversion. Again experiment to see what works best for you.
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Thank you again, you have all been a great help.
