Quote:
Originally Posted by
Skillet 
I just pulled the trigger and bought a used 80.3. I won't actually have it and be up and running for about 2 weeks, but am trying to figure out my music library options. Other than streaming from a computer that either takes time to boot up or has to be left on all the time, what are you guys & gals using for a music "server" with your 80.3's and 5508's? I see that you can plug a USB drive in either the front or back and run music files from that, but my guess is that the 80.3 doesn't provide any type of user interface that would allow you to move files around, create playlists, etc. I don't want to hijack this thread, but what are my "non-computer" and "non Ipod/Ipad/MP3 player" options for streaming regular and hi-res music files to the 80.3 where I would have access to an interface to create playlists and such? It seems like the few music servers that I have seen (Olive is the first one that comes to mind), are ridiculously overpriced for something that isn't much more than an encased hard drive and a GUI. Thanks and feel free to PM me if you'd prefer.
I don't use the Integra for that purpose. I use my Oppo 93 with USB or eSata directly from a hard drive instead. It's a much simpler setup, and it supports even hi Rez multichannel downloads, videos, etc. plus ripped CDs, of course. Rumor has it that there is software out there to rip Blu-rays, as well. But, Oppo officially discontinued support of Blu-ray from hard drive beyond a certain fimware level. The Oppo comes into the Integra via HDMI.
The hard drives are authored on a PC, but the the PC is out of the picture on playback as the drive is moved over to the Oppo. It's good old sneaker net, but with terabyte capacity.
Actually, I use the less expensive internal hard drives into a cheap, quick swap EZ Dock. The dock is what has the USB/ connections to the Oppo. The drives are easily swappable, so my library can easily get into terabytes spread over as many mountable drives as I need now and in the future. Some friends have over 10 terabytes in their libraries this way.
It's cheap and simple plug 'n play and easy to create backups with another separate mirror image drive cloning dock or the hard drive can be simply and quickly copied from the PC via USB 3.0. The only limit is that the Oppo can only access one drive at a time. A 2 TB internal drive costs around $110 these days and the USB 2.0 EZ Dock is about $20. A USB 3.0 dock is about twice that, but you only need 2.0 for playback.
Plus, it sounds great and the picture looks great. My friends and I think CDs sound slightly better played back from the hard drive rather than the silver disk.
outside of direct streaming to it and 11 channel capability I don't know that it outperforms/features the 80.3 in any other regard. Oh...the upper Denons can also play 2 channel PCM to the zones which is nice.
