Aargh! I thought I had it figured out perfectly. I got an 18GB Empeg model, knowing that I have a lot of music. 230 so CD's and a bunch of assorted MP3's (all of which I also own the original, of course.) I did some tests and figured out that 128k CBR encoding (with LAME) was the same perceivable quality as higher bitrate VBR's, at least on my factory system. So I thought I'd fit all my music on. So I come into work on a Sunday to scan in my CD's (I work in a lab with 10 PC's with fast CD-ROM drives.) And I come up about 10 albums short of space on my Empeg! I have like 90 megs free on an 18GB drive! Unbelievable. I guess my math was a little off.

Then I realized I accidentally encoded many of my albums as Stereo instead of Joint Stereo. I thought that might explain things... But I tried re-encoding in JS and there was no size difference at all... I expected at least a little, but nothing with any of the albums I tried. So I'm not going to bother re-encoding.

So anyway, it looks like I have to make some "cuts" from my collection. But I really do listen to every CD I own at one time or another... I thought about going through soundtracks and deleting some of the weaker songs from those... Or maybe I might have a disc or two that I only bought for a couple songs... But most of my albums I listen all the way through. Sigh... This is going to be a difficult process. I hope I'm not insane enough to buy a second HD for this thing...


-Tony
MkII 080000554

Ouch - I am afriad I may be in the same boat. But the good news is, new drives will be 2x as large and cost 1/2 as much.

-Doug
(Mk2-12G-Blue)

You could always encode some of your CDs at a lower rate (maybe the less demanding ones.)

Also, If you are satisfied with 128k, then why not use VBR with a max of 128k? This way they will almost always be smaller in size, but still have your max rate of 128k, and often a much smaller rate (depending on how low you set it.)

As an example, Tom Sawyer off the Digitaly Remastered Moving pictures takes 4.17MB at 128k CBR. At VBR min 64k, max 128k, it's 4.08MB. So that's only 0.09MB savings, but subtract that from every song over your 230 CD collection, and that adds up.

(NB: The above suggestion is based on theory. I haven't listened to these two on my empeg for differences... My PC sound is adequate, but not good enough for comparisons like this...)

I'm in a different boat. I only got the 12Gb, and figured it'd be fine, which it currently is. I've realized what crap I own for CDs (no accounting for what I used to like...), and I'm now looking for new CDs to buy (then rip...)

-Trevor

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Mk 2, Green 12GB 080000349

Hmm. 230 * 0.09 (from your example) = 20.7 megs = less than 1 more CD on my Empeg. I'd have to start making some more serious quality cuts if I wanted any real space to free up. I can't see encoding any of my albums in 112k or a low quality VBR setting, so it looks like I'm just going to have to cut some tunes/albums out entirely and wait until drives go down in price to add a second one. I can't believe I've filled 18GB already!


-Tony
MkII 080000554

I've already had to repeatedly delete lesser listened to CD's to make room for new one's i've purchased since getting my empeg. I filled up the 12 gig drive the second day i had it, so it's been a swapping game to figure out what of my 30 gigs of MP3's i wanna slap on at any given time. I thought i'd be fine and that i'd never actually listen to all the albums on the player at any given time, but it's amazing how it changed my listening habits and how much of the collection that i used to never listen to i am rediscovering. It's so incredible to have that much selection at your fingertips! I'm a hair trigger mouse click away from getting a 30 gig IBM to slap in there, but I'm waiting for the price to drop a tad and for the fact that i'm risking my warranty to sink in...


|| loren.cox
|| 080000446

Hmm. 230 * 0.09 (from your example) = 20.7 megs

Actually it's 230 * 0.09 * (avg # songs per CD.) Assuming 7 songs per CD, that's 230 * 0.09 * 7 = 144.9MB

Still not much at all. I'm going to run a test on a full CD, and see how that comes out...

-Trevor

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Mk 2, Green 12GB 080000349

Oh yeah :) My bad. You'd squeeze 3-4 albums out. I think I'm going to do some more of my own tests with bitrates and stuff to see if there's any tangible difference. I don't want sound quality to suffer but I could use the space.


-Tony
MkII 080000554

Update: I just did Foghat - The Best Of, and saved 13MB this way. It was 68MB at 128k CBR, and 55.2MB at 64-128k VBR.

So you'd gain about 1 CD per 5 ripped.

Again, I don't know what this does to the sound quality, but it wouldn't hurt to experiment...

Of course, personally I record 96-320k VBR with a resulting total size of 72.6MB...

-Trevor

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Mk 2, Green 12GB 080000349

I guess in my case its a little different. I am still in the queue and have not yet ordered but I only plan on getting the 6 gig version.

I too have a bunch of CDs, probably like 250 or so. Some I listen to a lot and others not as often. I listen to most all the way through, but few do I honestly like all the songs.

When I rip my CDs, I only rip the singles that I want to hear. I do as few as 2 or 3 songs from one CD all the way to the entire album. My personal collection of MP3s numbers about 730 files with about half recorded at 128 while the rest are higher. The sound quality is good enough for me so far, no problem there. Total disk space is about 3GB for me at this time, and I have a hard time looking for something else to rip that I want to hear.

I guess my point is that I don't rip the entire CD, just the songs I want to hear. I also have a lot of room for adding new MP3s when I get them, and don't expect to fill the 6GB drive any time soon. I also don't ever expect to hit the SKIP feature hardly at all. Why save the file to your MKII if you are only going to SKIP it when it comes up? I say use that disk space for something you really want to hear.

Financially, it makes sense for me to spend the extra $100 price difference and go ahead and get the 12GB version.. but I honestly don't see me ever needing that kind of space. Upgrading to a larger drive will only cost more, and slightly inconvenient. But I could use that $100 to buy future CDs to rip.. or beer. Most likely beer in my case.

queue 15772 - almost there!

Financially, it makes sense for me to spend the extra $100 price difference and go ahead and get the 12GB version but I honestly don't see me ever needing that kind of space

Please, oh please do not handicap yourself with a 6 GB player.

You are making a decision based on some faulty assumptions. Just ask any of the original Mark I purchasers who decided that 4 GB or 6 GB or even 10 GB was more than they would ever use.

This will seem hard to believe, but it is really true: Once you have the empeg, your listening habits are going to change dramatically. The empowerment of having all of your music so effortlessly and randomly available changes the way you listen and it changes what you listen to. I am not going to belabor this point as nothing I can say will convince you of this until you actually have and use an empeg. Tony said it very well here, and I am hoping he will jump in and re-inforce what I am saying.

Another possibly faulty assumption is that your present collection is all the music you are ever going to have. As you get older, your tastes in music will expand, and there will be additional music available that suits your present tastes. These factors will require more space.

I would consider 12 GB to be the absolute minimum to start out.

I know I have not convinced you, and that you are going to come back with some perfectly logical and plausible refutations of my arguments. I just wish to reserve the right to say "I told you so!" at some later date.

tanstaafl.


"There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch"

I agree with tanstaafl, 12Gb should be the minimum purchase.
But when I happened across Hugo's project two/three years ago, I had a measly collection of about 100mb of mp3's, I never even thought of ripping my on cd's, just getting tunes that I didnt own, back in the days of ftp and irc fserve, then napster came along, and I managed to get about 5 gig downloaded via nap, and then I ordered my unit in August of this year, then I realised, hey I have a large cd collection, SWEET!! I ordered the biggest, hugest, mofo empeg had, 36GB, and picked up a 40Gb drive for my server, and off to the races I went, ripping my whole collection, the I realised how many cd's have gone missing due to parties, swaps, etc. :-(
So, personally with just over 23Gb of mp3's to my name (I wont give the owned/downloaded ratio!!) I NEEDED the 36Gb model.

Thats my story and if you represent the RIAA, leave me alone, I am sure 90% of the idividuals here are in the same boat as me!

I second everything just said. I got the 12GB, and i'm already itching for a 30GB IBM drive to add on because i need it and know i will need that much more in the future. It DOES change the way you listen to music, and what you listen to. You find stuff you forgot about or that you thought you didn't like, but on second thought, really catches your attention when contrasted with other stuff... it's hard to explain, but the Empeg has definately changed my listening habits. Especially with the nice system i got installed, i listen to more styles of music simply because they SOUND BETTER than all the punk i'm used to listening too. Go for the bigger size, or at least be prepared to void your warranty when you want to plop a bigger drive in (unless of course you want to send it back to Empeg, in which case you should do it at the get go.)

-my two dollars. Where's my two dollars!!??


|| loren.cox
|| 080000446

Here's my typical listening habit:

Skip, Skip, Skip, Skip, Skip, Skip, Skip, Skip, Skip, Skip, Skip, Skip, Skip, Skip, Skip, Skip, Skip, Skip, Skip, Skip, D@MN it; don't I have ANYTHING good on this????

-m
ps - I have about 27gb worth of mp3's...

MK2: 36gb
Tivo: 90gb
CPU: 120gb
...I think drive manufacturers love me!

Hmm. Now you guys have got me thinking. I agree that I cannot predict what I will be listening to in the future, and getting a larger drive would only bethe smart thing to do. I mean, what happens if I do manage to fill the 6 gig? A 12 gig is twice the size, and is a deal for the price. After spending the $1200 asking price for a 6 gig, I guess $100 is not that much more of a strain. Thats my financial arguement.

As for my listening habits - hmm. I seriously have trouble digging out anything in my current collection that I do not already have ripped that I want. I have pretty much tapped the web for MP3s as well. While I do still come across something that I want and don't have, its not very often. On the other hand, I have no idea what will be coming my way in the future. I refuse to waste my disk space with country music. I'm a rocker at heart.. and I don't see that changing.

But OK. You guys have made some good points. I will order at least the 12 gig version, because you never know. I say that because my 8 gig drive at home filled on me, and I do remember thinking to myself that I could never fill it, and I did.

smart choice... I think the 12gb version is the best bang-for-the-buck right now anyways...
-mark

MK2: 36gb
Tivo: 90gb
CPU: 120gb
...I think drive manufacturers love me!