Music Library Guide. Part 1: Overall Explanation and Tools

First things first. Media formats are just like condoms. They come in every colour, price, texture and flavour there is out there. Formats are very varied, but they can be easily grouped in two main categories: Lossless and lossy formats.

Lossless. The packing monsters.

Lossless formats, are just as its name says: What you hear is what you get. These formats are powerful, crunch formats that provide 1:1 to sound ratio. Basically, they work grouping together media information, so the size is considerably compressed. The best definition I’ve heard for them, is that they are “packers”.

The algorithm works, groping similar sounds in a digital formats, so the sound given by the source format (i.e. a CD) is the same in both the digital file and the sound recorded into the CD. Examples of this are WMA and ACC in their lossless versions. Of course, there are also open formats, like FLAC and Monkey’s Audio (APE). Almost all files you’ll find in the net, encoded with lossless, will be either of this formats.

FLAC Logo

The first impression may seem all-glorious because of the fact of the 1:1 sound ratio (actually, it sounds glorious), but as everything else it has its downside. First of all, it’s compression ratio is somewhere around 40% and 50%, depending on the album. Although it’s not a halfway bad ratio, the space is an important factor to check.

Crossroads

Heaven knows why I published some of my last posts. I had a nice amount of pending draftts, so I kind of… just wrote and wrote without thinking much, to catch on again. Anyway, this post is only a brainstorm that i want to be in my frontpage, so I’ll know what (in reality) I have to do.

1. On a previous post, I already said that I’ll be posting a guide on making and tagging good MP3 files. This post will be published in parts in the next days.
2. I’m planning another how-to with Ubuntu. I don’t really know when will this be posted, as the new distro is bound to pop-up somewhere in April.
3. I love photography, and I have a huge amount of photographies from my last 5 years. I have almost the same amount of photos as music. I want to publish a way to organize them they it should be.
4. My personal tribute to a heroine, Gina Trapani, from Lifehacker. I remember that I enjoyed a long time ago reading her posts about productivity, and I actually did some of the small projects published there. I’ll say what, how and when too.
5. More hate and stupid posts are coming, of course…

I don’t know what else I’ll be posting, but one thing’s for sure. I’ll start with that little how-to on music soon.

Change to Ubuntu Intrepid. Again

The previous saturday, I decided it was about time to install Ubuntu again. Since the last problem with my computer, I hadn’t installed it back because I was very lazy and because I never found time to do it. So, the last week I finished my first term exams (Which went out very screwed by the way) and I decided to do it again. As a not-so-important fact, I helped a friend to install Ubuntu in his lap, so I decided I wanted it too.

I downloaded an .iso from the server at UNAM (Mexico city) It took ages to finish because my ISP is an absolute crap. Somehow, I got it, burned it with IMGBurn, and I set off to install it. When I formated my lap, I made enough space on the disk to fit XP, my data, Ubuntu and lastly the Swap area, so the installation went on on rails. Once again, I was amazed. It took less than 30 minutes to install completely on my ext3 area, so I was kind of happy when it finished.

On my first boot, the first surprises arose, as always. 1024 x 768, no wi-fi card. So, I connected the ethernet cable, opened Synaptic and installed EnvyNG. Again. It took roughly 5 minutes to install my card, compared to 15 minutes on Hardy. Looks like the guys working with Envy are doing a huge progress.

The next (again..) was my wi-fi card. I installed NDIS Wrapper and went on flawless. After installing my wi-fi driver (using the GTK version because I was lazy) I had full signal from my router. The rest, was just software. After several tweaking, it took me something around 3 hours to have Ubuntu completely operational. Not bad at all. It took me more than 6 hours to get XP working, counting the time it took to install private software (Macromedia Studio 8, Corel, Office 2007) and getting Vista out of it.

So as that, I haven’t booted to XP unless it is completely necessary. Looks like Amarok now supports music transfer with artwork and videos, so I’m seriously thinking on stopping to use iTunes once and for all.

As soon as I get Amarok working completely with the iPod, I’ll be posting the how-to. Or a post saying that I couldn’t get it done… Also, I have some pending post (From 4 months ago XD) mainly about the XGL server, and main programs. Once again, I don’t have time for anything. I hate pretty much studying large amounts of information that I won’t fuckin’ use in my life. I’m off, I have the Organizational Computing exam. I already fear the Math and the Physics exams, so I guess this afternoon will be kind of… Helish.

Media Freak

I absolutely love music. It’s one of the things I enjoy the most in life, but indeed, it’s not just like listening whatever gets to my hands. Music is not only a type of art, it’s also a way of life. A way of expression, a way of standing out from the crowds. It’s a part of me, as I could clearly point out a huge amount of tracks that describe a specific era or scene of my life. Memories are not just chunks stored as abstract images kept somewhere within the synapses of a brain. They are also feelings, that come out of the blue, when a specific action is triggered. Just what music makes me feel.

I’ve been listening to Industrial music since I was around 14. I had always made music a part of my life, but the first time I listened to that CD which was gifted to me, I loved the sounds captured within the Joliet structure of it. I had heard for the very first time some of the great bands of the genre, Apoptygma Berzerk, VNV Nation, Icon of Coil and Front 242, among others.

I lost that CD. It became scratched as I didn’t look after it, and it was rendered useless. It took me nearly 4 years of heavy listening to Industrial music, to find those glorious tracks again. To be able to hear them once more. From that time, I’ve listened to many other genres, sometimes hearing mainstream music, sometimes listening to the most underground part of it. My range on music has developed quite a bit, and I can surely say I’d recognize a good band from the genres I listen to the most.

Almost a year ago, I opened a new blog dedicated completely to music with a friend, named Somatoxin. We’ve had a very good time posting on it, as we both love music, and it has been interesting to watch the contrast between Industrial and Metal.

Anyway, studying Systems Engineering, and having an extreme love to both computers and music, I started to look for time-efficient tools that would help me to administer my music. In the time, I found a bunch of useful tools, like Last.fm, the Musicbrainz database, MP3Tag and the LAME codec. They all have been quite good guidelines and tools with my absolute love to music.

It’s been almost six months since I first said I was going to publish a full guide on how to administer efficiently and take the maximum out of a music library. I haven’t done anything to acomplish this since then. Thinking in a huge amount of things, today, I decided it’s about time to start finishing what I want to do. I’ve lived around a 25% of my life, and I feel I haven’t done anything productive. It’s time to get my hands dirty. It’s time to fight.

So, the first thing I’m accomplishing, is publishing a full detailed guide on how to (really) take the most possible out of a multimedia library. I was planning to publish only one post with the whole explanation, but just like a project, it will be fairly simple if I chop it down to small bits of information. In that way, I’ll have enough time to explain everything perfectly, without forcing anyone to read a lot of pages at once.

Be warned though. This will be for ‘media freaks’ only. Learning the process can take time, and each album that is added to a library will be time consuming. It may seem like a lot of work, but take my word. It will be worth it.

Stay on the watch. Soon, the first post, explaining the tools that will be used, will be published. Hang in there.

P.S: By the way, happy birthday to me!! I’ve rotated around the sun about 19 times. Just a curious fact.

Thing #3: Mediocre products

Right, I have a strange mixture of feelings. Yesterday, I saw a woman I hadn’t seen in ages. It was a very strange moment, but indeed it made me smile. I crossed a really bad period of my life with her, so I have special feelings for her. It’s that, and the fact that I once threw her a tequila. Her blouse absorbed it so well, that the scent remained in it for a long time. Really, I’ll never forget a lot of things I lived with her.

But also… I’m mad. My lap’s display started to show a big purple spot. Without a reason, it just broke apart. When it happened, I thought I had made something stupid. Now I know that HP manufactures (100%) of the displays in China. I know that the world is full of fuckin’ chinese shit, but common… What happened to quality?

A couple of hours ago, I packaged my lap in a box which will get to Guadalajara tomorrow. It’s supposed that it will be back in 10-15 days, which I certaintly hope is true. It has just been 2 hours and I already miss it. I can’t use the external drive on the computer I’m using right now, I don’t have full control of it, and it’s painfully slow…

I feel caged. As if I were paying a sentence. A sentence for buying something made by a motherfuckin’ chinese. Divine justice. It’s not like I had another choice anyway…

Thing #2: The ’stupidness’ of ’stupid’ people

I’ve just seen something awesome. It amazes me what people are ready to do in order to get an extra 0.01. I have a class named Organizational Computing, we learn about different numerical systems, numerical representations and the subject will end with Assembly language. Honestly it’s quite boring, but I really like the teacher and it’s the only class where that I take this semester with my friends from systems engineering.

We get evaluated in many ways, one of those is an evaluation-stupidness system, which is worth 10/100. I hate it so much. I asked the teacher at the beggining of the semester, but it looks like that’s the way the whole subject is evaluated, not only by her, but by everyone. Shame on the whole department. Looks like they don’t know that there are better ways to evaluate a student out there.

Anyway, the fact is that every class happens exactly the same. The teacher sets a couple of examples to be solved by us, and then gives participations points to the first ten people. So, everyone hurries and finishes before she even says that anything. A second later, a large quantity of people starts slamming all over the way to the desk. Yes, that’s right. SLAMMING THEIR WAY. Fuck, that makes me mad.

At the beggining of this term, I thought that I had to do the same thing. Later, I found out that I had my participation points from the last three classes, making it enough to get half of the participation total. I made a mediocre 69 on the exam, which by the way, was higher than anyone in my row.

Why reduce again to basic instincts?? It seems as filthy flies, flying over to trash. It’s incredible the speed that the desk becomes overloaded. Quite stupid. i’ll just take enough participations as the last time.

After all, only one of my friends was higher than me. By a fuckin’ shameless 0.1. Is it really worth it?? Common. We’re not animals. We’re not supossed to play dumb. It was funny the first time. Now, it’s just disguting.

**UPDATE** I absolutely love that teacher. I mean, she’s completely out of the standards I have of a teacher. Even though, I wouldn’t like to be in her shoes. The last class, she forced all the little flies to sit and solve a second pair of exercises, before turning them in. Smart move.

I forgot to write something. There’s a blonde ‘LATI’ girl in that class. I had a great laugh when I realized that she formed up before finishing to solve the exercises. Just like the bastards at any gubernamental building. They don’t even know what they have to do, but they are already in line.

It had to be a LATI. I mean, it had to be blonde. Sorry…

The 10,000 things I hate

Commonly, when I’m speaking with someone and something stupid or ugly comes out, I usually say “That’s one of the 35 K things I wouldn’t do/I don’t like/I really hate. One of the last days on high school, I was sitting in front of the basketball court with my friends. Fuck, those days are long gone… It has been less than a year and our lifes have changed completely.

Anyway, the point is that we were calmly speaking without disturbing anyone (Sure thing…) when an extremely ugly woman poped out from nowhere. By the way, she was a good friend of a girlfriend from that time.

She sat in a table in front, with her back towards us. Somehow, we all turned and saw her underwear comming out of her pants. It was awful. Sabrina, the girlfriend of a guy which drank too much RedBull XD said it was “graphic violence”. As usual, I said: “That is one of the 35,000 things I don’t want to see in my life”. I

n that moment, my idea of making up my list was born. I decided to carve a list from stupid things that happened to me. I wrote a short list, but I left it one day in another girlfriend’s house… So it kind of dissaperead.

Last night, I was thinking on stupid things that I had done. That list appeared out of the blue into my mind. I thought that it was a funny idea, or at least it was for me, so I decided it was time to do it. As 35 K is quite a large number, I’m decided to reduce it to 10K. I’ll fill it slowly, perhaps it will be filled before I turn 30…

Perhaps it won’t and I’ll say that not being consistent is one of the 10K things I hate. Heaven knows. Chuck Norris must surely know.

Bose In Ear

Ok, I admit it. I’m a motherfuckin’ compulsive person who is actually very, and I mean very selfish… So I decided that the Sennheisser headphones that I bought yesterday were to uncomfortable to be tolerarted more than 10 minutes, and so, I bought the Bose In Ear headphones…

I spent $1,049 in them, which isn’t that much for a Bose product, but it’s surely a high price for a pair of headphones. The least thing I can do now that I feel a little bit guilty because I haven’t bought anything for Christmas, is to review them.

The pack were they were was way big for a headphones this small. It was gorgeous though. Too bad I had to tear it apart to get them out. The package include the headphones with the medium silicone buds attached. It also included small and large buds, a wearing collar to keep them hanged to the neck, and a huge (compared to the buds) leather case. Also, it included a manual which had more pages than useful information, along with the warranty and a ton of useless papers.

Now, on to the headphones.

Overall, the quality is very good. They are way better than the Griffin and the Sennheiser ones. One thing though that I miss a lot from the Griffins, is the Bass overload. I surely enjoyed that. They were great headphones, too bad that they broke easily.

The headphones themselves are notoriously designed to fit the whole ear. An I actually mean, the whole ear. The silicone buds occupy every corner of the ear, so even if you shake your head badly, they won’t fall. I’m starting to think my neck will fall apart before this headphones from my ear.

One curious thing, is the feeling of having them inside the ear. It seems as if they were about to fall, but they don’t actually even move. One thing I didn’t like, once again compared to the Griffin, is that unless you turn the volume way up, you can clearly hear the exterior sounds. I guess they are so small that they couldn’t fit a noise suppressor in.

Another point that is worth mentioning, is the comfort. They are not uncomfortable, but they could’ve been better. I have around an hour listening music with them, and they are starting to hurt. I’l see what happens if I leave them there. I want to see what’s the maximum time I can tolerate them. To be honest, there have been times that my ears hurt way bad, and keep listening to my music. The addiction is bigger than the pain.

The last important point, is the volume. Overall, the volume is good enough to hear, but not enough to hurt. I got mad when I turned them all the way up for the first time, as I remembered that the maximum sound pressure of the Griffin was higher. Part of this were the buds though, actually if I attach them to the Bose, the volume is more or less equal. The maximum pressure is actually good. What I love, is that if I turn them up, the sound doesn’t distorts a bit.

Overall, they are very good headphones. The quality is awesome, the maximum volume is quite good, they are comfortable and they are gorgeous. Too bad they’re way overpriced. I would’ve gladly payed $500 for them (Like in US) but not the whopping $1,049 they costed. It actually made me tremble…

Bose In Ear headphones

UPDATE:

Being as paranoid as me, I decided to check the qualitiy of the headphones with someone who has used them for a while. I was talking to Pablo, a friend from High school, and he told me that his headphones hadn’t wore down a bit, even though he didn’t use to carry them in the case. He made it clear that they were intact, even after months of use. Hopefully, my headphones will last the same as his.

Sennheiser MX 360 Headphones

For the third time in around nine months, my Griffin headphones died. Just like the previous two times, the cables were torn apart from the head. After analysing them, I found that the inner cables were shorter, and they were poorly soldered to the head, making them very fragile. The sound quality they deliver is quite good compared to the price, but they’re surely not a good buy if you’re looking for something durable, they’re not the best choice.

Another thing that’s worth remarking is that they’re completely made in China… I know everything this days is made in that motherfucking mediocre country, but there are some things out there that are only manufactured in China, so the only thing that’s bad is the assemblage, but not the making. It’s kind of sad that everything is made in a mediocre country, where quality is worth a shit and the only imporant factor is the price.

Welcome to the real world… I guess.

Waiting for the beat to stop

So the years passed by, and I stopped to write…

This week has been terribly rough, so I didn’t even have time to write. Unfortunately, I’m taking the second term exams this week, so I won’t be around for some days.

Things went really bad this week. My Ubuntu Graphics Server died completely and I couldn’t fix it, so I’ll be installing from scratch. I’m already thinking in a complete format to install Ubuntu and Windows in a decent way. I have some ideas of posts I want to write:

1. A good dual boot installation, not the crappy thing I did to get Ubuntu running on my lap
2. yWriter, the software I’ve been using to write my novel
3. uTorrent client and web interface

I don’t actually remember everything, but I think this are the most important ones. If they come across my mind, I’ll update this post.

Later.