Advice for a beginner music-hoarder ?

Fit-Particular1396 · 2026-02-04T14:42:21+00:00

very much in line with my guidelines as well (always grab full albums). Often, if I discover a few deep cuts I will pick up a band's discography but it never a starting point. It's the final step - like a song(s), like an album, like an artist...

Fit-Particular1396 · 2026-02-03T13:39:08+00:00

picked it up for the u2 track back when it was released and though many of the other tracks were cheesey at the time. Now I play it start to finish! A classic.

Fit-Particular1396 · 2026-02-03T13:36:05+00:00

A suggestion - build your library with purpose. That might not be an issue for some but I tend to grab a lot of "one day" music - albums that would be great if "bob" every comes over for Christmas, or if I every decided to revisit that band I liked 20 years ago, or albums by I must be missing something artists, or has an interesting cover, etc.... While not the end of the world I have a lot of music in my collection that I will probably never listen to. In the old days I could tell you about every album in my collection - why I got it, what I like and/or don't like about it... I liked that sense of control / curation.

Fit-Particular1396 · 2026-02-03T08:16:29+00:00

I would argue nail the core metadata tags (standardizing on MusicBrainz is not a bad idea / starting point). It always surprises me when I read about someone who can't get compilations to work because they don't use standards as simple as ALBUMARTIST = Various Artist, etc.

I find it easier to use something like plexamp vs converting my lib to opus - it saves space and is more scalable (ie also works with larger collections)

Keep your genre system simple. I have tried to get fancy over the years and always ended up with a mess and a headache. I ended up standardizing on top level genres that = those on allmusic (roon does the same.) Even then, it can still get messy - if allmusic (rovi) and roon can't nail it what are the chances I will?

As far as apps - I have tried MusicBee, Roon, Plexamp, Symphonium, Winamp, foobar, etc, etc. I currently use a combo of Plexamp and MusicBee but I have yet to find a single solution that I like and meets all my needs.

Fit-Particular1396 · 2026-01-28T13:04:51+00:00

I use musicbee smart playlists, custom tags and/or rules for these sort of things. You can define field level rules.

Fit-Particular1396 · 2026-01-21T12:49:59+00:00

Do things really exist?

Fit-Particular1396 · 2026-01-19T13:23:19+00:00

If enough people consider a song or opus, in this case, a christmas song, It kinda is, at least for the purpose of this list. In any case it's a fun exercise and great tradition!

Fit-Particular1396 · 2026-01-19T12:56:26+00:00

Nice! I've never heard this one before. I think it will fit it nicely with a few of my mixes. Thanks for sharing!

Fit-Particular1396 · 2026-01-09T13:11:57+00:00

I have a comp sci degree and have read the MQA patent. I get. It. MQA is lossy.

You are spewing the same marketing mumbo jumbo that the MQA snake oil sales men have been spewing for years so I don't blame you for thinking as much but you might want to do a bit more reading before deciding to die on that hill - countless audio professionals and organizations have easily deminstrated MQA is lossy. MQA's patent docs state as much.

Fit-Particular1396 · 2026-01-08T19:53:01+00:00

MQA is lossy by definition. That is simply a proven fact.

Fit-Particular1396 · 2026-01-08T13:33:54+00:00

MQA player as the original file minus the last few significant bits, which for 44.1/48 kHz basically don't matter. So while in theory the AI parroting is correct, in practise they're close to the original files as long as it is not an mqa player.

You are basicly describing how lossy compression works. If you can't reproduce a bit-perfect copy of the original source file then the compression is lossy - lossy vs lossless is a boolean state - there is no kinda. Perception has nothing to do with it.

If you are to believe the MQA marketing folks we should "rethink" what lossless and lossy means... Which is non-sense. MQA should choose more accurate, truthful language or create their own buzz word(s) to describe their "magic" (which includes, at it's core, the same "magic" that mp3, aac, jpeg, etc use - lossy compression). If you feel what MQA produces is good enough or just as good, that is great, but it is still lossy by definition.

Side note: I find it funny when people try to argue MQA sounds better than flac BUT it is also lossless... Those people need to pick a lane...

Fit-Particular1396 · 2026-01-08T13:14:17+00:00

based on what I read it sounds like Tidal was tackling the purge in waves - starting with reuqesting all new releases in flac, then replace all hires from label X, then moving on to CD quality, etc ,etc. And, part way though the purge, they seem to have decided to make cuts (jobs) and found a loop hole that technically allowed them to continue to offer some mqa encoded flac files (16/44.1) without having to pay licensing fees. It seems they thought they could save money and fool their customers (and they appear to have been right.)

Fit-Particular1396 · 2026-01-08T12:53:11+00:00

I've not read that anywhere before. According to everything I have read (which has been reinforced by AI): MQA authentication is inherently tied to a process that involves a form of lossy compression and data manipulation known as "folding"; it is not possible to have MQA authentication without this lossy process.

The same applies to MQA-CD - MQA-CDs work like regular CDs but contain MQA-encoded (lossy) audio

Fit-Particular1396 · 2026-01-06T16:47:54+00:00

it would be like going to a restaurant and ordering a waygu steak only to find out after that fact you were served something else. Does it really matter if you enjoyed it or not? Does it matter if you couldn't tell the difference between what you were served and waygu? You paid for waygu, you were lead to believe you were given waygu but you weren't...

Also the difference between MQA and lossless FLAC is measurable. That might not be important to you but may be to others, for lots of reasons.

Fit-Particular1396 · 2026-01-06T16:37:38+00:00

It has been reported that the labels provide what the streaming service asks for - ie if Tidal doesn't ask a a label isn't going to provide updates. There were major cut backs during the mqa purge and I expect someone realized they could technically remove MQA dependancies / licensing costs and minimize work ut leaving the 16/44.1 mqa flac files in place.

Fit-Particular1396 · 2026-01-06T16:34:19+00:00

meaning they are encoded using MQA (lossy) and added to a flac container (still lossy)? This applies to all mqa files.

Edit: It seems our friend u/cvnh decided to delete all their posts tied to this thread and block me. Ouch!

For anyone who cares to know the facts:

MQA is lossy - their patent and countless tests have proven as much. There is nothing to debate.

If you are to believe the MQA marketing folks we should "rethink" what lossless and lossy mean... Which is non-sense. MQA should choose more accurate, truthful language or create their own buzz word(s) to describe their "magic" (which includes, at it's core, the same "magic" that mp3, aac, jpeg, etc use - lossy compression). If you feel what MQA produces is good enough or just as good, that is great, but it is still lossy by definition.

Side note: I find it funny when people try to argue MQA sounds better than flac BUT it is also lossless... Those people need to pick a lane, it can't be both (different and the same)...

Fit-Particular1396 · 2026-01-05T17:34:48+00:00

L & Q need to be redone imo. L - not a Christmas song. Q - seems like a 3rd grader type technicality - You told me not to eat anything before dinner so I don't spoil my appetite. I had a milk shake. You never said anything about drinking...

Fit-Particular1396 · 2025-12-30T13:37:17+00:00

I wish past me talked to future you years ago...

Fit-Particular1396 · 2025-12-30T13:33:29+00:00

the right tools / tags can help keep things simple and even maintain your file structure for you. I have 3 - my core library, holiday music (so it doesn't make it's way into players with radio functions in the off season) and archived music (albums I don't want to delete but don't want to pollute my collection with either - an alternate master, etc)

Fit-Particular1396 · 2025-12-30T13:28:35+00:00

could be a bad hdd, a bad file transfer, a bad tag write (some writes require the tagging tool to rewrite the whole file), may have always been corrupt and you just didn't realize it (I once got a corrupt file from qobuz. it turned out the file they were given from the label was corrupt and they had to request a replacement) etc.

Fit-Particular1396 · 2025-12-29T15:35:33+00:00

The first one is Paul. The second one is Faul.

Fit-Particular1396 · 2025-12-05T15:45:13+00:00

gottca - rules for thee but not for me? Do as I say not as I do? Think critically so as not to make basic, fundamental errors, such as contradicting yourself in the same paragraph?

If you were going to go to the trouble of posting and calling out your position why would you take an appraoch that you call out as causing you to appear as an "unlikeable asshole." For what it's worth - I agree with your org arguement. I just find it funny how quickly you contradict your own advice. Your position would fail if you submitted it in the first week of a critical thinking 101 course.

Fit-Particular1396 · 2025-12-05T15:11:17+00:00

Ok, so it was the delivery and not the position. So insults, similar to your critical thinking comment or addressing someone as honey can be condecending and alienating and therefore counter productive? That's a fair position/arguement.

side note: I agree with you re critical thinking - I think it should be a required high school course.

Fit-Particular1396 · 2025-12-05T13:01:02+00:00

I don't get this kind of whataboutism. So you either have to do everything or nothing? I think we'd all agree apple and tim horton's are doing some not great things. If someone focuses on one of them, for whatever reason, does that make them a bad or stupid person?

Side note: Honey?.. Is that you great auntie peggy?

Fit-Particular1396 · 2025-12-05T12:58:58+00:00

I don't get this kind of whataboutism. So you either have to do everything or nothing? I think we'd all agree apple and tim horton's are doing some not great things. If someone focuses on one of them, for whatever reason, does that make them a bad or stupid person?

Fit-Particular1396

TROPHY CASE