headygouda

The easiest thing for FLAC is to get the FLAC installer. It will install everything you need to encode/decode and playback (plugins for foobar, winamp). Get it here:

http://mikewren.com/page.php?2

For portable flac playback, the karma is great, its what I've been using for a couple years. But there is now a way to playback FLACs on ipods, irivers or archos jukeboxes (only some models). You can install Rockbox, an open-source firmware replacement for the above mentioned devices that will allow you to do waaayyy more with it:

http://www.rockbox.org/

Esau..I'd gladly help where I can.

I've converted most of my collection to FLAC for archive and ogg for convenience of having it all accessible to listen to at my finger tips. I used EAC to rip, Foobar to add metadata & tags as well as converting. Foobar2000 has a script called 'tradersfriend' that knows how to read most text files that come with shows you download.

When I have a hard drive full of FLACs, I use my buddy's flac transcoder script to encode the whole drive to ogg (which will take a day or more)..

http://www.simplefuels.com/tapergeek/flac-transcoder.htm

You can also use etree's flacify to automate the tagging process, but you need to ensure that the text files are in a particular format. There's nothing worse that having untagged FLACs/Oggs, thats the one bottle neck of the entire conversion procses IMHO.

For commercial CDs though, I've used mp3tag with great success since the freedb database is quite comoprehensive.

http://www.mp3tag.de/en/

Remember to back everything up (flac or ogg) on DVD in case the HD dies unexpectedly! You can use a program called 'disclib' to read the directories/files on each archived DVD so that I can simply number the dvds without having to burn them in any particular order, it makes an image and creates a sortable/searchable database that can output a text-delimited file, really convenient.

http://www.lyrasoftware.com/modules/news/index.php?storytopic=2

BTW, Go FLAC...screw shn. For playback of FLAC/ogg/mp3/wav on a home network, get slim devices squeezebox.

http://www.slimdevices.com/

Hope that helps...its a never ending process ;o)

There are several things you can do to pinpoint your problem. I was unable to find any info on the controller chipset for the metal gear box, but some message boards seemed to imply that it utilizes the dreaded prolific chipset (not the stable oxford 911). You should be able to take a look at the board of the XHD and see which chipset it is.. I wouldn't go ahead updating firmware until you confirm your chipset.

As for the latest firmware, you can get it from the site you found or from prolific's site:

http://www.prolific.com.tw/eng/downloads.asp?ID=44

Some little things I did to circumvent the problem (though not eliminate it) was to disable write cacheing on the xHD. Even with my updated firmware, I would occasionally lose contact with the drive when connected via USB when my mp3 player was also docked via USB. Similarly, I was unable to have both xHDs hooked up via firewire...the only stable way I've found is to hook up my drives in series, via firewire...with my other, stable, oxford 911-based drive hooked up to the PC directly, with the shitty prolific-based drive connected to the other drive via firewire.

What a mess. Stay away from prolific-based devices!

Several questions for you:

1) When you say HD crash after copying files to it, do you mean it is no longer seen windows? Does the yellow triangle come up on the bottom right?

2) What brand/model is the external HD enclosure?

3) Is it USB2/Firewire combo and if so, is it connected via USB2 or Firewire?

The reason I ask the above, is that I had a similar problem with one of my externals as well, and after all sorts of experimenting and troubleshooting, I had determined that it was the fault of the USB2/Firewire controller chip in the external enclosure. I had no problems reading, but the HD would become 'disconnected' after writing to the drive.

The bad controller chip in my enclosure was the prolific PL3507. I corrected the problem by updating the firmware for that controller. Its a widespread, known problem...just google pl3507.

Someone mentioned this site to me and I've been digging it since. Its based on the 'music genome project' where this group annotated, in detail, the styles of a wide variety of music and cross-referenced them all to other artists with similar sounds creating a network of music.

www.pandora.com

Its totally free. All you do is type in the artist of something you like, then they describe the sound of that artist and create a radio station where they play songs from other artists in that network, each with its own description. I've been able to sample all sorts of stuff I would've never heard or been able to sample otherwise. Cool stuff worth checking out.

There are too many shows on the archive to go through, and some of them don't sound as good as others.

I'm trying to download at least 3-5 shows from each month, each year off the archive but am only interested in the best sounding (regardless of SBD vs AUD), well-played shows.

Its hard to go by the # of downloads and the comments are not very helpful, most of them are long stories of how whacked they got from the L they found in the lot etc...

Although its convenient to stream archive shows, I don't like the gaps between songs and would rather have a nice, representative collection spanning the years, mostly interested in 1970-1990.

Any help would be gratefully appreciated.

Did anyone go to Umphrey's latenight? I've listened to it and it smokes! Or was everyone too busy watching Trey Suck?

Uhh... the wet/dry system started in guelph in 1995.

not bill graham, some venue at fisherman's wharf on the pier. Thanks to phil, all the venues were taken so it took them a while to secure a place to play.

But I've heard SF + latenight/all night for a while now. Finally confirmed.

I think I should be there monday. No ticket yet..

Did I mention that Jason Hann is one sick percussionist?!?!?

Eye Know Why, Shine

FYI, NYE was announced today - 12/30-31 in SF, supposed to be all night. They are taking half a year off after.

Hey StnMtn.. I'm definitely going to be around. Not sure about franti's gig, but likely for soulive.

What I love about this webcast is that I've got a better view of the band...for free!! Good camera work, nice crowd shots - even seen some friends. The sound is great too.

Geez.. I told basher were he should've been late night friday: UMPHREYS.

Sweet! My 4th show...and best NYE except cypress..and maybe '97.

The kicker is... the idiot who jumped the stage was turned over to the cops and busted for possession as well!! ha!

Sometimes drives need to be plugged in (internally) and formatted prior to installing via an external case. But sometimes drives can be formatted from the usb enclosure as well.

lol.. the troll gets trolled..classic.

all kidding aside, you don't need digital cable at home to watch leafs tv. Just go out to a bar next time, I'm sure many of them were broadcasting it.

Alright....who the hell is singing in The "Jerry" Band?

The guy sounds like Jerry. Cats Under the Stars was fan-friggin-tastic!

Either melvin seals or stu allen.

Info for the show:

Thanks to Rob Scalcione, "This is not "official" but it's a start". Also thanks to Thomas M., Bruce W., Robo, Scott F., JB, Steve M., SW, JJ, PT & more

Soundcheck

String Cheese Incident - Casey Jones

David Nelson (Acoustic Guitar & Vocals), Sandy Rothman (Banjo & backup vocals), Sandy Rothman, & Brian Godchaux

7 songs, 30 minutes

Sourwood Mountain

If I Lose

Rosa Lee McFall

Oh, The Wind and Rain

Gone Home

Oh Babe, It Ain’t No Lie

Barefoot Nellie

String Cheese (Jason Hann, Michael Kang, Keith Moseley, Bill Nershi, with Scott Law on guitar:

5 songs, 30 minutes

Friend of the Devil

Catfish John

Casey Jones (also w/Jeff Chimenti)

Goin'Down the Road Feelin' Bad

Ripple

The "Jerry" Band - Melvin Seals (Keyboards & Vocals), Gloria Jones (Vocals), Jackie LaBranch (Vocals), Stu Allen (Guitar, Vocals), Marty Holland (bass), Sam Howard (drums), Donna Jean for a few songs

5 songs, 30 minutes

Cats Down Under The Stars

Rhapsody In Red

That Lucky Old Sun

My Sisters & My Brothers

*Deal

*with Billy Kreutzmann, Warren Haynes, Merl Saunders joined Melvin Seals on keys

Ratdog

4 songs, 30 minutes

Mississippi 1/2 Step

Bird Song

Lazy River Road

Big Railroad Blues

Rex Foundation speakers

Rex Executive Director, Sandy Sohcut

President of the Rex Board

Annabelle Garcia, and family speak briefly

The Jerry Garcia Tribute Band

Core band: Bob Weir (Guitar, Vocals)

Drums: Jay Lane on Help thru Eyes, Billy Kreutzmann and Mickey Hart on Scarlet thru the end

Keys: Jeff Chimenti, Bruce Hornsby both played & switched off. Bruce sang lead and backup often.

Guitar: Jimmy Herring, Warren Haynes, Trey Anastasio in various combinations, alone, in pairs, and all together at times. Mark Karan on a few songs.

Bass: Robin Sylvester (Ratdog) handled most of the bass duties, plus J.V. Collier (Horsby Band) on some songs

Also: Kenny Brooks (Ratdog) on saxophone for a few songs.

Lead Vocals: first name listed in parentheses below

Backup vocals: Gloria Jones, Jackie LaBranch, & Donna Jean Godchaux-MacKay on backup vocals. (At times, Donna was out there alone, and on some songs she sang from a mic right next to Bobby at center stage).

8:10pm to 11:00pm

@Olin Arageed (Hamza El Din, Mickey)

%Help on The Way> Slipknot! (Trey, Jimmy)

Sugaree (Warren)

Loser (Bruce, Warren)

Brown Eyed Woman (Michael Kang, Donna, Bruce, Jimmy)

Dark Star> (Bobby, Bruce, Jimmy, Kang)

Bertha (Warren, Jimmy)

Eyes of The World (Trey)

(Bobby intros a few folks)

Standing on The Moon (Bruce, Trey, duo mostly, some Bobby, no drums)

Scarlet Begonias (Bruce, Warren, Jimmy, Kang)

Fire on The Mountain (Mickey, Trey, Jimmy, Kang)

Stella Blue (Warren, Bruce, with Jimmy)

The Wheel (Bobby, Warren, Trey, Karan)

Uncle John's Band (All, Warren, Trey, Karan)

He's Gone (Bobby, Trey, Jimmy, Kang)

Franklin's Tower (Trey, Warren, Bruce, Kang)

Encores:

Brokedown Palace (Bobby, Warren, Bruce)

Dark Star v.2 (Bobby, Trey, Warren, Karan)

Touch of Grey (Bobby, All, Trey, Warren, Karan, Kang)

Group bow

Mickey: "Take this spirit home with you..."

@with ~30 other percussionists/clappers in white robes including Bill Walton)

%Power failure, house sound goes completely out for a minute or two.

Esau, you should try changing the listening ports on your BT client. Unless your ISP is stating that your service is capped at XX Kbps, its likely they are only throttling certain ports, usually 6881. I'm with sympatico DSL and they throttled that port, I just changed it to 4200 and I'm back!

From setlist.com, which is incomplete...

String Cheese Incident

Friend of the Devil,

Catfish John,

Casey Jones *,

Going Down the Road Feeling Bad,

Ripple

Entire set with Scott Law on Guitar. * with Jeff Chimenti on keyboards.,

Ratdog w/ Jimmy Herring & Trey

Mississippi 1/2 Step,

Bird Song,

Lazy River Road,

Big Railroad Blues

David Nelson & Friends

Sourwood Mountain,

If I Lose,

Rosa Lee McFall,

Oh The Wind and Rain,

Gone Home,

Oh Babe It Ain’t No Lie,

Barefoot Nellie,

I also heard reports of help/slip by ratdog w/ trey/jimmy and sugaree with warren.

Also kang, bobby, hornsby and trey for dstar and eyes... and a trey/hornsby duet for standing on the moon. bertha same cast as above with warren singing.

I'm sure recordings will pop up sooner than later.

It went down this weekend. No Phil.. I believe his excuse was 'he is busy moving his son into residence' or something like that. Anyway, the lineup from dead.net is:

Comes A Time - A Celebration of the Music and Spirit of Jerry Garcia

This very special benefit for the Rex Foundation at the Greek Theatre in Berkeley on Saturday, September 24th, 2005 features:

Trey Anastasio, Hamza el Din, Brian Godchaux, Mickey Hart, Warren Haynes, Jimmy Herring, Bruce Hornsby, Gloria Jones, Bill Kreutzmann, Jackie LaBranch, Donna Jean McKay, David Nelson, Sandy Rothman, Melvin Seals,

members of String Cheese Incident

Jason Hann, Michael Kang, Keith Moseley, and Billy Nershi;

Bob Weir and Ratdog: Kenny Brooks, Jeff Chimenti, Mark Karan, Jay Lane and Robin Sylvester.

http://www.minkindesign.com/jt/

nice to see trey (and others) smiling...looked like they all had a good time.

I think spending NYE in asheville would be more exciting than whatever Albany has to offer. Of course, i'm sick of albany and never been to asheville.

Personally, I'd prefer the Asheville shows. Thomas wolfe is one venue I'd like to check out someday. The orange peel is a tiny, intimate venue <1000... I'm sure these will be epic shows. Its freakin Asheville!!!