Pbeidy
We return to the scene, ankle deep in old letters, clothes bound for the donation bin and stacks of CD jewel cases, when inspiration crept up on me like Rose Finger Dawn, reaching out delicately over the horizon to bathe us all in her radiance.
I could digitize all this music! I had an old DS116 Synology NAS sitting around in a box at home, dating back from my time in exile in Switzerland (I’ll probably write about that at some point). It was 3 terabytes, mostly unused, and would easily be able to hold the music and DVDs that my parents had assembled over 30 years.
The next steps were fairly simple: a short Google session pointed me in the direction of all the hardware I would need: a cheap and cheerful DVD drive (forgive the Amazon link, but sometimes we all must swallow our disgust for overnight shipping), recommended by Wirecutter and a pair of peak millennial CD folders to hold the discs themselves as back up (the main impulse of this had been to declutter after all).
In terms of software, the path was more twisted and gnarled. Self hosting media is an enthusiasts occupation, though anecdotal evidence points to it gaining in popularity with the “youff”, likely from impulses not dissimilar to my own. Unpicking the partisan preferences of various subreddits to find the media server software that best suits ones needs takes time. In the end I opted for Jellyfin over leading brand Plex. The latter company seems to have been creeping towards the same trend of chopping up all its features into distinct tiers as a means of shanking your wallet from multiple directions. Doctrow stays correct.
Figuring out which tools to use to actually rip the music also required some figuring out. In the end Exact Audio Copy became the program of choice (here is the guide I used for those interested).
And so will all the parts assembled the process began. With sparkling eyes and a bubbly enthusiasm, I started to build my own media library. I could stream my music directly from my computer to our Sonos network and to my phone while I was in our home WiFi. My wife was a picture of studied disinterest to my flailing about. I had forced her onto Spotify during the early years of our courtship, and she had the grace to note my return to silvery discs with nothing more than wry bemusement. As long as she had access to Fettes Brot and Diana Krull, she was happy.
Had I left things there, everything would have been fine. But the ancient works warning of Mans obsession are still with us for a reason. Never are we content to just sip from the cup of forbidden knowledge. Ever must we quaff it down like a thirsty Labrador. So two thoughts percolated in brain that would drive me further into the heart of darkness: “How do I get this on my phone when I am out and about?” and “I wonder if I can find any more music?”.