IF one ONLY has a PC
- Thread starter Peter from Sleaford
- Start date
Personal preference, but I would leave the programs on the Windows drive.
You can take a disk image onto a secondary larger disk if you install something.
Back in the day the pagefile was put on a separate partion and was a fixed size 1.5x the amount of RAM.
The pagefile partion allows you to chkdsk the windows drive without a reboot and the 1.5x multiplier was a myth.
Can't remember the last time I ran chkdsk on an NTFS partion.
The worst storage system were big expensive SANs running emulated NTFS partions.
Even though the were certified by Microsoft.
Strangely, networking without IPv6 meant Microsoft wouldn't support you as they didn't test without it - not sure if that changed.
I had to get Microsoft to re-write XPs Explorer as it was buggy, drawing too much meta data from some network files, so when you clicked on a file and wanted to delete it, you couldn't as it was open. Microsoft flew in a product developer when France when I was annual leave without checking with me first - an expensive mistake as that sort of support costs thousands, but it was a system problem.
I used to work in the Banking industry focusing on Windows server design automated in Powershell and installed in VWmare.
We could build, trash and rebuild 100s of servers per day. My boss wasn't happy as I got it down to a few mins build that she could no longer cross charge for the 2 day build process previously quoted. Longest time was to document the server build and "advise" the contractor "consultants" that they didn't know much about servers.
Being Banking, we had ridiculous amounts of money to spend on exception high spec disks and latterly M.2 or whatever they were when I retired 4 years ago.
x21
pfm Member
Is there any reason in particular? Only upside I can see is it makes things a bit easier. Downside is less throughput/higher latency when a program needs to access it's own files along with system files.
Peter from Sleaford
Well-Known Member
I personally do not have much PC experience now (not that I did before), so just relying on suggestions as to what suits audio, without paying silly money
Windows & Programs run faster.
Data files - FLAC or Word, tend to be single loading so a fast SSD may have a marginal impact but keeping your data on a seperate disk can be advantageous.
If your Programs files are on a SATA HD you have, rotation spin speed dependant, a fixed IOPS (input outputs or sector reads) per second.
Dependant on sector size, you have a set read/write cycle.
And SATA is single threaded.
NVMe M.2 are about 10,000 times faster and are mutli-threaded - they can read all your file requests without your first request being satisfied - your are really only limited your motherboard NVMe interface.
I left the industry just as NVMe M.2 was coming out and handled by the storage team, but I think the figures speak for themselves.
x21
pfm Member
I never suggested a hard drive. I suggested 2 NVMe drives. one for windows, and another for data and programs. A SATA SSD will be fine for the music storage, as the bit rates are trivial.
x21
pfm Member
For static storage I agree. It's significantly cheaper.
Darth Vader
From the Dark Side
Yes that is what I do. It makes things a lot easier to backup and even move the Windows installation to another computer.
I would choose a computer (laptop/desktop) that has an M.2 NVMe slot for the Windows installation as this is a lot faster than a SATA interface which is suitable for the music/data store.
I am currently working with a tiny desktop computer that fits in the palm of my hand. Inside is an AMD Ryzen 9 CPU with 32GB memory. Because I dual boot Windows/Linux I stuffed a 2TB SSD into the M.2 NVME slot and installed a slower 4TB SSD into the SATA slot. All that power in such a small box. I have a nice big screen for my weak eyes and an old clicky IBM keyboard that I've had since new. Backup is to high capacity external HDDs.
tuga
Legal Alien
You need to back up your library so I would also get an external hard drive.
A Wi-Fi or a wired network DAC might be the best option in terms of offering more positioning flexibility for system and PC.
Similar to me. I use a Mac Mini desktop since Microsoft brought out the ludicrous Windows 8.
I two ProLiant Micro Windows 10 and hard wired 1G network.
I bet all this info is too much for some though.
Personally for the OP keep it simple with a basic PC and a streaming service unless you have rare music.
Have a look into refurbished PCs with an upgraded SSD for Windows and Program Files.
Make sure it's Windows 11 Home or Pro and some unknown names, outside the corporate, are Lenovo who I think bought out IBM's desktop business - they are built like tanks.
I get them for all my clients on the side and you are looking at up to £300 - make sure it's got ethernet, wifi and the correct video output.
Processor/RAM spec is again personal and each Intel processor (not sure about AMD) - i3, i5 etc have different vintages.
I've got Windows 11 running as a VM on my Mac M1 - and it's free!
I know people prefer hard wired but for my needs - including 2160p - wireless works fine.
That's another argument though.
Darth Vader
From the Dark Side
For anyone who knows what they are doing in most cases WiFi will meet their requirements.
The OP mentioned the word 'disabled' but we don't know what this actually means. There are umpteen++ solutions at umpteen price points but without knowing the requirements...............
I should add that I've just chucked 10 working but old IBM laptops complete with Win XP and M$ Office onto the tip as no one wants them. Sad really. I have several Apple PCs Mac minis and Macbook Airs. Oh and I run Windows 11 and Linux on them! Win 11 pro is running on a 2012 Mac Mini not to mention a Pi4. I'm about to try Win 11 Pro on a 8GB Pi 5 once I get my finger out. I've already compiled the Windows so one day.
Windows 8 was so bad that it was the first time that M$ gave a free upgrade to 8.1. It was another 'Vista' moment for them.
I'm also running Win 11 Pro in a VM under Fusion. Its now free since VMWare was taken over by Broadcom. Whats interesting is that on a 2014 Macbook Air thats booted into Win 11 Pro I can run the macOS Sonama in a VM!
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SteveG
pfm Member
A small NVMe drive for the O/S etc. and bigger SSD's for the rest would be what I'd do nowadays.
My main PC is a bit older so it has an 250Gb SSD for the O/S and programmes, a 1TB SSD for general stuff and a 2TB hybrid drive for bulk storage (at the time 2TB SSD's were pretty expensive). It does have an NVMe slot on the motherboard but came with the O/S on an SSD so I haven't got around to fitting one and cloning the O/S to it.
My main PC is a bit older so it has an 250Gb SSD for the O/S and programmes, a 1TB SSD for general stuff and a 2TB hybrid drive for bulk storage (at the time 2TB SSD's were pretty expensive). It does have an NVMe slot on the motherboard but came with the O/S on an SSD so I haven't got around to fitting one and cloning the O/S to it.
I see that prices, as ever, are coming down so I suppose NVMe for OS and large 4Tb SSD data drive would be relatively cheap these days.
One thing of much benefit for a music system is that those drive types are solid state so noiseless.
When I was using Windows for music, I had a water cooled cpu, gpu and power supply and an a large SSD - it was completely fan-less and noise free. Not sure if that's possible with power dissipation.
Modern CPU/GPUs are pretty much up to most tasks these days so I generally don't spend much on them - unless you know you have a heavy processing requirement e.g. photo manipulation, video manipulation etc.
I now use a Mac Mini which I never hear any noise from.
With spinning disk storage in remote parts of the house, the most noise I get is from the transformer in the Naim NCS 222.
One thing of much benefit for a music system is that those drive types are solid state so noiseless.
When I was using Windows for music, I had a water cooled cpu, gpu and power supply and an a large SSD - it was completely fan-less and noise free. Not sure if that's possible with power dissipation.
Modern CPU/GPUs are pretty much up to most tasks these days so I generally don't spend much on them - unless you know you have a heavy processing requirement e.g. photo manipulation, video manipulation etc.
I now use a Mac Mini which I never hear any noise from.
With spinning disk storage in remote parts of the house, the most noise I get is from the transformer in the Naim NCS 222.
SteveG
pfm Member
I've got an old Lenovo Thinkcentre PC lying around that I've been considering setting up as a music server. It's very quiet as the fan pretty much never kicks in and it already has an SSD, an i7 processor and 16GB of RAM so I expect it should work fine. I really should get around to doing that.
I differentiate between a music server - Roon, Plex etc - and a file server that holds just FLACs.
I'm sure there overhead for a music server will be greater than a file server, but don't use one, so can't comment.
I use a web browser to stream online and just a SMB file server to use locally - which I never seem to do anymore as streamers are more convenient.
I'm sure there overhead for a music server will be greater than a file server, but don't use one, so can't comment.
I use a web browser to stream online and just a SMB file server to use locally - which I never seem to do anymore as streamers are more convenient.
Audio files as so small, and computer memory is so large by comparison, that what really happens is that the file is loaded into RAM and played from there. So there is no difference in performance or quality by splitting the files onto different drives or partitions.
However there *is* a difference in convenience - if for some reason you need to rebuild the operating system, if it's on a separate drive you know that nothing will get trashed if it gets wiped and restored. In addition, it makes backup strategies easier, as it just comes down to 'make a copy of what's on this drive', and people here have covered those things.
So, best advice for audio, assuming you want to keep it all in one box, is to get a machine with sensible amounts of ram (16Gb at present is the sweet spot) and space for at least two drives. Stick with SSDs, you don't sound like you need so much storage that the price of SSDs becomes a major issue.
Assuming you are running to a USB DAC, then that's basically it! It's pretty simple these days.
Peter from Sleaford
Well-Known Member
My current machine has 32Gb RAM and a 2tb SSD, The reason behind using 2 SSD drives is as you have mentioned