For now the KDX schedule matches my personal endurance as a listener, usually about 9-hours a day. But the radio beast tends to expand so I am considering adding more hours.
For now the KDX schedule matches my personal endurance as a listener, usually about 9-hours a day. But the radio beast tends to expand so I am considering adding more hours.
However, I worry that running the hard-drive so constantly will wear it out, and it contains tons of audio-files. Sure we try to keep everything backed up, but it seems that a non-mechanical way of streaming would be the smartest thing of all.
An SSD, solid-state-drive, would fill the bill by providing a “no moving parts” solution to streaming. But there’s a catch.
According to PC Mag the XP O.S. is not suitable to SSD performance because it lacks TRIM software, which keeps the SSD from becoming too disorganized… probably the solid state equivalent of de-fragmenting.
Economically it would probably cost more to purchase Vista and an SSD than to simply buy another hard-drive.
Good reason to be undecided.
Hasn’t Skipped A Beat
Knock on wood, I’m using a laptop hard drive in an external USB carrier.
It’s been running 24/7 for about 2 years now.
I have about 30 GB of MP3’s on it.
Expansion Thoughts
Hi Carl,
I too have often wondered about how hard disk reliability is related to activity rate. It just seems to be common sense that the more it’s used, the sooner it will fail.
From my experience, the hard disk activity rate seems to be related to the operating system and the background software. I just switched over from a 5-yr old XP machine to a new, much faster Windows 7 machine. The poor hard disk on the XP used to hammer away much of the time when I wasn’t even using it. Mostly it seemed to be McAfee scanning and software for a Western Digital external hard drive scanning for automatic backups and (God knows) whatever else it was doing.
The hard drive on the Windows 7 machine is way less active, even with the same McAfee and WD software running in the background.
I have never had a hard disk failure on any machine. I guess I have been lucky, but hard disk failures are not a widely publicized problem.
May I suggest a USB Flash Drive as an inexpensive way to keep hard disk activity down when playing audio files. A quick search at bestbuy.com shows the cheapest 32 GB drive on sale for $39.99. http://www.bestbuy.com/site/SanDisk+-+Cruzer36+32GB+USB+2.0+Flash+Drive+-+Black/9288807.p?id=1218075402509&skuId=9288807
The Way to Go
The flash drive idea seems like the way to go and I appreciate the suggestion.
Perhaps tomorrow already I’ll stop nearby and grab one.
Full report on the progress will follow.
i use a 8GB and a 16 GB
i use a 8gb and a 16 GB flash drive for my moms laptop all the computers and laptop i have arent working so the flash drive is the way to go for my station and me!
MOHD
music On Hard Drive is what I do.
For shows however I use flash drive simply because that’s the easiest thing to do considering nothing gets downloaded from the internet onto the Automation PC.
So far its been working just dandy (knock on wood)
SANDISK DEDICATION CEREMONY
Putting the SANDISK CRUZER into service went smoother than things usually go, and it’s working so well there’s nothing else to solve.
Finding the Best Buy store could have been easy if it was in the place I thought it was. But eventually I found it in a place my mental map didn’t know about.
The big hard-drive is now on summer vacation while all KDX programming is already being played from the USB Flash drive, the SANDISK.
Thanks for this good idea.
At the Risk of Sounding Goofy
This may sound goofy, but I think audio played from the SANDISK Flash Drive sounds better than audio played from the regular hard-drive.
No Moving Parts
Amazed by the performance of the tiny Flash Drive recently installed at the suggestion of another member, I wondered that such a tiny disk-drive could whiz and whir in a device the size of a car key, so I went on Wiki to read about it.
“The Flash Drive has no moving parts.” Huh? But how….
So this is not merely a substitute until SSD (solid state drives) are ready for Windows XP; this is, to borrow the words, a type of solid state “drive.”
The word “drive” makes it seem like a disk drive. It doesn’t drive… it stays parked.
Head Gum
When I get mixed up my thoughts turn to gum and I start stepping in them…
Well, no wonder I thought the Flash Drive was a “disk.” The computer lists it as “Removable Disk G,” and the device itself is named “Sandisk.”
Why wouldn’t I think it was a tiny spinning disk drive?