MusicBee + which NAS for big audio collection ?

[Orion]

Hi.

I am considering buying a NAS to store my large collection of music, which is nearly 1 TB large, made mostly of 320 kbps MP3 files.
After many days testing players, I've come to the conclusion that MusicBee is probably the best free player and have now succeeded in customizing it, so that it fit my needs.

Yet, I still have some questions to ask before buying my NAS.

1. First of all, will it be possible to use MusicBee on my computer in order to navigate through my files located on the NAS (connected to my computer via WIFI) and to give the NAS the order to read the music directly on my wireless Marantz M-CR510 audio amplifier ? If it is possible, how to to it ?

2. If it is possible, then, given that my WIFI connection is not specificaly slow, will the navigation be fluid enough to be confortable ? I guess it depends on the NAS specifications... I am wondering wether it's important to buy a powerful NAS or wether a "normal" one would be enough, given the fact that I won't use it to stream videos.

I'm actualy considering buying one of theese :
SYNOLOGY-DS215j (160 €) : https://www.synology.com/fr-fr/products/DS215j
QNAP TS-231 (160 €) : https://www.qnap.com/i/fr/product/model.php?II=155
QNAP TS-251 (240 €) : https://www.qnap.com/i/fr/product/model.php?II=142
I'm wondering wether it's necessary or not to by the last one, which is more powerful, but also more expansive. If some of you also have invested in one of these NAS, what do you think ?

If necessary, I also give you my computer's specifications : http://www.comparatif-ultrabook.fr/hp/spectre-x360-13-4001nf-2018.html

Thank you very much for your help, fellow NAS + MusicBee users.

[dasman]

I'm using musicbee with my Synology NAS and sending the output to my USB DAC which is connected to an external Amp.  But my entire setup is wired... it sounds like you want to push your music wirelessly from the NAS to the Marantz (using airplay, or whatever the Marantz uses), rather than using an Audio In/Optical In on the Marantz.

For that to work, my guess is that your computer needs to talk to the Marantz, since MusicBee is playing the music on your computer -- it is only retrieving it from the NAS (ie., network hard drive).  There is a Airplay Plugin that the Musicbee wiki says will stream to airplay-compatible devices... I can't personally vouch for it.  Wiki article is here:  http://musicbee.wikia.com/wiki/AirPlay

dave

[Orion]

It would be more simple indeed. Yet, isn't it likely to lack fluidity because the files will be transfered from the NAS to the computer and then from the computer to the amplifier ?

Do you think I could connect the NAS to the amplifier via Ethernet or USB cable so that the NAS can transfer music directly to the amplifier without having to transfer the files through the computer ?

If it is possible, then how will I have MusicBee and my NAS communicate and how will I ask the NAS to play music through the amplifier ? That I can't understand...

[dasman]

I can't speak for the airplay app and it's "fluidity".  I can say that I have no issues whatsoever with my wired setup.  The computer pulls the songs over the local network and then pushes the audio out over USB to the DAC, which then goes to the Amplifier over stereo RCA cables.  It's no different than a CD player connected to a DAC then to the amp... just my source is different.

As for airplay, I guess it depends on your wireless network traffic - all you're doing is replacing my cat 6 network/USB/RCA chain with wireless.  But then,  I even access my NAS remotely at the office over the internet with Musicbee and play FLAC files.  I get a slight pause when queuing up the first song, but that's it.  That is using 5Gbps up from my home ISP and 10Gbps down on my office network.  I can't imagine airplay over local wireless would be slower than dealing with the internet.

What it sounds like you want is to use Musicbee as a frontend to the NAS and have the NAS serve directly to the Marantz, bypassing MusicBee's player.  Someone else will have to chime in on that one, but I can't say that I've ever heard of that being done with any player (ie., MusicBee, MediaMonkey, Foobar, etc).

dave

[Orion]

Thank you for your answer.

You perfectly summed up what I would like to do. I have read jRiver can do that and that's why I assumed MusicBee could do it as well...

If it's not the case, do you think I could ask for such a feature to be developped or is it demanding to much work ?

Thanks, once again.

[vincent kars]

I haven’t tried it but it looks doable.

This by and large about UPnP/DLNA
The Marantz supports it
NAS by Qnap or Synology supports it
MusicBee has a UPnP plugin, it says server and control point
Control point means it can tell the Marantz what to play and this “what” will be pulled from the NAS by the Marantz

[Orion]

I hope it will : I have just ordered a QNAP TS-231.

Unfortunatly, I have faced problems with MusicBee : after a few minuts, it crashes when I use the UPNP plugin to stream music to my Marantz. I guess it will prevent me from using this feature until the problem has been fixed. I may even be forced to use another software... which is a pity because I love this one.