New user - help with directory structure?

[DavidL]

(14-05-2022 21:51)RachFan Wrote:  I'm just starting, and just found this forum. I have over 1000 CDs (mostly classical), a Cambridge Audio CXN streamer, and QNAP TS 251+ NAS. I am excited about using MinimServer to search my collection. But I have a lot of questions.

Are there any general intro articles? I found a guide for installing MinimServer 2 on a QNAP NAS. That should get me started. Are there also any pinned articles somewhere with general advice and how to avoid common pitfalls?

My biggest puzzle now is how to structure my files. I have just read that the actual file hierarchy won't matter to MinimServer, which is good news to me. I'm hoping to do things like this with MinimServer: find all copies of the Haydn Trumpet Concerto in my collection, display them with performer & album data, and allow me to select one. I must have half a dozen recordings of that concerto scattered in my collection. MinimServer can do this, right?

But I still would like to structure files so that I can find content on my own, if I have to. I thought I would mirror my physical shelving in the file structure, like so:

+ classical / composer / work / performer / album / tracks...

+ jazz / performer / album

+ piano / performer / album

+ trumpet / performer / album

+ soundtracks / composer / album

+ poprock / performer / album

Would this be a good idea? I just read a post advising against dividing classical/composer by works. But I do like putting all my copies of Bach's WTC together, or all my copies of Rachmaninoff Concertos by different performers shelved together -- for example.

I haven't actually started ripping CDs yet. I think dbPowerAmp and MusicBrainz Picard look like my ticket there...

Thank you!

Welcome to the forum.

From my experience I'd suggest you use a very simple file structure e.g. Artist/Album/Track and let your computer do all the heavy lifting involved in searching for the particular combination of (say) genre/composer/work/artist you wish to listen to. To go down this route all you need is software to (1) rip the CDs and extract and store all the associated meta data on your NAS, (2) curate (edit etc) the extracted data to convert it all to a single consistent form (there is no universal standard for CD meta data) and (3) extract and play what you wish from the NAS.
I have no experience of dbPowerAmp or MusicBrainz Picard so cannot offer specific advice for this software. I see dbPowerAmp is recommended for CD ripping and I assume Picard does the curation.
As you have probably gathered from this forum MinimServer software is excellent for accessing music files (particularly classical music) but it does not curate the music files. You will also need a control point (hardware & software) compatible with your Cambridge Audio streamer to compile your request(s) for the music to be played from MinimServer and start playback.

When I started out streaming my ripped music files stored on my NAS I used iTunes software for curation and I have found no reason to change this after 10+ years. This software is very mature and has an excellent user interface that makes curation of music files very simple.

Before you start ripping CDs you need to think carefully and make some major decisions about what you wish to see displayed by MinimServer and edit the meta data accordingly. To give a concrete example for classical music I decided to define several 'Genres' (classical - baroque, classical-classical etc, etc) and to use 'Album' as composer + work (e.g. Beethoven - Symphony No.3). In this way I can search on Genre (Classical - classical) then 'Album' and immediately get a list of all the versions I have of this symphony.

Hope this helps - happy listening!