Can 60GB Harddrive Be Used To Store Music?

[goodman]

Okay, so now I have this game console on top of my stack, with 60GB of storage. Can it be used to advantage, such as the storage of music (at a high bit rate, of course)?

 

[jonnythan]

At 320kbps, a 60GB hard drive will hold about 405 hours of music.

At 128kbps, a 60GB hard drive will hold about 1017 hours of music.

 

[MDS]

Does the game console have any kind of external connectivity like USB, Firewire, or Ethernet jacks? If so, then you could use it for storage of music. If it is the type of console where only the game cartridge or CD can use the hard drive then no.

 

[jonnythan]

Oh yeah, I forgot to ask which game console it is..

 

[goodman]

Oh yeah, I forgot to ask which game console it is..

It's a PS3.

 

[j_garcia]

Um, YES. That is one of the reasons it has a hard drive...and a little icon in the main menu called music.

 

[apatel25314]

the only bad thing is that i wish it would label the songs , and categorize them

 

[goodman]

Um, YES. That is one of the reasons it has a hard drive...and a little icon in the main menu called music.

I'm not familiar with the process. Do you record on to the drive directly from a CD, or do you record first on to a PC? What is the codec to use for highest fidelity? And how do you catalog the music, so it doesn't end up in a disorganized jumble? Would the result be the equivalent of a media server?

 

[j_garcia]

I don't think you can categorize yet. I don't know if you can rip directly from a disc to the HD, but if you already have a catalogue of files you can either put them on a memory card or burn them to a CD and drop them in there. What codec isn't the entire answer, bitrate is - you need to rip at least at 128k, preferably 192k or higher, for better fidelity. At 192k I can't really tell the difference between MP3 and CD, but file sizes are larger obviously as bitrate goes up. According to a friend, ATRAC (Sony) is a better compression method giving better fidelity with smaller file sizes than MP3.

 

[j_garcia]

BTW, The XBox and XBox360 can rip to their HD straight from discs, so I believe you can do this with the PS3 as well. I asked on another forum, and if I don't get an answer, I will try it tonight and let you know what I find out.

 

[j_garcia]

Here's what I got back:

Yes you can, in either MP3, AAC or ATRAC format & various bit rates. It can also go online and retrieve CD track info.

Look under Settings - Music Settings - Audio CD import.

 

[goodman]

I don't think you can categorize yet. I don't know if you can rip directly from a disc to the HD, but if you already have a catalogue of files you can either put them on a memory card or burn them to a CD and drop them in there. What codec isn't the entire answer, bitrate is - you need to rip at least at 128k, preferably 192k or higher, for better fidelity. At 192k I can't really tell the difference between MP3 and CD, but file sizes are larger obviously as bitrate goes up. According to a friend, ATRAC (Sony) is a better compression method giving better fidelity with smaller file sizes than MP3.

I'm not going to allow file size to be a major concern. Apparently, Sony has provided user instructions for adding additional hard drives. If I record to the hard drive at all, which I will do only if I can organize the music properly, I want to have the most accurate reproduction via the highest bitrate possible.

 

[j_garcia]

Should be able to just use an external USB HDD. You can pick up a 500G drive pretty easily these days.

 

[goodman]

Should be able to just use an external USB HDD. You can pick up a 500G drive pretty easily these days.

I thought the USB connectors on the PS3 were strictly for charging and identifying the game controllers. Can you really attach an HDD to them?