Lets kick off then

[Chris V]

Right lets kick off this discussion

I'm sitting looking at my current collection of about 700 CDs and wondering how to start this storage process?

I tend to select my music to play by browsing through a particular genre, but it would also be useful, if possible, to search by artist or album title.

I can certainly do it using Windows folders, but I cant see that its going to be very attractive, so what are the options?

I want to file initially by genre such as Irish, Country, Pop, Classical etc, then subdivide into solo, groups, then again into male, female etc

I would like to see the album cover appear at each selection and a list of tracks.

I am hoping XX will allow selection of individual tracks or "play album in full"

[PeterSt]

Hi Chris,

For now, and in short reply to your suggestions, in the end XXHighEnd will arrange for all that individually. "In the end" means : after we got rid of the beta version, and we can acually play rather normal.
Think of a means of keywords which can be added to albums and tracks, and further hierarchical means of making structures, making you indepentent of the physical locations and structure Windows provides.

This means that currently you don't need to worry about this all that much, but, during the time you'd have to organize yourself via what Windows provides (and this is a story by itself, which even for me is not easy to workout).

Although rather awkward for the things you all want, currently you can use the Playlists to capture groups of tracks. So I know, it's minor for what you want, but currently it *is* an additional means of storage.
Do note though that when you plan to move your files to another location, the connected Playlists become obsolete, and there is no means to convert them (although you could manually edit the underlaying XML in the file).

It is a good thing that everybody adds his/her requests like you did Chris, and all the "convenient playback" features will be incorporated, I'm sure.

[Chris V]

Sorry Peter, but I'm a bit confused now (again).

Somehow I formed my own impression that my CDs would need to be copied and assembled in their own library on the PC (hard drives), with album sleeves and track listings attached. XX would then delve into this library to take out whatever is selected and put it into a playlist. It's the setting up of this library that I was asking about.

From your reply I think you are suggesting that XX will be able to offer the entire package including structured library, and storage of album sleeves, track listings etc. and that for the time being anything can be stored in Windows folders and transferred over eventually.

Have I misunderstood?

Thanks Chris

[PeterSt]

Somehow I formed my own impression that my CDs would need to be copied and assembled in their own library on the PC (hard drives),

True ...

with album sleeves

True ...

and track listings attached.

True ...

XX would then delve into this library to take out whatever is selected and put it into a playlist.

More or less true ...

I want to file initially by genre such as Irish, Country, Pop, Classical etc, then subdivide into solo, groups, then again into male, female etc

Not so practical for several reasons.

It is about the "delve" you mentioned;
If I don't provide anything for it, there's not much to delve, because it would be too hard to lookup things. I mean, make a small structure, and look how
a. important it is that you can select by album sleeve, and DO NOTE that you have 700 CDs which will soon be 1.400.
b. there is no good way to let Windows show you the albums, when at the same time working "structurally" or, say, hierarchically. I could go "delving" for the photo's, but that would not be a structural means (it's just logically impossible).

All is solved when BESIDES the normal storage, there's another means of storage. The current Playlists are an example. Keywords is another of very different kind. SO, you'd have Keywords for virtually as many as you want attached to an album (or even track), and selecting (combinations of) keywords gives you a flat list (with photo's) of what you wanted to see. Example : All Irish, all women, or all Irish women. It's up to your creativity of of defining the stuff.
Actually, by this means the physical storage structure is not important anymore, which will lead to "flat" (hence no hierarchy) because that's the most easy at looking for albums via Windows itself, and which may be needed at storing (ripping) them.

From your reply I think you are suggesting that XX will be able to offer the entire package including structured library, and storage of album sleeves, track listings etc. and that for the time being anything can be stored in Windows folders and transferred over eventually.

So this would not be true.
It would be like working with a database, wherein, say, persons are stored with name, address, and telephone number, and either could be used to find the person. The physical storage means allows only ONE way to do that, although hierarchy can make it virtually "better". It would still be one way.
Lastly, do note that Vista has rather powerful search means, but they do not provide what's really needed here. You could try it though (I'd rather be finished ! ).

Cheers,
Peter