Do you cache the music?

t00h0t · 03-17-2005, 07:09 AM

How does centrafuse handle playing the songs? Does it put the whole song into memory and play it or does it read it as it goes? To maintain HD life I think it would be better to place the whole song in memory. Maybe even place the whole playlist in memory (or at least 75 megs or so, user changeable). My last hard drive was a normal 3.5 inch and it ended up dying in the car environment. I have a laptop HD now which is supposed to be rated for a lot higher G's and built in crash protection. But I'd still hate to lose another HD.

Frigor · 03-17-2005, 09:49 AM

Quote: Originally Posted by t00h0t

I have a laptop HD now which is supposed to be rated for a lot higher G's and built in crash protection. But I'd still hate to lose another HD.

How many cache does it have?

The more it has the better is... you cache the mp3 and then the HD lay down till the next mp3... so it's harder it could crash!

RoyN · 03-17-2005, 09:58 AM

I dont really think it is that big a factor... clean power, etc, would be much more of a deciding factor...

We have servers accessing their HD's 24x7 for years on end and the HDs tend to fail much less than other parts... In my experience this wont be your main problem!

t00h0t · 03-17-2005, 10:58 AM

Quote: Originally Posted by RoyN

I dont really think it is that big a factor... clean power, etc, would be much more of a deciding factor...

We have servers accessing their HD's 24x7 for years on end and the HDs tend to fail much less than other parts... In my experience this wont be your main problem!

Thats not what I am worried about. I am worried about constant reading the song while the car is in motion vs reading it once quickly. I think it works by streaming (constantly reading the music) which means the HD is working more (hence more time for the head to crash into the platter when going over bumps). If it were to put it all into memory once quickly it would have less of a chance of crashing.

RoyN · 03-17-2005, 12:04 PM

Yeah that is true... I thought you were worried about your HD dying of exhaustion...

I think this is easier to be dealt with by HD cache instead ofr application no? Cuase file-read would be taken care of by the OS as far as I can imagine...

wizawuza · 03-17-2005, 12:22 PM

if a file isn't being read at a particular moment, is the head of the hard drive disabled? Obviously the thing is still spinning, but if the head is still somewhere over the platters (I have no idea personally) then this is wouldn't be as helpful..

I have no idea.

veetid · 03-17-2005, 12:27 PM

I don't think it would make any difference... The platter would still be spinning with the head right over it. The kind of damage you are talking about could still happen when say hitting a bump... I have always only used laptop HD's in the car and have never once had one mess up in mine or anyone I knows car so far... I tried a fullsize HD in the car myself and had it go out in a matter of weeks. It might have been a bad HD, but it was enough to make me never put a fullsize in the car again...

I have been off roading with my laptop HD playing music with no problems...

david

Bobby Digital · 03-17-2005, 12:40 PM

I don't think the head moves away from the platter unless the drive stops spinning so it wouldn't help anyhow, unless you sent a command to power down the hard drive after caching, but that would be awfully inefficient to spin it up everytime you need a read...

jbors · 03-17-2005, 01:41 PM

In all OSes you can set very small interval for HDD to turn off. Let's say 1-2 minutes. After you read the playlist into memory, just hang on there and OS will turn HDD off for you. 128Mb will be 1 hr of playing MP3 or 15 mins AVI.