If you open the app from an alias or launcher, Control-click the app's icon and choose Show Original from the pop-up menu. Then select the original app. Press Command-I to show the app's info window. Select the checkbox next to Prefer external GPU. Open the app to use it with the eGPU. Learn more about using eGPUs with your Mac. (mac to mac, mac to android etc) Air Display is the power house when it comes to using other devices as your second monitor. With this app(s) you can use your Android, PC, iPad, iPhone, or Mac for a second or third monitor.
After decades of digital music, it's not unlikely if you've amassed quite the collection of music on your computer's hard drive. If your iTunes library is taking up too much space, you can move it off of your local drive and onto an external hard drive without breaking your music collection. You can also transfer your entire iTunes library from one computer to another if you are migrating to a new Mac. Before you start: Back up your Mac Before making major changes to your computer, it's always a good idea to back up your data: The best way to back up your Mac is with a in place, but you can choose that's right for you. What you will need You will, of course, need the computer your iTunes library is currently on.
You will also need the following:. An external hard drive (and power source, if applicable). A USB cable to connect the hard drive to your original Mac.
A power source for your original Mac. If you're moving to a new computer, your new Mac (and its power cable) Step 1: Consolidate your library Over time, it's easy for your music, movies, apps, and other iTunes content to end up stored in various places throughout your computer's hard drive. To ensure that you copy everything from iTunes over to an external hard drive, you should first consolidate your library. Even if you think your library has all your information consolidated already, it can't hurt to do a manual check before moving any data. Launch iTunes on your Mac. Click File in the upper left corner of your Mac's screen. Hover your cursor over Library in the dropdown menu.
Select Organize Library from the secondary menu. Tick the box for Consolidate Files in the window that appears. This process makes a copy of all files in the iTunes media folder, and leaves the original files in their current location.
Step 2: Move your iTunes Library to an external hard drive. Quit iTunes.
Connect your external hard drive to your computer using a USB cable. Click on Finder to open a Finder window. Select your Mac's hard drive. Click on the Music folder. Select iTunes and drag it to the external hard drive.
Click Authenticate when prompted to give permission to move the iTunes folder. Enter your administrator password. This process could take upwards of an hour or two, depending on how much data stored in your iTunes library. Step 3: Redirect iTunes to the new location Once you've transferred a copy of your iTunes library onto an external hard drive, you will need to set a new path for the iTunes app by redirecting it to search the external hard drive for content, rather than your local drive. Launch iTunes and hold down the Option Key at the same time. Click on Choose Library when the window appears.
Select your external hard drive under Devices in the Finder sidebar. Click on iTunes. Click Open. Note: Until you delete the iTunes file on your local hard drive, you can switch which libraries iTunes uses by launching the app and holding down the Option key at the same time. Step 4: Make sure it worked If you performed the first three steps correctly, when you open iTunes, it should look the same as it did before. You can double-check to make sure the migration worked by checking the info of any content. Launch iTunes.
Select a song, podcast, movie, app, or other content. Right-click or Control-click on the song. Select Get info from the drop down menu. Click on the File tab in the info window. Look under Location to ensure that the content is now being stored under /Volumes/external hard drive name/.
Instead of Users/local hard drive name/. Step 5: Delete the old iTunes library Once you have transferred a copy of your iTunes library onto an external hard drive and redirected iTunes to the new location, you can delete the iTunes folder on your local hard drive, freeing up space on your Mac. Note: If you are making a copy to transfer to a new computer, you don't need to perform step 5 unless you want to remove your iTunes library from the old computer. Quit iTunes.
Click on Finder to open a Finder window. Select your Mac's hard drive. Click on the Music folder. Select iTunes and drag it to the trash.
Make sure your external hard drive is connected to your Mac when you launch iTunes from now on. Otherwise, iTunes won't be able to find the files. If that happens, quit iTunes, connect your external hard drive to your computer, and reopen iTunes. Step 6 optional: Move your iTunes library to a new Mac Once you have your iTunes library on an external hard drive, you can relocate it to a new Mac. Quit iTunes on your new Mac. Connect your external hard drive to your new Mac using a USB cable.
Open the external hard drive once it appears on your new Mac's screen. Click on Finder on your new Mac to open a Finder window.
Select your new Mac's hard drive. Click on the Music folder. Drag the iTunes folder from your external hard drive into the Music folder on your new Mac. Launch iTunes and hold down the Option Key at the same time. Click on Choose Library when the window appears. Select your local hard drive under Devices in the Finder sidebar.
Click on the Music folder. Click on iTunes. Click Open. Any questions?
Do you have any questions or issues with moving your iTunes library onto an external hard drive or onto a new Mac? Let us know in the comments and we'll help you out.
Software Type: Operating System Optimization Price: $129.00 Website: Many computer audiophiles have been discovering that optimization of the operating system can lead to significant improvements in the sound of their music systems. I have previously reviewed Fidelizer Pro (see ); a program that I found made sonic improvements to the sound of music software utilizing the Windows Operating System. I have also reviewed the Playback Designs Syrah Server (see ) that employed a modified Windows 10 Pro that was stripped and configured so that it could only be used to play audio files and utilize network access. Enter the creator of AudiophileOptimizer, Phil, the owner of Highend-AudioPC who resides near Zurich, Switzerland. Phil and his wife Claudia run a business that not only offers AudiophileOptimizer, but numerous hardware and software solutions for the computer audiophile. Phil, also known by his customers as AudioPhil, first offered AudiophileOptimizer in 2013 to be used with Windows Server 2012. Why Windows Server 2012?
Windows Server 2012 runs fewer services and processes than the standard versions of Windows as well as having the ability to completely remove the desktop environment. It was the operating system of choice for optimization that allowed Phil to include over 300 additional modifications of various operating system elements including disabling of unnecessary drivers and services that aren’t needed for audio playback. AudioPhil’s rationale for use of the AudiophileOptimzier: 'A typical Windows operating system has about 50 to 100 processes and about 500 to 1000 or more threads all running at the same time.
The CPU is involved in every single thread and process and, unfortunately, all of this processing must take place in real-time, resulting in jitter. By dramatically reducing the number of processes and threads run by your CPU, your music server will greatly minimize noise and jitter, allowing for a far more accurate and natural sound.' So will the difference be worth the investment if you are using a more modest setup? Does the addition of a second Win10Pro OS on the partition require a second License purchase as well?
I have the desire to eek out as much from my systems as I can afford, but affordability is currently a moving target. Your setup used is beyond my means and may remain there for some time. I would Love to hear that this would be a great addition to either of my systems. (1 computer desk low budget, one considerably better but incomplete listening rig). The addition of a 2nd Win 10 Pro didn't require a new license; when I signed in with my Microsoft Account, the computer was recognized and activated by the Microsoft Server.
I really have no idea if you will hear a difference or not since I don't know anything about your system. All I can say is that the more revealing your system is, the greater the effect from these OS Optimizers. Why not try the free version of Fidelizer and see if it makes a positive difference in your setup. This will give you a taste of OS optimization. Keep in mind that the intent behind all this is to get an OS to run in a stripped down “core mode,” meaning a ton of little tasks and other crap like UI/UX and printing services are made unavailable. The reason is all of these behind-the-scenes processes add to the overhead of the operating system, and subtract from CPU and RAM capacities that are left over to simply play music.
The Audiophile Optimizer makes best use of the hardware resources that that are controlled by the stripped down OS, and only focus on delivering music within the profile. The result is sound reproduction without all of the operating system overhead and interference.
That said, AAPL would NEVER let you tweak their OS that way. (Just one in a plethora of reasons not to use a mac mini.) IF you wanted to go through tweaking an OS, you could certainly get yourself something like an Intel NUC, and then either: a.) Go through the core server and optimizer installation process in their 61-page how to. Or b.) Download the Audiophile Linux project which has a similar approach of a stripped down OS: “Standard Linux distributions are designed for running servers or desktop usage. But because of his design, Linux itself have the ability to be a perfect audio solution. We have taken this ability and turned standard Linux in something that is enjoyable to listen.
Every little part of it can be crucial for listening. The unnecessary services and daemons, included in standard Linux distributions, have been removed and their negative influence on audio playback made impossible. Printing and some other network services running in background of the standard Linux distributions, use the CPU and memory and are completely useless for audio reproduction.”. I also would like to add that low voltage Atom Windows Tablets made in China sound the best. Why cheap Chinese tablets you ask? Because, those Chinese tablets are so cheap, they have all BIOS settings EXPOSED, you can tweak the hell out of it, unlike those from big brand names, BIOS are mostly locked down leaving you with nothing to tweak at all.
So far I think disabling Intel thermal control, CPU speed stepping, and turbo speed gains the most significant improvement. Other tweaking helps too but varies from tablet to tablet. On my GPD Win, with AO I can already enjoy very good audio quality with its onboard DAC (not so much with my Jumper Ezpad mini3 though), quite amazing. Connecting to an external USB DAC, it sounds better than all of my previous optimized notebooks and computers too. I was using the Asus as a Roon Core. I needed something with a fast CPU for the HQPlayer conversions to DSD256. Most of the CAPS designs, while excellent sounding, are not ideal for this job.
The Mac needs to be set up with Boot Camp which is not my first choice for Windows. I have used Boot Camp in the past, but that is a different discussion. Let's just say that it adds more issues to overcome. This Asus G501 is a gaming computer that deals with the HQPlayer and my large Roon library pretty well. The computer power supply is plugged into the excellent Shunyata DPC-6 v2 to firewall the SMPS and computer noise.
I am now experimenting with an Asus G701VI gaming computer that has its CPU unlocked for overclocking and very fast memory. The sound of this unit for a Roon Core with HQPlayer duties is pretty amazing. Remember, my Core computer is streaming to a Sonore microRendu for the 'audiophile tricked out computer'. New thinking for different needs. I only brought it up because we've discovered sound quality improvements running Roon core on a custom high-end PC, our Roon end point being an ayre QX5 vs running Roon core on a DelI desktop to the Ayre. I don't know how much of that improvement was due to the better power supply on the custom high end one, but I suspect at least some of the improvements were due to the other non-power supply related hardware.
Sadly issues of time and money do not allow more granular experimentation as to what is contributing the most improvements. Once again I guess the point is just that 'everything matters'. I know this article is about using a dedicated PC as a high end audio component, but is it a totally bad idea to use a virtual machine to stream music to a DAC, perhaps with a couple cores dedicated solely to the VM? I guess I'm not a true audiophile in that I prefer fewer physical boxes / power cords in general, neither do I have a room dedicated to listening to music.
(I do have a room pretty much dedicated to my grand piano.) Instead, my music listening is done mostly in the same chair that I use for working on the computer. At work, my desktop computer has two VMs running under Xen, one for Windows (email, web browsing, etc.) and one for Linux (real work, though web browsing and handling email is real work, too). I could easily create another VM just for listening to music, and move my USB DAC to that VM. I could do the same at home, since I already use Hyper-V under Windows 10.
(I have a VM just for working from home, with access to my company's network, etc.). First and foremost: AO is definitely NOT intended for VMs. If you're still going to tinker with VMs, you do not want to use a full-fledged host OS (which immediately eliminates VirtualBox and Hyper-V inside Win 7/8/10/Server). I've not played with Xen, but I did tinker with Hyper-V Server 2012 (the free-download, low-overhead, hypervisor variety) a while back for grins. What ruled it out for me was its inability to load a driver for the sound card (Asus Xonar Essence STX) at the hypervisor core. (As you know, whenever you try to set up sound card hardware in the VM, it only allows an emulated sound card - not the actual device.) That lack of success drove me to the Intel NUC, which I highly recommend for a dedicated multimedia machine. There are plenty of hardware profile options to customize your own:.
All of the NUCs support USB and HDMI, but not all come with optical out, so I recommend the model you choose supports optical. (Optical also has lower jitter than HDMI.) (FWIW, I have this one: and can confirm that it supports 24-bit/192-kHz over TOSLINK and HDMI).
Last year, I built another NUC for a friend, and when I tallied the costs of the NUC, SSD, and RAM, it was around $220, which is less than half the price of the cheapest, dual-core mac mini. (And if you wanted to stick with Linux, the NUC supports it. For grins, check out AudioPhile Linux:.). Additionally, if you had actually read the article beyond the title and posting date, you would've observed that the synthesis was substantiated by the multitude of 'Caution' and 'Don't Buy' recommendations posted on the very pro-AAPL MacRumors website. Specifically, the Mac Mini is called out as a 'don't buy' since it's been 778 'Days since last release' (as of 2 DEC 2016, which is more than a month after AAPL's most recent event that only impacted the MacBook Pro).
And since I cannot let any porch dog love go unrequited, envy couldn't be further from the truth. But have fun trying to tweak your 778-day old (and counting) mini!;-). To avoid Windows as an audiophile OS to start with. It was not designed as such and all of these types of modifications just put that fact into a searing spotlight. What we need for this hobby to prosper is an audiophile OS that does not require a MS Degree in Computer Science to use.
There are some hopeful signs that things are moving in that direction. If computer based audio is to ever become a mainstream pursuit, it can't happen soon enough. There will always be a place for these types of modifications for dedicated hobbyists but whenever I show my non audio hobbyist friends this approach when they ask, I always get an answer that goes something like 'you must be kidding.' Please explain how different Sound Signatures work. I can try to understand how AO optimizes the OS for reduced noise and jitter to have better sound as a result.
Doesn't different sound signatures imply that AO does something else in addition to reducing noise and jitter? If yes, what? I just want bit-perfect data with the lowest noise and jitter to stream to my PS Audio DirectStream DAC. Currently I use Roon on my PC/Window 10 Home to stream the music file which resides on my external NAS drive by BuffeloTech. A naive question, since the music file is on the external NAS drive, I assume that music data does not go through the PC, will AO make any difference?
Thanks for your advice in advance. 'The Sound Signatures and Digital-Filters have a prominent effect on the sound quality heard. Both Sound Signatures as well as Digital-Filters are 100% bit-perfect. They only change the way the operating systems handles the running tasks and their priorities as they relate to the operational state of the CPU. AudiophileOptimizer is not part of the signal chain and there is no alteration of the source at any given time. Everything is always 100% bit-perfect.'
AudiophileOptimizer allows one to change the settings as the music is playing. You will quickly find what you like. I will contact AudioPhil to answer your question since I didn't perform my evaluation with an NAS. As a retired database software programmer, I have no problem admitting that I am unschooled in the realm of hardware and software configuration setup. I am purchasing a muscular laptop and want to know if I'm making the right assumptions. I would like to have the laptop be both a personal computer (internet, word processor, music composing software, etc.) and a music server for my hi-res audio system.
The laptop will have 16GB of ram, a high speed i7 processor, 512 GB SSD for the main drive, and 2 TB SSD for data files. Can I partition the main drive; one for 'optimized' Windows Server 2012 (or 2016) as music server, and the other for Windows 10 Pro for standard laptop use.
I'm assuming both OSes could access the data drive. If this is doable, how large should the partition for the music server be? I'm assuming it would hold WS2012, Roon, AudioOptimizer, plus a little room for growth. Please let me know if my thinking is right.
Also, how might I find assistance for the installation? I guess I'll start with the local audio club. Hello Quantum-Mechanic Yes this will work out exactly like you want it to. For the Windows Server 2012 R2/2016 partition you would only need about 20GB. But with a 512GB OS Drive I'd suggest you use around 100GB for the Windows Server partition and use the rest for the Windows 10 OS drive. The use the 2TB SSD to create the drive for music storage. You will even be able to configure both systems that they do not 'see' the others C: drive.
Please feel free to contact us via if you need any further assistance. Best, AudioPhil.