Music once stored on optical media such as CDs and DVDs is now being stored on hard drives for better performance and security.

With so much content available, digital media libraries are constantly growing and changing to accommodate personal collections of music, audio books, podcasts and other types of digital audio.

In this section you'll learn how to make your digital music library secure and organized, so you can find what you want when you want it.

More Storage Means More Freedom

The more storage space you have available, the more freedom you’ll have in organizing your content. You can download as much as you want without worrying about where you’ll put it. Plus, with all your media in one convenient place, you’ll spend less time managing your library and more time enjoying it.

The first step in organizing a digital media library is centralization: storing as much of your digital music library as possible in a single location—on a PC or personal media server, for example.

Centralizing and backing up your digital media will accomplish several things:

• Your collection is safe and secure. Even if your laptop or portable media player is stolen or drops and breaks, your music is still safe.
• It makes the most of your storage. Storing massive amounts of content spread out over multiple devices wastes space because you frequently end up with duplicate files and no master library location.
• It saves time and effort. With everything in one location, it’s much easier to identify duplicates and to consolidate your library. Finally, having plenty of storage space gives you the freedom to download everything you want without the need to delete content.

"Ripping" Your CD Collection

With enough storage space, you can create an archive of your entire CD collection (called “ripping”), organize it and store it in a variety of digital formats.

This gives you immediate access to all your favorite songs—plus, digital music files can never get too scratched-up to play.

Additionally, you can create playlists for your portable music player and listen to your favorite music wherever you are—without having to waste time fumbling through CDs to find the songs you want.

Getting The Best Sound

One of the decisions you’ll want to make when ripping your CDs is the tradeoff between sound quality and file size. Compressing your music makes the file size smaller, which lets you fit more songs onto your hard drive.

However, compressing files can degrade the quality of your music—high frequencies get clipped and distorted, and low bass lines become less crisp.

The less you compress your music, the better it sounds. With the low cost of storage, it makes sense to preserve as much of the original CD quality of your music as you can when you rip it to your hard drive.

Most music software is set by default to a lower-quality setting, a lower "bit rate." But it’s easy to change the default to take advantage of your massive storage space and preserve the sound quality of your collection.

Which Bit Rate to Select

If you decide to compress your music, we suggest you choose a higher-quality bit rate such as 192 kb/s. This will make your songs an appropriate size for most portable media players while keeping the sound of your music at an acceptable quality level.

For instructions on increasing your bit rate to capture higher quality sound:

• Microsoft Windows Media Player 10
• Microsoft Windows Media Player 11
• Apple iTunes, see "Set iTunes to Import and Manage Music My Way"
• For other music management software, consult your Help menu.

Many people choose a “lossless” format when ripping their CDs—this minimizes any loss in sound quality. The file sizes are much bigger than compressed files, but you’ll enjoy CD-quality music.

Taking the time to find the right software for the way you listen to digital music will complement your listening experience and make it easier to manage your collection. For most people, popular multimedia players work fine. More extensive music collections might require a more versatile management solution that allows you to create massive playlists, automatically look up and edit metadata, synchronize burning, synchronize playlists to portable devices, and convert audio file formats.

If you use one computer, an external hard drive will secure your library and help you to better organize your growing music collection. If there are multiple computers in your household, a network storage solution or a personal server will let you consolidate all of your music in one place while still granting instant access from any computer or networked entertainment center in your home. If you travel extensively, a personal server will also allow you to access your library from any Internet-connected computer, anywhere in the world.

Backing Up

Now that you’ve created a digital media library, it’s important to keep it safe and secure by backing it up. This will ensure that your collection will be available to you if something goes wrong with your computer. It also gives you a single source for restoring your collection if something catastrophic happens.

It’s easy enough to get started with backups once you’ve consolidated your collection. In the backup application you’re using, simply choose the folder into which you’ve ripped or saved everything. With most backup software, this will create a complete copy of your music and other audio files, and automatically add files to the backup as you add to your library.

Don't Forget Your Licenses

Don’t forget to back up your licenses for music purchased online. These small files preserve your right to listen to music on specific computers. If you don’t have the license, you won’t be able to play the music file.

Windows Media Player

If you purchased music through one of Windows Media Player’s online stores, the music file will probably be encrypted and accompanied by a digital rights license.

By backing up your license, you can move the file to another PC and restore the file, should it become corrupted.

You can back up your licenses by going to the Windows Media Player menu bar and looking under Tools for the Manage Licenses feature.

iTunes

If you purchase your music through iTunes, the songs themselves can be copied to an unlimited number of computers. But you are limited to being able to play the songs on only five computers at a time.

You can choose which computers are able to play your purchased music by “authorizing” and “deauthorizing” them. Deauthorizing does not delete the file from that computer; it simply prevents the song from playing.

To authorize a computer to play a song purchased from iTunes, simply select the song in your iTunes playlist. If it is already authorized, it will play. If it is deauthorized, iTunes will ask you to enter the Apple ID and password used when you purchased the song.

If you use music management software other than Windows Media Player or iTunes, consult your help menu for information on how to back up your licenses.

Conclusion

In an ever-expanding world of exciting digital media, it's no longer just a matter of finding great songs and programs to listen to—it's also a matter of storing your growing collection and keeping it organized, accessible and safe. Today’s digital storage options give you the freedom to enjoy your digital media library whenever and however you want.