MS300/MS750 Golden CD?

[BlueSky]

Originally Posted by surf123

If you are set on keeping it you should pick up a backup CDROM and hard disk as both of these are IDE, which is all but dead.

Incidentally, there are good adapters on the market that will convert a SATA disk drive, mechanical or SSD, to an IDE interface. I suspect the adapters would work for a SATA CDROM as well.

[New to Mac]

Is there a way to back up the internal MSxx drive to an external drive?

[Still-One]

Originally Posted by New to Mac

Is there a way to back up the internal MSxx drive to an external drive?

Yes. This is from pages 44-45 of the 750's manual.

MS750 Music Backup
It is possible to backup and restore the music contents of a MS750 using the CIFS or “Windows” Networking feature. Backup is accomplished by mounting the MS750 onto your PC or Mac desktop and using your computer’s backup software.
You can also backup the music files to any standard media which your PC supports, such as: DVD+/-R, DVD+/-RW, CD-R, CD-RW, or external hard drive.
There are several methods and tools for backing up your MS750’s music content. You will have to determine which method is best for you. One such method involves attaching an external FireWire or USB hard drive to your PC and backing up your Content directory by using a simple drag and drop from the Content directory to the external drive or using more elaborate features provided by a third party backup software product such as Dantz Retro- spect. A free trial of this software is provided by Dantz for both Mac and Windows users. Please visit the Dantz web site for more details: Retrospect personal.dtml
Only the music files are available in the Content folder. Play Lists are available in the Play Lists folder. Setup infor- mation, and Internet Ra- dio stations are NOT available for backup at this time.
44
A full 500 GB backup could take 2.5 days to complete using a standard 10/100 baseT Ethernet network. It is not recommended that you use your MS750 to play music while a backup is in progress as this will cause the backup to take longer to complete.
Note: A good place to start is the PC and MAC Integration documents that can be found on the McIntosh Web Site at McIntosh Analytical Systems.

[BlueSky]

As mentioned, there are ways of backing up the media (songs, playlists, etc.) as indicated in the user's manual.

Beyond that, there are ways of cloning the entire hard disk on a sector by sector basis so that an exact, bit for bit, copy of the disk could be made and kept should the hard disk crash and become unuseable. Cloning would require the MS750's drive to be removed, installed in a PC along with the new spare disk, and running any one of several software packages designed to do a complete sector by sector disk copy. This would probably be a PITA for most users and, not knowing what additional stuff is on the hard disk, potentially of little value in the long run. If, on the other hand, the MS750 uses the hard disk for its operating system, configuration information and the like, it may be beneficial.

Just a thought.

[jdandy]

Joe.......The McIntosh MS300 and MS750 operating system is installed on the hard drive. The CD transport drawer won't even eject without the operating system and hard drive functioning properly.

[New to Mac]

Originally Posted by Still-One

Yes. This is from pages 44-45 of the 750's manual.

MS750 Music Backup
It is possible to backup and restore the music contents of a MS750 using the CIFS or “Windows” Networking feature. Backup is accomplished by mounting the MS750 onto your PC or Mac desktop and using your computer’s backup software.
You can also backup the music files to any standard media which your PC supports, such as: DVD+/-R, DVD+/-RW, CD-R, CD-RW, or external hard drive.
There are several methods and tools for backing up your MS750’s music content. You will have to determine which method is best for you. One such method involves attaching an external FireWire or USB hard drive to your PC and backing up your Content directory by using a simple drag and drop from the Content directory to the external drive or using more elaborate features provided by a third party backup software product such as Dantz Retro- spect. A free trial of this software is provided by Dantz for both Mac and Windows users. Please visit the Dantz web site for more details: Retrospect personal.dtml
Only the music files are available in the Content folder. Play Lists are available in the Play Lists folder. Setup infor- mation, and Internet Ra- dio stations are NOT available for backup at this time.
44
A full 500 GB backup could take 2.5 days to complete using a standard 10/100 baseT Ethernet network. It is not recommended that you use your MS750 to play music while a backup is in progress as this will cause the backup to take longer to complete.
Note: A good place to start is the PC and MAC Integration documents that can be found on the McIntosh Web Site at McIntosh Analytical Systems.

Thanks!

[surf123]

As mentioned, there are ways of backing up the media (songs, playlists, etc.) as indicated in the user's manual.

Beyond that, there are ways of cloning the entire hard disk on a sector by sector basis so that an exact, bit for bit, copy of the disk could be made and kept should the hard disk crash and become unuseable. Cloning would require the MS750's drive to be removed, installed in a PC along with the new spare disk, and running any one of several software packages designed to do a complete sector by sector disk copy. This would probably be a PITA for most users and, not knowing what additional stuff is on the hard disk, potentially of little value in the long run. If, on the other hand, the MS750 uses the hard disk for its operating system, configuration information and the like, it may be beneficial.

Just a thought.

This is an excellent recommendation since you don't have the golden disc.

Another option is to figure out which Escient model the MS300 is based on. I took a quick look at Escient Support/Manual Page and I believe it is an E2, which has a very similar back. I did not look at all of them, but did look at a few and this is the closest to the MS300.

Then search for "Escient Disk Cloning" or "Escient Disk Copying" (plus other combinations) on Google. You will get several hits with discussion on copying/replacing drives without the golden disc. You need to do this for Escient and try including the model, which I suspect is an E2. The reason for doing this is that Escient probably sold way more music servers than McIntosh ever did just because of the price difference between the Escient and the McIntosh models.

Hopefully this will lead down the right path.

[MC352]

I use Tera Copy to copy the files from the MS300 to an external hard disk on my network.

[mike175gr]

Yes, I have backed up my MS300/750 several times. Mine started out as a MS300 and then I upgraded the hard drive to a 750, swapped out the fan, and added sound deadening material (dynamat) to the chassis. I use the unit almost every day and am very happy with it. The "golden disk" does exist and can be found if certain people are sent IMs. I think we are supposed to be discreet about this and that is why I am being slightly coy. I have posted a lot about this upgrade and if you search "ms300 upgrade" you can find out a lot on the topic.

[lwschwartz]

I have had an MS300 and now have 3 MS750's. I also have numerous other music server alternatives including SONOS, Apple, and Windows based systems. We can talk about the pros and cons of all of these systems but none are the "dream solution". We all have different expectations. I think the key to which is best is which do I use most. By far and away, I use the MS750 more than the others. The main one can see the others easily, the various network players can see it, digitizing the music is easy enough, backups are easy enough, and there seems to be plenty of room. 800 CD's take up less than half of the 750gb.
I would suggest having a spare hard drive with the operating system on it and a spare CDRW. There is no reason to expect that these shouldn't last another 5 years. By then there will be something else out there. Remember, 80% of what we will be using in 10 years isn't even invented yet.
I have found that it is easy to get caught up in the upgrade fever and lose track of what this is all about, listening to and enjoying the music. So rather than worry about what may happen if the MS750 dies, enjoy the music. I will bet it can either be fixed or a good solution can be found when the time comes. Thanks, Larry