A few years ago I used to use an old Mac Mini as a basic FTP server on a fast broadband connection. In fairness, it was a flawless setup, never went offline (unless the broadband line went down), remained quiet in operation and is a recommended setup. However, as the need for a faster connection drove us away from providing content from within the office, the Mac Mini was made redundant. Although it's a Power PC system, we realised recently it could be used to stream audio around the home. Connect an Airport Express to every audio device where you want to play your tunes and you're away. Well, nearly.

Signal 1.1.3 enables you to control your streaming audio through your iPod Touch, iPhone or similar device. Simply install Signal on to your Mac Mini (or another computer, Mac or PC, with iTunes installed) and you can see your music and control output from your iPod Touch. Wherever you're in the house, you can move to another track, control volume, speaker distribution and more.

Signal link.

If you've 'collected' digital audio from the old Napster days, we'd safely say that you probably have a rather extensive audio collection, with most tracks lacking the right information, artwork and other elements that you want for a successful catalogue. The snag is, if you have thousands of tracks, updating them isn't an easy task. Ideally you'd find a companion tool that would reside alongside your existing iTunes library and enable you to update tracks en-masse.

TuneUp Companion 1.0.4 is such a tool. It enables you to check your tracks and search for and then update your artwork. You can fix track information on the fly and much more. However, there are two big problems - firstly if you store your iTunes audio on another computer (such as a media server), then you can't use it to fix or manage your tracks. Secondly, one of the key features is to search for and update the artwork on your tracks, but in our test, out of the 50 tracks where artwork was clearly missing...it could only find artwork for one of these tracks. These 50 tracks were all sourced from iTunes or imported via audio CDs a few years ago. Old they may be, but a tool such as TuneUp Companion 1.0.4 - designed to fix these issues - should be able to do what it says on the tin.

The other issue we have is that it will only clean a small number of tracks before you have to pay a subscription fee.

TuneUp Companion 1.0.4 link.

It's easy to store your audio tracks on your desktop computer and then play them back through a media manager such as Apple iTunes or similar. However, you can also use iTunes to stream your audio tracks to a compatible wireless device such as the Apple Airport Express. If you want to distribute audio across multiple rooms, however, you may be better with a dedicated application that will enable you to intercept audio on your PC and re-direct this to your various Airport Express devices, situated through your home.

Airfoil 2.6.1 is a commercial tool that enables you to take just about any audio source on your PC, intercept, then distribute it to various wireless audio devices, connected to speakers through your house. This enables you to walk from room to room without missing your favorite track.

Airfoil link.

It's really easy to do; you have a party and people browse your CD and DVD collection, then ask if they can borrow them and for you to forget who borrowed each item. One easy way of tracking your media collection would be to create some kind of database and then type in the details. An easier way would be to use a dedicated media cataloguing tool which will enable you to scan in using the barcode on the DVD or audio CD, extract the information from Amazon, then display in your virtual catalogue.

MediaMan 3 is a brand new version of the PC-only media cataloguing tool that will not only enable you to store and view your media collection via a 'virtual shelf', but also track who has borrowed each item. There's a Mac equivalent of this application called Delicious Library, which is also worth a look.

MediaMan 3 and Delicious Library 2.0.3 links.

We've just put a couple of media catalogue managers online, the Mac-based Delicious Library and the equally as good PC-only MediaMan 3. These tools enable you to import and catalogue your audio from your CDs. However, many of us still have lots of old LPs and cassettes and these are our only source of some of the rarer tracks, particularly live tracks. Over time tapes will certainly deteriorate. For this reason, it might be a wise idea to import them to your computer, so you have a digital copy.

Vinyl Studio 5 is all you need to record from your old LPs, tapes and video cassettes, import the audio tracks, edit and touch-up the imported audio, then save as MP3 files or simply burn the tracks directly to CD.

Vinyl Studio link.

Along with the new iPods announced last night, there's a brand new version of Apple iTunes available to download. The latest Apple iTunes 8 ships with a number of new features, including 'genius' music recommendations which will offer you various track options based on the music you like to listen. Of course, the recommendations come from the iTunes Music Store. Other new features include the ability to download and watch HD-based TV programmes.

However, early feedback suggests that the new version of Apple iTunes also ships with improved support for Windows Vista, including a quicker statup procedure. You'll need to download iTunes 8 in order to use the latest iPods.

Apple iTunes 8 link.

Some of the best audio is sourced from vinyl, rather than modern CDs. Modern production values have dropped in recent years, partly as they have to accommodate the 'iPod crowd' who listen to their music through tiny headphones, which are capable of reproducing a limited dynamic range. If you like to listen to your music through large powerful speakers, you might want to grab your old LPs and import the audio to your computer. However, once it's on your machine, you need a tool to touch-up and enhance the recorded sound.

Wavosaur 1.0.3 is a free audio editor that will enable you to import your audio and make tweaks, remove issues such as crackle and then export as your finished track. You can even record your audio using Wavosaur, if required.

Wavosaur link.

Setting up your own home media server isn't particular easy for the majority. How do you configure your system to share audio and video files across different computers, enable playback through your TV or via your hi-fi? You could purchase something like the Windows Home Media Server or the Apple TV. Alternatively, you could find and use some simple software that will enable you to take your audio collection and stream it to various locations in your house.

Airfoil 2.02 is a tool that will take your audio source and then stream this to your hi-fi. It will hijack your audio source, such as a media player, then stream it to your Airport Express. The latest version will stream to multiple locations, so you can playback the same audio to different locations in your house. The only snag is that this can be affected by old property, so the audio may suffer from thick walls. The download is the for Windows version. The Mac version - which we've found to be a better version - has recently been updated to v3.

Airfoil 2.02 link.

Even the average user will have their own music library stored on their computer, yet sometimes it can be tricky to get some of your personal music in to your collection. Maybe you have rare or live recordings want to be more accessible for you to listen to by adding them to your PCs library you can then edit, equalise and burn to a CD. Some of these rare recordings may be stored on vinyl, cassette or even video.

REAPER 2.0 is an application designed for a user to record, edit, mix and render audio. It has an easy to use interface for amateurs and professionals and has a large number of features for a reasonably small application. You can easily create your own compositions using Reaper, perhaps mixing in other tracks, and then exporting as your own music.

Managing and editing your music library can be tedious. Correcting names, track information and searching for album artwork can be time consuming. It would be great if you had one tool which enabled you to all of these things with relative ease.

MediaMonkey 3.0.0.1069 is an easy to use music manager and jukebox for music collectors. It catalogues CDs, MP3 files, and any other information, including album artwork can be sourced easily from the Internet. It includes a tag editor and a file renamer to help organise music, it also includes a CD ripper and audio converter to save music. It has a play list editor to create music mixes. Plus, it levels volume, supports various Winamp plugins, burns CDs, and can sync with MP3 players and MP3 phones.