Converting Old Vinyl To MP3's

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I'm using a program called Pyro (by Cakewalk) to convert my many hundreds of old albums to digital files. I just got this program and so far it seems pretty decent.

Do any of you use this and what do you think of it? I have no affiliation with Cakewalk, by the way. Are there other programs that do this better and what are they?

Just in case you were wondering - right now I'm converting "Let's Breed - Part 2 Of The Throbbing Lobster Saga" which is a grebt compiliation of late 70's/early 80's Boston bands. One of my treasures...

Davlo (Davlo), Monday, 3 March 2003 17:13 (twenty-two years ago)

http://packages.debian.org/stable/sound/gramofile.html

http://www.vorbis.com/

Jon Williams (ex machina), Monday, 3 March 2003 17:15 (twenty-two years ago)

here's a good Voice article on the topic.

g.cannon (gcannon), Monday, 3 March 2003 17:16 (twenty-two years ago)

i just use Sound Forge to record the vinyl via line in to soundcard on PC - then edit/clean up as necessary, save to wav then convert to mp3 using MusicMatch. have recently recorded a handful of classic rave 12"s (including Production House compilation and Altern 8 megamix) and the classic soul breaks compilation '2069: A Spaced Oddity' - i couldnt do much with the muffled sound and crackle tho sadly

stevem (blueski), Monday, 3 March 2003 17:53 (twenty-two years ago)

i'm with stevem - i do exactly the same as him, except for the style of music. i've found this link usefull and informative : http://www.delback.co.uk/lp-cdr.htm

phil turnbull (philT), Monday, 3 March 2003 19:40 (twenty-two years ago)

Doesn't this take forever?

Mark (MarkR), Monday, 3 March 2003 20:13 (twenty-two years ago)

I'd probably only do this for OOP stuff that people would be interested in hearing on the internerd.

Jon Williams (ex machina), Monday, 3 March 2003 20:14 (twenty-two years ago)

I must be crazy, because I want to convert ALL my albums to MP3's - I want to be able to listen to the biggest, most eclectic selection of random music as possible on my computer and then make CD's as I please.

Eventually I want to start a webcast through Live365 or something. I guess I'm just a frustrated DJ wannabee with too much time on my hands (not enough actually).

Davlo (Davlo), Monday, 3 March 2003 21:52 (twenty-two years ago)

i also do almost the same as stevem. at work we've got cooledit so if there's a really bad pop i'll zoom in so i'm looking at it in microseconds and snip it out. i don't worry about crackle.

yes, it can still take a long time.

gaz (gaz), Monday, 3 March 2003 22:21 (twenty-two years ago)

I use Goldwave, which is free. It has an auto pop/crackle filter.

On the one hand, it takes a long time, tho only because you have to do it all in real time (I don't spend much time cleaning the recording up, just run a couple of filters and it works fine). On the other hand, I'm selling all my vinyl and I will actually listen to a lot more now, because I lost patience for flipping the record over every 10-20 minutes a long long time ago.

Good instructions here (simpler than it seems once you get going).

Next step: getting a wireless audio converter so I can play music from the computer through the sound system in the other room...

Ben Williams, Monday, 3 March 2003 22:31 (twenty-two years ago)

i've been doing this for a while now and i'm getting better at it but there's a few things one must realise. i'll get to that in a sec.

I use a lineout from my stereo amp into my soundcard, and i use Cool Edit Pro to record. I get absolutely no line noise (which I was tremendously impressed with) and excellent quality (I tested it by recording a CD the same way and compared the results - no noticeable difference)..

If you're going to do any processing on the .wav files you need to tread lightly. I only remove about 40% of the surface noise which makes it all but inaudible without sacrificing the clarity of the recording.

Removing clicks and pops is a hairy situation. I do use the automatic click/pop remover but on a very very light setting. If it's too heavy you start to see things like drumbeats (this is especially serious in glitchy electronic music), vocals, acoustic guitar sounds, keyboards, strings and trumpets get affected and deteriorate sound-wise.

I tend to remove any large pops manually, but this is very time consuming and rather frustrating at times. Recently I've decided to just leave the recordings as untouched as possible because for the time spent on cleaning up the recordings, I wasn't getting back an equal amount of pleasure from listening to crackle-free recordings.

If you are persistent though, it is entirely possible to remove almost all pops and crackle from a recording. Vinyl distortions are a lot more difficult, as are low thuds caused by actual damage to the vinyl.

electric sound of jim (electricsound), Monday, 3 March 2003 22:44 (twenty-two years ago)


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