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Nerd/Boffin Technical corner. Page 22

Is it an old nor new record players? Most new ones have US ports you can use.

Quote: Ben @ February 6 2011, 6:15 PM GMT

How do I go about converting some vinyl records in to MP3s. I have a record player and a PC.

Also, what sort of quality will the sound be that comes out? Good? Bad? Average?

Your record player will need to have output sockets suitable for feeding into a hi-fi amp through an ORDINARY input, not a special one for pickups.

You then need to buy an appropriate lead to connect your record player to the LINE-IN socket of your computer.

You can do quick tests using the Sound RECORDER program in Windows accessories, but as mentioned above you will probably want to use a good program like Audacity for your real captures.

Things to watch out for are making sure that you are really recording in Stereo not both left & right merged and getting the recording level roughly right. You can normalise in Audacity to get it finally at the correct levels.

If your record player does not have a pre-amp you can buy a low cost one here
(and any necessary leads) http://cpc.farnell.com/_/aud-19/stereo-pre-amp/dp/AV1274641?Ntt=av1274641

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Your final quality will depend mainly on how good your record player is and secondly on how much computing hiss your sound card picks up.

If your inbuilt card picks up too much computer hiss you can get an external USB sound device which you can use well away from any strong computer signals.

I have one of those. :)

PS: Audacity is a free program.

Get it from a reliable download site, not one where they might have inserted a Trojan malware program.

http://audacity.sourceforge.net/download/

Thanks all! I'll have a look at the player when I'm back home and see what sockets are on it. Luckily, I work with a qualified sound engineer, so can press him for help if I get stuck further.

Quote: Nat Wicks @ February 6 2011, 6:40 PM GMT

Is it an old nor new record players? Most new ones have US ports you can use.

It's a Numark one from four years ago. It's definitely not got a USB port though or I would have fiddled already!

Quote: Ben @ February 6 2011, 9:19 PM GMT

Thanks all! I'll have a look at the player when I'm back home and see what sockets are on it. Luckily, I work with a qualified sound engineer, so can press him for help if I get stuck further.

It's a Numark one from four years ago. It's definitely not got a USB port though or I would have fiddled already!

The reason I know all that stuff is I keep intending to do all my Vinyls too one day. I did have a go, did one or two & found I'd done them in mono because of the crap sound board I had in that computer. :D

:)

Okay. I'm trying to burn an Audio CD ( Its my talk )

Will it work on the DVD-R disc?

Because I can't seem to get it to work. I mistakeningly burned the first two as data disks and then realised I was an arse but when I changed to burn audio it said there wasn't a disk in the drive.

I am assuming I need a different blank disk.

The file is a .wav if that helps anyone with an answer.

The data disk burned ok - but could only be played on PC not in CD player.

No. You can't play DVD's in CD players.

A CD player wouldn't recognise a DVD disc, you'll need to burn it onto a CD as an audio disc.

Thank you :)

I knew I was being a TWAT.

Quote: bigfella @ February 9 2011, 8:30 PM GMT

Okay. I'm trying to burn an Audio CD ( Its my talk )

Will it work on the DVD-R disc?

Because I can't seem to get it to work. I mistakeningly burned the first two as data disks and then realised I was an arse but when I changed to burn audio it said there wasn't a disk in the drive.

I am assuming I need a different blank disk.

The file is a .wav if that helps anyone with an answer.

The data disk burned ok - but could only be played on PC not in CD player.

You can't mix CD audio and data on a CD unless you tell the software before-hand.

So yest you need a fressh blank disk.

Most CD audi driver software will convert any kind of audio file into the necessary wav format that is actually on the disk.

Quote: billwill @ February 10 2011, 1:39 AM GMT

You can't mix CD audio and data on a CD unless you tell the software before-hand.

So yest you need a fressh blank disk.

Most CD audi driver software will convert any kind of audio file into the necessary wav format that is actually on the disk.

Some but not all cd players can handle CDs with mp3 files on - i.e. burned as a data disk instead of an audio disk.

But if you want it to play in conventional CD players it should eb CDA files, right?

I've got 20Mb broadband (& when I checked the speed, it was around 20Mb), but streaming HD TV gives a slightly jerky result. Is 20MB not enough? Might it work better at 'off peak' times? Is there something else I could do to improve matters?

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