OLD ALBUMS TO CD's

  • Thread starter Thread starter ASHBY
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ASHBY

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I WOULD LIKE TO BURN MY OLD VINYL ALBUMS TO CD's. I'VE NEVER TRIED THIS BEFORE ANS NEED A LOT OF HELP. HOW TO GET STARTED? WHAT IS THE BEST PROGRAM TO USE? ETC. THANKS FOR ANY HELP YOU MIGHT CAN GIVE ME.
 
You Gotta turn the Caps off bud...In the chat-communities it's considered Yelling....

It doesn't bother me, but it will bug other people:)

I suggest, you download a Free program or something... Check out N-Track from Fasoft.... All you really need is 2 tracks...

You can go into your soundcard (If you have one with 2 inputs) and then edit the songs....

It works quite nice, I do it quite a bit... You can edit out the needle dropping and the crackles before the song starts and even make new fade outs etc... All for free....

www.fasoft.com

PS.. Im not affiliated with Fasoft in anyway... I do realize that I sound like a salesman.. :)
 
A Search on "vinyl" and "transfer" will take you to a number of threads dealing with this.

Do you have a PC with a CD writer/burner? If so, the path is quite simple: stereo amp (with phono/RIAA stage) to soundcard using the right cable (often two RCA conectors at the amp end, stereo 1/8th" jack plug at the soundcard end), software (I use Soundforge XP, £50), CD burning software (often comes with the CD burner), CD burner/writer.

Caps lock stuck?:)
 
First of all, turn your caps lock off :)

Ok, this really isn't as difficult as it might seem thankfully. You need to get some kind of simple wave editor like goldwave ( http://www.goldwave.com ). You'll use this application to record the record, and then split it up into tracks. I don't think that goldwave can drop CD markers and burn a disc, so you'll have to physically cut the file into individual tracks, and save each seperately, then use your favorite CD burning software to make the disc. Sorry I can't be more specific here, just get the software and start playing around...if you have any questions just ask!

The physical connection is pretty simple. I'm going to assume you have some sort of integrated amplifier with a phono preamp and tape in/outs, right? If so, just run the tape outs into the LINE IN port on your soundcard using a stereo RCA to 1/8" phono cable. The tape outs might be labeled "RECORD" (and tape ins labeled "PLAY").

The actual recording process is then very much like a regular analog one. Tape outs should be line level so you probably won't have to adjust the input level on the soundcard too much, but if you have to, look under Control Panel->Sounds and Multimedia and click the second tab to set both playback and record properties for your hardware. The slider you're looking for is LINE IN. (tip: you might want to mute the other inputs like CD and MIC IN for the time being, as they're often very noisy even when idle). Unlike tape recording, however, cliping is very very bad...set your level such that you don't clip at all.

At this point the quality is really dependent upon your phono preamp, and your soundcard. Most consumer grade or integrated soundcards should work "ok" for recording records, but don't expect the quality to be astounding.

As far as noise reduction, I would avoid it. I've tried some of the better reduction plugins out there, even those especially made for vinyl, and even when barely using them I found the noisy track more pleasing than the track with less noise. They're just life suckers...bye bye snare drum. The only thing I would recommend in this regard is low frequency flutter removal which several of the restoration plugins feature....but you should be able to mimic this by using an EQ in wavelab to cut down below 60hz (to taste).

I realize that if you've never done anything like this that I'm giving you more information than you need to know to get started. So just grab some software and see what you can do, that's the best way to learn!

Slackmaster 2000
 
Hehe, I think we all replied at the same time. As you can see, the first step in recording your old albums is to turn your caps lock off :) haha

Slackmaster 2000
 
Just to clarify, that link does demonstrate using a preamp. They show hooking a turntable to an integrate amplifier. An integrated amplifier can contain several preamplifiers for connecting several different devices, and if the amp has a phono input, it has a phono preamp.

The only reason I say this is that a phono (RIAA) preamp is required to connect a turntable to any line device, like an amplifier or your sound card. It's not like a tape deck, which could be connected directly to the soundcard.

Slackmaster 2000
 
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