Transferring LPs to CDRs (1 Viewer)

[JayDaniel]

I'm interested in transferring some of my vinyl collection to cd, but am unsure of the process. I have stereo audio-in jacks on my 7.1 sound card. And I think the correct connection is to use the Tape Monitor Out jacks on my amp, to the stereo mini jack "audio in" on my computer. Is this correct?

Second, what software is needed to "record" the line level signal sent from the TT (via the receiver)? I have NERO Burning software already installed, and am familiar with using it to burn a cd. But I am not sure if it has the capabilities to "record" a line level signal, or if a separate recording software is required (and if so, which one(s)).

Thanks for your help.

 

[John_Berger]

The Search function is a wonderful thing -- when it's used.

http://www.hometheaterforum.com/htfo...threadid=68782

 

[JayDaniel]

John,

Thanks for the link. You are right - the search function is a wonderful thing. Unfortunately, I can't access this site from work (restricted) on my T1 line, and where I live in a rural area, all I have is painfully slow dial up. Searching takes forever, esp. if you have to go through several posts. Last night I downloaded a 6 mb virus definition file, and it took 38 minutes. Ah, one of these days, DSL will make it out here.

JayDaniel

 

[Mike LS]

Jay,

Depending on the version of Nero you have, you might be able to capture the audio that way. I know that Nero 6 has some capture software built into the Nero suite. Check all the programs that installed with Nero to see what you have.
I think it's "Nero Wave Editor". I've not used it since I have Cool Edit, but it has a recording feature that should work for you.

If not, you can go to www.download.com or any of the other download sites and run a search for "wav capture" or "wav record" and you'll come up with some good free programs that will work.

The biggest thing with recording from vinyl is the fact that you really need a preamp to get a good recording. If you connect it directly to your soundcard, you'll be able to hear it, but not well enough to make a good recording to CD. You might need to head to Radio Shack and get a cheap inline preamp to boost the signal enough to be useable.

 

[Grant B]

I have a home audio cd recorder which I use to record lps and tapes. The only drawback is the level of noise on lps is so high, the auto increment does not work. You need to hit the remote button or else 1 side = 1 song. Not a problem for Yes albums....

 

[John Watson]

If I can piggyback on this thread, Grant, would you call the CD Recorder you have easy to use? I have miles of cassette which I would like to get to cd, but I have enough problems with plain CD from CD sources on computer, that I might consider giving up on the computer if I could just add a simple component to my audio system. Thanks.

 

[ThomasW]

I just finished ripping 19 C-90 cassettes to .wav files. I used the SpinDoctor program in Easy CD Creator, but any capture software will do.

To complete the process (these were very low cost 25yr old cassettes literally falling apart, with lectures recorded on them) I used a great program called Pinnacle Clean!. It includes a version of Wavelab which is an excellent editor. WaveLab was used to remove pauses and edit the tracks together.

Next the clean! program was used to automatically remove the tape noise and other unwanted garbage on the recordings.

After all the processing is completed it's necessary to 'normalize' the signal level. This is a function that looks at the entire file and reads the highest level signal strength. It then establishes that as 0db and adjusts the rest of the file accordingly.

At this point the files is ready to be burned to CDR.

Note this same process is used for LP's.

Be aware that any of the programs that can autoclean/de-noise/de-click/de-pop/etc; will draw all the 'life/air' out of a high quality stereo recording. The end product being a flat 2 dimensional. For my purposes this wasn't a problem given that all I wanted to do was archive the lectures.

When I'm ripping high quality recordings I use no signal processing (de-noising/de-clicking/de-popping/etc.) Once recorded to the hard drive, the wave files are 'normalized' and that's it. This keeps the 'ambience' intact and as a result the soundstage is relatively uneffected.

FWIW the Nero program called SoundTrax is their capture software. Unfortunately it seems not to include a 'normalize' function.