Most LPs and singles released after the early fifties are composed ofpolyvinyl materials and are more durable than it's predecessors. Whencleaning vinyl records, I recommend a 50/50 solution of isopropyl alcohol(70% by Vol.) or denatured alcohol (fewer impurities) and filtered ordistilled water (again, fewer impurities). A few claim that alcohol isdamaging to vinyl... 70% or more by volume strength and continual contact fora long period of time, maybe... but not in the recommended dilution. Alcoholis water soluble and leaves little or no residue. A mild detergent, such asJohnson and Johnson Baby Bath, can be used in small amounts with water withno rinsing necessary. Photo Flo is a wetting agent used in photography tohelp reduce water spots and marks during the rinsing of negatives. A coupleof drops in the above solutions also help in reducing residual deposits. The solution should be applied with a soft, clean washcloth, wiping in acircular motion with the grooves. Rinse the cloth often in the solution andreplace with a fresh mixture when needed. I recommend thoroughly drying therecord with a soft, clean towel... this further reduces residue left behind.Try not to get the labels wet.
General Care For Records It is equally important to handle, store and play records with the same careused in cleaning. Once a record has been thoroughly cleaned, it should beplaced in a new, clean inner sleeve. It doesn't make much sense to put dirtysocks on freshly cleaned feet, right?
Step By Step
1. Connect the turntable to the amplifier
2. Connect the amplifier TAPE OUT sockets to the sound card LINE-IN (normally blue). You'll need a custom phono to 3.5mm jack cable for this. Any computer shop, or somewhere like Maplin Electronics (UK) or Radio Shack (US). Note that you need hifi separates, all-in-one units rarely have line out sockets of any sort, so they aren't suitable for the job. You can't use the headphone socket, because its fully amplified and your sound card can easily be blown.
3. Make sure your pc sound software (loudspeaker icon in the tray, bottom right of screen) has the RECORDING controls set with Line In checked, and the slider half way up to start with. This recording setting can be tricky.
4. Start up some suitable sound recording software, such as Audacity which you can download from the link above.
5. Put the LP on, hit the record button on your recording software. When the music is over, hit stop on the software, delete any silence from the beginning and the end, hit file-save and save it as a .wav or .mp3 file. Its both quicker and better quality (if you're going to make and audio CD) to save as .wav at this point and use wav2mp3 to batch convert to mp3 later. This coding can take while and you don't need to be sitting around waiting while this goes on.
6. Use crackle removing software if you like. **
7. If its an LP, you probably want to save as separate tracks - you can do this with your sound recording software, by saving each track as a separate .wav file .If its a live LP, there are various ways to deal with that - see the section on live LPs further down.
8. If you have a cd burner, it will have come with software such as Adaptec or Nero. Now you can use this to select which tracks you want to burn to audio CD. Both of these are equipped to make audio cds from mp3 files or wav files.
NOTE - you CAN'T record straight from vinyl to CD, you must save your music tracks as files first, then copy to CD.A Bit More Detail On Recording
Set 44100Hz, 128 bandwith, record in stereo in the options settings on your chosen recording software. These are the industry standard settings and the ones that are used in audio CDs. After recording, delete any silence at the beginning and end of the track and save the file. Now is the time to use your crackle remover if you are going to. Some software, such as Audacity has built in crackle removers
I like to save my music as mp3, because it reduces file sizes from about 30Mb to about 3Mb, with virtually imperceptible loss of quality. Use the Audacity MP3 Plug in to EXPORT the Track in MP3.
You can use Adaptec/Nero to make audio cds from your mp3 collection, but make sure you use a CDR (write once cd) and not a CDRW (cd re-writeable) since only the newest of CD players will play these. It is now possible to get CD players that will play MP3 files straight off the disk, both as discman and in-car units. Most DVD players will also play them. These are great since you can copy up to 200 tracks on one CD. If you're doing this, you must copy your tracks as data, not as an audio CD.
How to Deal With Live LPsThe question here is whether to keep each side as one piece or break it into separate music tracks. You can break it into tracks using your editing software with carful use of fading in and out, and that's how I like to do it so that I can use the tracks in any sequence. Another approach is break them up into tracks in such a way that they will still play seamlessly, but still allow you to skip forward track by track on your cd player. The way to do this is split the track up into however many segments you want, using a sound editor (such as Audacity etc, available off the link above), obviously don't put any fade, just make a clean cut anywhere you choose, and save each segment
Computer Active Editorials 2004 Parts 1 & 2http://www.computeractive.co.uk/2014076Convert your records to CD - Part 1There are few areas of computing so immediately rewarding and downright sensible as converting old LPs and cassettes into digital format.
Doing so offers massive benefits. For instance, you can preserve your favourite music in its current condition forever and even improve it by removing scratches and tape hiss.
Songs will no longer degrade with every new play. You can make your own compilations and save them to CD or turn your computer into a fully-featured digital jukebox. No more fast-forwarding through tapes, flipping records or sitting through turgid album 'fillers' while waiting for the next decent track.
Never again need you replace your turntable's stylus or clean those tape heads. And, of course, it saves you a fortune in replacing treasured recordings with CD reissues.
We covered the essentials in our
Revive your records on CD feature last September and we know from your letters that many of you successfully converted your music collections. However, we suspect that some readers remain hesitant to hook up a PC to a hi-fi and wrestle with the apparent complexity of audio software.
Well, the good news is that it's now easier than ever to go digital. Here we present an updated overview of the process, including everything you need to know if you missed the original feature, and tips on using the latest technology and software to make the process even easier.
Hardware ins and outsUnless you are a serious musician with an interest in recording your own instruments, you can pretty much take it as read that any recently purchased computer is more than capable of performing the tasks we'll be covering here.
It doesn't much matter whether yours has a separate sound card or an integrated sound chip (where the audio circuitry is built into the motherboard) as long as there's a line-in socket somewhere around the back of the case.
The only complication is that on some computers the line-in socket can be configured to function as a speaker channel in a surround sound set-up. Check the paperwork or help file that came with your computer for instructions on how to reverse this configuration.
If you need to install a new internal sound card, don't panic: all you need is a vacant PCI expansion slot on the PC's motherboard. This can easily be checked with a peek inside the case.
You can pick up a capable
Creative SoundBlaster Live sound card for less than £30. Failing that, you could opt for an external sound card, which we'll look at in more detail a little later in this feature.
Even the smartest sound card in the world will sound atrocious when paired with lousy speakers, though. Although this might not seem critical if you intend to burn CDs for playback away from the computer, you'll probably want to edit and enhance tracks on your PC first.
Invest either in a decent set of stereo speakers - there's no need for surround sound here because you'll be working with stereo (or even mono) recordings - or good headphones.
Existing hi-fi headphones will do fine but you'll need an adaptor to convert the large quarter-inch jack to the smaller 3.5mm standard required by the sound card. Logitech's
Z-2200 speakers are a good choice and cost around £85.
To create audio CDs, you will need a CD writer drive. This is now standard equipment on pretty much all PCs or can be easily installed as an upgrade. If your computer has a CD-Rom drive, which will only read CDs, you can replace this with a CD writer in a straightforward old-for-new substitution, even reusing the existing internal cables.
All DVD writers take CD recording in their stride, incidentally, so now might be a good time to bring your PC right up to date with a recordable DVD drive. You can buy a CD writer such as the Samsung SW-252SEA for less than £20 from
Dabs.com or alternatively, stretch the purse strings to around the £50 mark and you can have a LiteOn SOHW-832S multiformat DVD writer, also from Dabs.
Connection conundrumsIn order to re-record an album using your PC, you'll need to run a cable between the computer and hi-fi system, but it has to be the right cable and the right connection. We'll leave it for you to decide whether it's easier to cart the PC into the living room or the stereo into the study and focus here on the technical aspects.
If you have an integrated hi-fi system with a pair of stereo phono outputs - one for the left channel and one for the right - you can connect them directly to the sound card's line-in socket. You'll need a cable with a single stereo 3.5mm jack on one end and two phono plugs on the other (or an adaptor that converts one type of cable to the other).
If you have a separate stackstyle set-up with a dedicated amplifier somewhere in the mix, use the amplifier's phono output. If your hi-fi system does not have a phono output, connect the headphone socket to the sound card instead.
You'll probably need a cable with a stereo 3.5mm jack on the sound card end and a quarter-inch jack on the other. If you want to connect a standalone or portable cassette deck to your computer in this way, use its phono or headphone output as we have just described.
However, if you want to connect a standalone turntable to your computer, it's not so easy. The problem is that most turntables output only a very low-level signal, which is then amplified externally. Without this intermediary amplification, the sound card cannot 'hear' or record directly from a turntable.
However, there are four ways to work around this difficulty. The first is to leave the turntable connected to your music system in the usual manner and hook up the phono or headphone outputs as previously described.
Alternatively, some turntables have built-in pre-amplifiers, which will solve the problem: you can connect such a device directly to the sound card. Ask your nearest branch of
Richer Sounds for advice. The Bush MTT1, for instance, has its own pre-amp and costs between £40-50.
A third option is to use a phono pre-amp. This is a widget that sits between the turntable and computer and boosts the turntable's signal to the appropriate level.
The TerraTec
Phono PreAmp Studio costs around £75 and draws the power it requires through one of your computer's USB ports. Steinberg's Clean Plus from
Pinnacle Systems is £20 cheaper and includes software for 'cleaning' your old recordings. More on this in a moment.
Finally, consider Magix Audio Cleaning Lab 2005 Deluxe from
FastTrak. This does away with the requirement for a pre-amp altogether by providing amplification through software enhancement alone (a virtual pre-amp, if you will). It also features cleaning tools and can take you all the way through the process to disc burning.
Sound card set-upYou're almost ready to start converting, but just pause for a brief foray into your sound card settings. If a loudspeaker icon is displayed in the taskbar next to the clock, double-click on it now. From the Options menu, select Properties and open the Recording settings. Now set the volume slider at about the two-thirds level and ensure that the Mute box is not checked.
If you don't see the loudspeaker icon, open the Control Panel from the Start menu. In Windows XP, click on Sounds and Audio Devices, then under the Volume tab check the box labelled 'Place volume icon in the taskbar'.
In Windows 98/Me, you'll find this option by opening Sound and Multimedia from the Control Panel and looking in the Sounds tab.
Digital divideCopying music from LP or cassette to CD is a multi-step process but by no means difficult, especially if you use software that helps you every step of the way. One excellent example is
Roxio Creator 7, which we'll refer to here as we work through the main procedures.
With the cable connections in place and your tape or album ready to go, launch Roxio Creator's Sound Editor application. Now click on the Record button, start playback on your turntable or tape deck, and sit back while your music is saved onto the PC's hard disk.
You don't need to worry about recording settings here because the program automatically uses the uncompressed WAV file format to preserve the highest possible quality audio levels. Unfortunately, this swallows 10Mb of free hard disk space per minute of music; that's 4Gb for an average 40 minute album.
If space is tight you can get Sound Editor to convert the resulting file to the compressed MP3 format as soon as capture is complete. If disk space is no problem, it's better to keep recordings in the WAV format all the way through the editing process right up until you're ready to burn a CD.
Save the recording as a WAV or MP3 file named 'Album Title Side A' (replacing 'Album Title' with the real title of the album), then flip over the record or cassette, and repeat. You now have two digital recordings on your computer, each representing one entire side of the album. See, we told you it was easy.
Making your mind upDecision time. You can either split these recordings into separate tracks or leave them intact. The first option gives you more flexibility because you can then name, play, edit, rearrange and otherwise manipulate tracks in isolation.
However, if all you want to do is transfer an old album straight to CD, you might choose to burn these files to disc in their current format. Your CD will then sound exactly like the original vinyl or cassette, with all the track gaps preserved. Just bear in mind that all the CD player will 'see' is two tracks, side A and side B, so you won't be able to skip from track to track during playback.
Let's assume that you do want to create separate tracks. Sound Editor displays a recording as a graphical waveform: the higher the peak, the louder the sound. Flat parts of the waveform represent (near) silence.
Working in automatic mode, Sound Editor looks for these patterns, assumes that they represent gaps between tracks, and inserts track markers along the waveform. To see this behaviour in action, select Auto Locate Tracks from the Tools menu.
However, Sound Editor is sometimes over enthusiastic and commonly mistakes musical pauses for track breaks. To check and edit the results, double-click on the waveform just to the left of a flagged track break and play the file from that point forward. To remove an extraneous track break, right-click on the track marker and select Delete Track Break.
Conversely, you can add track breaks yourself if Sound Editor slips up or, in the case of tracks that run into one another, if it can't tell where one track ends and another begins. Navigate to the appropriate point in the waveform, pause playback, and use the Insert Track Breaks command from the Tools menu.
To save these flagged tracks as individual files, open the Edit menu, click on Select Track, and choose the first track. Now click on File followed by Save Selection. Name the file to match the first song title on this side of the album and choose a format: WAV (preferably), MP3, WMA or OGG.
Select the second track in the same way, repeat the process, and so on. Alternatively you can choose Save All Tracks from the file menu and Sound Editor will automatically split the recording and save the files as '1 - Album Title Side A', '2 - Album Title Side B' and so forth. Rename these later at your convenience.
The sound of silenceYou may also wish to clean the music you are re-recording, by which we mean remove or reduce imperfections in the source material.
If the entire album would benefit from an overall treatment, perform these actions universally while the original captured recording is still open in Sound Editor. Otherwise, split your tracks as described and work on each in turn.
Choose Select All from the Edit menu, click on Tools, and then on Apply Effect to Selection. Now select the DeClick utility. Play the file and adjust the DeClick and DeCrackle sliders until you achieve a balance that muffles most of the background noise without adversely affecting the music.
To reduce tape hiss, use the Graphic Equalizer tool and gradually reduce the treble until you achieve an acceptable balance. This is why you need good speakers or headphones.
You can also zoom in on the waveform, select a specific part of a track - an unfortunately prominent scratch, for instance - and use the DeClick or Equalizer tools to minimise it.
To delete part of a recording altogether, such as a few seconds of silence at the beginning of a track, select the appropriate section of the waveform and hit the delete key.
With experimentation and a steady hand, you can enhance the quality of a recording and remove general imperfections or, if you like, apply Sound Editor's other advanced effects to dramatically change the track.
Disco infernoWhen you have named, saved, split and cleaned your tracks, you're ready to commit them to disc. Open Roxio's Creator Classic application and tell it that you want to make an audio CD. Now add tracks to the playlist in any order you like.
It doesn't matter which format you saved them in with Sound Editor as they'll be converted to audio CD format automatically. Nor, odd though it seems, do you have to worry about file sizes. Ten WAV files could easily top 4Gb but they'll fit on a 650Mb recordable CD as long as the combined duration of the tracks is no longer than 74 minutes (or 80 minutes for a 700Mb disc). Creator Classic keeps you abreast of the current running time as you add new tracks.
Click on the Transitions button to specify the gap between any two tracks - this can be zero - or to have the start of one track cross-fade with the end of the previous track by a few seconds. In Project Properties, you can also 'normalise' the project. This is important when burning a CD of tracks culled from a variety of different sources, as their relative volumes may differ substantially.
Normalisation saves you constantly having to adjust the volume level during playback. However, this is not usually an issue when making a direct transfer of an entire album from vinyl or tape to CD, as you'll probably prefer to preserve the original track volumes.
Now pop a blank recordable CD in the drive, click on Burn, and a few minutes later you'll have an audio CD at your disposal.
Music for the massesRoxio Creator 7 is just one of several tools that can help you digitise an old music collection. Alternatives include
Nero 6 (£45), Steinberg Clean from
Pinnacle Systems (£25, or £60 for the Plus version that includes a hardware pre-amp) and Magix Audio Cleaning Lab 2005 Deluxe from
FastTrak (£30).
These all offer a high level of control over the editing process in both automatic and manual modes. Magix Audio Cleaning Lab even includes the cables you need to make connections, and don't forget that virtual pre-amp feature.
All of these products include CD-burning utilities so you can move through the record-edit-save-burn process with ease. For a completely free approach, check out
Audacity, an open source program that records in the WAV format from any connected source, such as a cassette deck or turntable, and includes some truly impressive editing tools.
Windows XP users might also consider Microsoft Plus!
Digital Media Edition, a snip of a program at £13. Its Analog Recorder utility is designed specifically to record from LP or cassette, making this an easy and quick way of getting music onto your computer.
There are anti-hiss and anti-pop tools for removing the worst artefacts of old media, you can split tracks automatically or manually, file naming is particularly straightforward and you can even add copy protection if you really want to.
However, tracks are saved only in the Windows Media Audio (WMA) format, so check that your portable player supports this format if you want to take your music on the move.
What you can't do with Analog Recorder alone (or with Audacity, for that matter) is make an audio CD. For this, turn to any CD-burning program that supports the WMA file format - Roxio Creator and Nero both do - and your captured files will be converted to the audio CD format on the fly during burning.
In fact, you may already have, or can certainly acquire, some good free software for making CDs. Windows Media Player, for instance, is already installed on your computer and has just the tools you need. Or you could consider one of the alternatives such as
iTunes.
Both of these are designed primarily for playing music files on a computer - see 'Jukebox jury' below - but they can also turn a hand to churning out CDs.
One potential problem with Windows Media Player is that it automatically and irrevocably adds a two-second gap between tracks on a CD. The only ways to force consecutive tracks to play without a gap are either to leave them conjoined as a single file or to download or install a free plug-in from
Nero.
The iTunes player does let you change the gap between tracks but it's a one-time option that applies to all tracks in a project simultaneously. One point worth noting is that of these programs, only iTunes will make you an MP3 CD (that is, a CD containing MP3 files that can be played in an MP3-supporting CD or DVD player).
Get yourself connectedSo far, we've rather assumed that you'll be able to connect your desktop PC to your stereo system. But what if you simply can't get your hi-fi and computer in close enough proximity to string a cable between them? Or what if you no longer have a working turntable or cassette player of your own and need to use a friend's equipment?
In both cases, the obvious approach is to use a notebook computer. However, as audio performance has not traditionally been a prime concern in notebook specifications, you may find that yours has no line-in socket, or only a cheap onboard sound chip that's ill-equipped to capture an analogue signal from the original record or tape in high quality and real time. It may even have no sound capability at all.
The easiest solution to this problem is an external sound card, by which we mean a device that connects to the notebook via USB and provides all the circuitry and sockets found in a standard internal sound card. You can also add one to a computer that doesn't have its own internal sound card or chip.
Consider Creative's
Extigy model, which costs around £115 or the much cheaper 510EX from
Trust, which you can pick up for less than £30.
Alternatively, you can use an intermediary device to record directly from vinyl or tape and then transfer the captured files to your PC later. For instance, the
iRiver H140 is a portable MP3 player, costing around £240, that features a handy line-in socket with which you can record directly from a hi-fi. Files are saved in the WAV or space-saving MP3 formats and can be quickly transferred to your computer through a USB 2 cable link for playback and burning.
Jukebox juryWhile burning audio CDs is one obvious and attractive use for captured music, don't neglect the possibilities of playback on your PC.
We've already mentioned Windows Media Player, iTunes and Real Player in the context of burning CDs but these are primarily intended to help you organise and play audio files on and from the hard disk. And they do so very nicely indeed, with custom play lists, cross-fading between tracks, on-screen psychedelic 'visualisations' and more.
Of course, once you've recorded music from an album, you can make a CD and enjoy the benefits of a computer jukebox. For the latter purpose, save disk space by converting tracks from the WAV format used during capture to a compressed format like MP3, WMA, OGG or AAC (the iTunes-favoured format).
You can do this with Roxio Sound Editor, an element of Plus! Digital Media Edition called Audio Converter or a standalone program such as Ashampoo MP3 Audio Center. This last one is available as free-to-try (£18 to buy) shareware from
here.Final touchNow that you have (or soon will have) a pile of freshly-burned CDs, why not finish them off with professional-looking printed labels? For a quick template-based approach, try the CD Label Maker utility in Plus! Digital Media Edition. For full design control use Label Creator in Roxio Creator 7.
Be sure to buy labels that your software supports and expect to pay about £10 at the most for 30 labels. You'll also need an application kit to ensure that your labels stay firmly stuck, which will cost about the same again. Check out the
PressIT range.
To go the whole hog, print inserts for your CD cases as well. For a quick solution, try using iTunes. Open any play list, click on File, click on Print, and select CD jewel case insert.
Right side of the lawOdd though it may seem, it is technically illegal to copy music that you own, whether you convert an album into an audio CD, make MP3s for playback on your computer or tape a vinyl record. Your original purchase bought you the right to play the recording in its original format, and no other.
The precise position is muddled by a plethora of national and international copyright legislation, but it is tacitly accepted that you will not be prosecuted for copying music you legitimately own, provided you do so strictly for personal use.
Should you sell, lend or otherwise distribute copies of your music, including on the internet, the weight of the law is liable to fall heavily upon you. However, if you download tracks from a legal music site such as iTunes or Napster, the licensing implications are notably different.
Although Digital Rights Management measures are designed to restrict what you may do with your files, you will typically be permitted to copy tracks to your portable player or burn them to CD. Check the service provider's licensing agreement carefully before you proceed.
Record breakersRegardless of our enthusiasm for this subject, you may only really appreciate the beauty and flexibility of digital audio once you've converted a few records or cassettes yourself.
When you play that old LP in the car or kitchen CD player for the first time; when you copy MP3s to a portable music player and discover that you can take your music with you everywhere; and when you make your first custom compilation of tracks you really love and free yourself from the shackles of flipping vinyl and fast-forwarding tapes, you too will be a convert to the digital age.
Music is there to be enjoyed, and digital music is easier to enjoy in so many ways. It really is as simple as that.
TROUBLESHOOTING
Troubleshooting vinyl to CD Recordings.
The most common problem is no signal being recorded. Likely solutions are:
Go to Control Panel - Multimedia and make sure the Recording Device is set to match your soundcard, and the box 'use only preferred devices' is checked.
Record volume line in is not selected - double click the little loudspeaker in your system tray. Choose 'Options' 'Properties' and hit the 'Recording' radio button and OK. Now you'll see the recording settings. Set Line In to max. and check the select box..
The soundcard line-input is not working. Try the microphone input to see if that works (you'll have to select micorphone as the input on your recording control) - its mono but it will prove everthing else works.
You connected your turntable straight to the sound card, without an amp or a preamp. More on this in the hardware section above.
Another common problem is getting mono and not stereo. Make sure you selected stereo in your recording software. The turntable may be at fault, try another sound source (tuner or tape deck). Check the system out with a sound that is very clearly stereo.
Using Laptop Computers for recording
Laptops rarely have line-in connections, and if you use the micorphone socket the recording will be in mono. The solution is to buy a USB audio adaptor, should be about £15, or Creative make an external version of their soundcard.Background Noise Problems
A good recording should have low background noise, although you can't expect absolutely zero as you will record the sound of the stylus tracking on the vinyl. If there's a significant noise there are several things that can be generating electrical noise;
1. Any transformer thats near to your PC. Your PC speakers usually have a built in mains transformer, try recording with them turned off. Any other suspicious kit, turn it off or move it away.
2. The computers Power Supply Unit (PSU). These can be electrically noisy, as well as physically noisy. There are a number of whisper quiet PSUs on the market, but the only way to test if this is the problem is to try one.
3. Your turntable. The best hifi turntables are 12v with the transformer at the plug end - ie well away from the stylus. Again, this is a costly option, but maybe you could loan one to test.
4. Your hifi amp or preamp. This is the last port of call and its unlikely to be the problem unless its faulty because (audiophiles turn away now) the difference between even a low budget amplifier and the best is quite small - much more than the difference between the best and worst PSUs and turntables.
With many laptop computers it is not possible to record directly from the record player because the volume will not be loud enough for a good quality recording.
It is possible to get around this by keeping the record player plugged into the hi-fi and connecting the headphone socket from the player to the blue line in socket on the computer. The signal is then acceptable but it requires a cable with stereo 2,5mm plug on each end.
Download software from Audacity Webpage
http://audacity.sourceforge.net/download/windowsNote that you will also need the MP3 plug-in if you want to convert (Export) to mp3. A link from the above Webpage will take you to a site to download the plug-in
