BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!

Subject: RE: BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: Mr Red
Date: 13 Jan 02 - 02:11 PM

JohnInKansas
Thanks but defaults didn't alter anything
I checked what I was burning and one track didn't have artist data, the pesky CD's may have been the first run as I was feeling my way, and I still get conflict with ATI/Creative/MS players if I just slap in a CD.
BUT it works now......... AND Bill Gates ain't outa the woods yet!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: folkmonster
Date: 06 Jan 02 - 06:04 PM

Ive now posted my Cool-Edit tips at my new website.

I have had some success de-hissing tapes, but have been defeated by wow and flutter. I'd be interested in any software that does this effectively!

Subject: RE: BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: Don Firth
Date: 05 Jan 02 - 07:14 PM

Better and better. Thanks, folks!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: Justa Picker
Date: 05 Jan 02 - 05:57 PM

(If there is a clone available, please delete my previous post. Thanks muchly in advance.)

Kevin's site is great as are some of the other referred links.

I've just finished my own little restoration project. After sifting through about 30 cassettes of live and studio performances encompassing a period from the early 1980s into the late 80s when I was gigging professionally with my band, mostly as a synthesist and jazz piano player) I decided it would be a real good idea to take what I considered the gems, and get them transferred onto CD, because some of the tapes were starting to wear out (-that phasing in and out of the highs is always a telltale sign) and get them stored on a more permanent medium without having to worry about deterioration. Suffice to say, for me the process was relatively straight ahead.

I use a Sound Blaster Platinum Card with "Live Drive." (I've mentioned this setup before on Mudcat) but it's really the way to go in terms of elegance and simplicity, if you can afford the cost which I believe is currently around around $199.00 U.S. You get a great sound card with all the requisite inputs etc on the rear of your computer...but the Live Drive portion is the real gem here. It is a front mounted extension panel that sits in an empty CD ROM drive bay (above or below your CD ROM) and is patched internally via supplied ribbon cable to your sound card. Essentially all the connections you would have had to reach around the back of your computer and make, are now in the front. What can be handier? (The front panel has midi in and out, digital in and out, 1/4" phono mic/line input and a 1/4" headphone input.)

I pop the casette into my tape deck (which is connected to my receiver) and using a stereo Y jack 1/4" plug/adapter cable (Y jacked on both ends -but 2 RCA stereo inputs at the centre junction) I take the headphone out on the receiver and stick it into the front mounted Mic/Line input. I use the volume control on the receiver to adjust the gain/signal being fed into the computer, and I use Goldwave hard disk recording software. It IS a great program, especially if you spend some time delving into using all the bundled effects with the registered version. You have parametric e.q., graphic band style e.q., fade in/fade out capbabiltiy (all selectable and programmable as far as length, duration etc.. pitch control, variable sampling rates, click, pop, hiss removal), and a ton of other effects you can use. I know there are other programs that offer these editing capabilites as well, but I find Goldwave pretty simple to use.

Good luck with your project. You'll learn a lot in the process.

"JP"
...who doesn't own shares in the Soundblaster company, but just happens to really like this particular product. It makes transerring anything recorded to your hardrive a no brainer.

---

Zapped "draft copy." --JoeClone

Subject: RE: BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: Don Firth
Date: 05 Jan 02 - 01:54 PM

McGrath, thank you for the link to your site! I have a box of old open-reel tapes and cassettes and a stack of vinyl, all of which I want to preserve on CDs. This is exactly the information that I need!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 05 Jan 02 - 11:24 AM

Mr Red -

I've had similar problems playing audio with Win98, which were apparently caused by a reassignment of what device(s) to use for audio. The "last resort" fix that finally worked was to go to Start-Settings-ControlPanel and open "MultimediaDevices." On the Audio Tab, open "Advanced" and click on "reset defaults."

I'm still trying to figure out exactly what it changed - and why it "worked;" but it did turn my CD player back on.

John

Subject: RE: BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: Mr Red
Date: 05 Jan 02 - 07:33 AM

Oh yes! My CD's still play on the machine they are burned on and all audio players I've tried. The plot thickens.

Subject: RE: BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: Mr Red
Date: 05 Jan 02 - 07:31 AM

GUEST,McGrath of Harlow Isn't EasyCD for burning? you need that too - I use Nero.
SoundForge (there are others) is for manipulating sound. A word processor for sound bytes!!!!
My copy of SoundForge comes from a Dragon4 Disk, so is a demo/beta version but I havent found anything it won't do, though it is a bit ideosyncratic on occasions (no surprise there). PM me.

I have found a recent problem which I think is Win98 &/or drivers where an Audio CD burned on my Win98/Nero machine no longer plays on my web machine now it has Win98 - it did under Win95. Each player reports there is no data. What am I leaving out in the burn stage? ANYONE?
74 minute Commercial CD's play perfectly. Mine are 80 minute with about 78 minutes burned.

Subject: RE: BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: GUEST,rvwinkle
Date: 04 Jan 02 - 09:48 PM

A useful piece of software for this is Cool Edit Pro. Restoring old recordings is very tedious. I hope you're up to it.

best regards, rvw

Subject: RE: BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: Steve in Idaho
Date: 04 Jan 02 - 02:34 PM

Here's a recent thread on the subject -

Steve

Subject: RE: BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 04 Jan 02 - 02:26 PM

Very observant of you, GeoffThis should be a bit better. The trouble is, my website, as stored on my computer where I try to hammer it into shape, looks just like it does when I load it up on the magic server up in Internet heaven.

Subject: RE: BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: Geoff the Duck
Date: 04 Jan 02 - 01:50 PM

McGrath - you seem to have put a blue clicky to a location on your own hard drive :-
(file:///C:/My%20Documents/THE%20MOVING%20FINGER/musiconCD.htm#How to put music from a tape onto a CD)
rather than on your website.
Perhaps yopu could redo the link?
Geoff!

Subject: RE: BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: GUEST,McGrath of Harlow
Date: 03 Jan 02 - 08:20 PM

But Easy CD Creator is a quarter of the price of Sound Forge, and came bundled in with the CD burner. No doubt it can't do some of the things the more expensive one does. Still, that's a lot of money that could be spent on spent on musical instruments.

Subject: RE: BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: Mr Red
Date: 03 Jan 02 - 07:52 PM

I use Sound Forge 4 and it is an excellent app.
it does have some wonderfull features. You can resample to speed or slow a section which would restore stretch but you would have to determine where the variations were and presumeably they occur in sections and vary. It would be a slow process but if it's worth it. You can even slow/speed without changing pitch but it can introduce echo if pushed too far.
I couldn't find the feature in a hurry but I was sure it did an FFT (Fourier) which could help you measure the stretch as long as the original was in tune!
recording is easy use the earpiece o/p into mic input on the sound card. How high a fi do you want? - Oh yes record in 16 bit. 8 Bit can sound good enough until you burn a CD and listen on earphones. 16 is adequate for all but the youngest ears and pedantic ones at that.

Subject: RE: BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: NicoleC
Date: 03 Jan 02 - 07:50 PM

When archiving to CD, it's important to digitize the tape and then play with a digital COPY of it. I know it sounds obvious... but it bears repeating.

There's no magic button to remove hiss and noise -- you're going to remove or dampen those frequencies. You'll probably never miss it in rock 'n' roll, but a nice classical recording could be dramatically altered. You may have to play with achieving a happy medium between losing the hiss and keeping the music, depending on how bad it is.

Subject: RE: BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 03 Jan 02 - 07:19 PM

The crucial thing with old tapes that matter is to get the recording on to some medium that is less prone to wear and tear and rot.

Record them on to a computer, and then maybe copy them on to a CD (sound tapes that aren't compressed take up an awful lot of room on a hard disk). Then you've got them in a safe form, and can work on them once again, or get someone else to.

I've just put together a very basic DIY guide on getting stuff from tape to CD via a computer, including various links to free programs, and put it on my website. That's because that way when I need to do it and can't remember how, I can look it up. If it's any use, here it is.

Getting rid of hiss and stuff like that is, I believe straightforward enough, with the right program. Essentially I understand what you do is find a bit where it's just hiss, and use that to calibrate it, and tell it to take it away from the whole tape. I'm sure there are equally cunning ways of dealing with sounds that have been stretched out and so forth.

The thing about getting it on CD in digital form is, you can mess around making it better, and learning how to do it, without making it worse in the process.

Subject: RE: BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 03 Jan 02 - 06:55 PM

In my "real life" I work for a post-production facility. Baking tapes does not really alleviate the problem. It gets rid of the stickiness, but depending on the severity you usually can only play the tape once after that - to record a new copy.

There are a number of devices you can use on your home PC, but tape stretch is difficult and usually needs to be sent to a lab to be worked on. It is also very expensive.

Ron

Subject: RE: BS: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: GUEST,Nerd
Date: 03 Jan 02 - 06:24 PM

it is possible. Tape stretch and distortion are the hardest, wow/flutter/hiss/crackle are fairly easy. Look for previous threads on recording LPs onto CD. The procedure is about the same. Software runs from cheap to very expensive, so you'll have to decide how much you can spend, etc. I use a cheapie called Raygun, but others have much better crackle/pop filters.

I was just reading a newsletter from the Smithsonian, where one of the things they deal with is tape that gets sticky over time so the reel sticks together. They bake the tapes, apparently, to alleviate this problem! So there are all sorts of concerns, and lots of people figuring out how to handle them.

Subject: Digitizing a dodgy tape!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 03 Jan 02 - 05:57 PM

Stemming entirely from something else (don't it always?). Does anyone know if it is possible to record a tape onto a computer (of any flavour!) and then use the machines digital capabilities to remove wow/flutter/hiss/crackle or even tape stretch/distortion?

Could mean a lot to collecters of old tapes!

Cheers

Dave the Gnome