Help wanted: CD recording

Subject: Help wanted: CD recording
From: Gurney
Date: 18 Jan 03 - 04:37 AM

Hi folks. I'd like to put some nice LPs and tapes onto CD, in a format that is playable on my stereo. I have the burner and cables, but tentative attempts got nowhere. I realise that the music must be collated on the harddrive first, but the acronyms and terms like 'streaming' and '.wav' are not very self-explanatory. I don't even know what format CD uses. Is there a friendly boffin out there who will point me in the right direction? Chris.

Subject: RE: Help wanted: CD recording
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 18 Jan 03 - 04:58 AM

Here's a page I wrote about this for my own use (to give me a reminder of how to go about it).

There are probably other ways and better ways if doing it, but this is how I did it, and I'm not very up this this technology.

Subject: RE: Help wanted: CD recording
From:
Date: 18 Jan 03 - 08:58 AM

CD's don't use WAV or such. They have their own way of doing it. You need software such as Roxio's Easy CD Creator or Nero's CD Burning software, or other equivalent software. There are programs which will copy MP3s or WAVs to CD for use in such systems.

You didn't say what kind of computer you are using. Gurney, if you are using a Windows oriented computer, check out those two programs. They usually have freebies which come with the CD Burner drives. You can download copies from web-sites.

For Windows

http://www.hitsquad.com/smm/win95/

For Macintosh

http://www.hitsquad.com/smm/mac/

They have software to record the material onto your computer, and this can be in WAV or MP3 or other formats. (WAV is lossless but HUGE. You can compress them but then they are not as univeral. MP3 and many others are compressed but there is SOME loss. Mostly it is undetectable)

Once the material is put onto your computer, assuming it is in WAV format, you would load up the CD Burning software. In both Roxio and Nero, they ask about the TYPE of CD you want to create. You have to specify the MUSIC CD and it takes care of most every thing else. IT will ask you for the names of the tunes you have. If your LP or cassette is in one big file, that is a problem. YOu have to record each cut/track as a separate file. This will enable you to put them as individual songs on the new CD.

If you recorded the LP/Cassette as one big file, you will also need a Wav (or MP3 or other appropriate file) Editor to cut each track into separate files before going to the burning step.

Hope this helps. There are a number of past threads here in the forum on the subject. Try a search on CD recording, or CD burning.

Subject: RE: Help wanted: CD recording
From:
Date: 18 Jan 03 - 09:10 AM

Here are some of those threads:

Help - Making CDs
Analog to Digital Music
Tech - How to Burn a CD from a MP3 file
Digitizing a dodgy tape!

Oh yes, depending on age/quality of the original material, you MIGHT also want software to clean up the original material before re-recording it onto the CD. Remember, GIGO (Garbage IN Garbage OUT). Originally a term dealing with computers, you will find it applies to almost all facets of life.

Subject: RE: Help wanted: CD recording
From: Gurney
Date: 19 Jan 03 - 02:20 AM

Thanks guys. I put this page on my hotlist to devour at leasure. George, the quality of the tapes is quite low, but I recorded it with a handheld in noisy clubs, so memories are more important than studio quality. And regarding quality, a technician advised me to record from LPs with the stylus running through a bath of isopropyl alcohol/isopropelene brushed on with an artists brush. This takes much of the dust-crackle out. Honest, it worked for me. Regards, Chris.

Subject: RE: Help wanted: CD recording
From: kendall
Date: 19 Jan 03 - 08:24 AM

I have a cd burner and a cd writer but don't know how to use it. No instruction book. How do I copy cds? The player shows up on my screen, but the burner doesn't.

Subject: RE: Help wanted: CD recording
From:
Date: 19 Jan 03 - 10:28 AM

Gurney, watch out for that. Alcohol is a solvent. It COULD damage the LP.

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Kendall, need a bit more information. How do you mean, "CD Burner" and "CD Writer". They are the same thing, really.

Usually if they are bought separately from the computer, it would have software on a CD to be installed.

If you bought a computer with the Burner included, then the software hopefully is already installed, but there should STILL be a CD with the original software on it.

The two most common pieces of software that comes with most CD burners are versions of Roxio's Easy CD Creator, or Nero's Burning ROM.

Both are able to duplicate a CD. It's fairly easy to do if you follow the instructions. Nero and Roxio have web-sites with PDF manuals available, plus the software has pretty good help files.

Hope that helps, Kendall.

Subject: RE: Help wanted: CD recording
From: michaelr
Date: 19 Jan 03 - 02:11 PM

This is surely thread creep, but FWIW: For record cleaning purposes, isopropyl alcohol should be diluted with distilled water. I recently watched a documentary on the transfer to CDs of the Smithsonian's old sound recordings, and that's what they do: manually apply a bead of iso/water just ahead of the stylus as the LP plays.

This puts any dirt particles in the groove into a state of temporary suspension, which allows them to flow around the stylus, rather than the stylus bumping over them. CAUTION: Never use soap products to do this, because the soap/dirt mixture will harden into the groove as it dries, making the noise problem worse.

Kendall -- click on Start/Programs. Your CD burner should be listed. You can then make a shortcut which puts an icon on your desktop.

The CD burner in my computer is a Plextor PlexWriter 16/10/40A (whatever that means). It comes with software that includes "Audio Capture 2000" which "rips" audio files from CDs and stores them on my hard disk. From there I use Roxio Easy CD Creator 5 to burn new CDs.
I don't think Easy CD Creator has a ripping feature.

Cheers,
Michael

Subject: RE: Help wanted: CD recording
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 17 Jun 07 - 02:00 AM

refresh