Time Consuming Steps - Digitizing Vinyl ?

Discussion in 'Audio Hardware' started by jtw, Aug 12, 2018.

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  1. BayouTiger

    BayouTiger Forum Resident

    I’m both a PC andMac guy and audio is one of the areas where I greatly prefer working on the Mac side. As such a used MacBook Air still works wonderfully for audio. The older machines had better built in features for audio with optical out. (I won’t get into the USB-a vs C thing, either is fine and c is a lot more flexible/future proof. You’ll likely get a good audio interface - my Korg DS-DAC-10r is my favorite by far of the ones I’ve used.

    But if you want to live on the PC side, I love the little Lenovo Tiny series. I’ve go5 about 20 of them at my office and they have been flawless. I usually get the most generic i5 config and I put an SSD in them. They also have a USB DVD drive chassis that the main unit slides into and it makes for a really nice small package.

    Lenovo ThinkCentre M715q Tiny Desktop Computer 10M30008US B&H

    I see now they have an AMD versionwith discrete graphics for a great cost. Never had one, but I do have a couple Ryzen laptops and they are great bargains.

    If you want an nice, inexpensive PC laptop, the HP Envy’s are hard to beat. BestBuy has the Ryzen or i5 unit for $599. This unit has a 1TB hard drive, but it has a slot for an NVMe drive. I’ve got two of them that I put a Samsung 960 blazing fast SSD into and not they have a super fast System drive and a 1TB drive for storage -perfect fo4 music!

    https://www.bestbuy.com/site/hp-env...sh-in-dark-ash-silver/6124570.p?skuId=6124570
     
  2. I've ripped over 225 vinyl albums so far. Once you are familiar with the software and gain experience reading the wave forms processing goes quicker. A piece of advice - minimal processing is best. Use auto click repair at lower settings, don't use equalizers too heavily and save the original unaltered file in case you need to go back and try again. Sometimes the whole rip does not need processing but just a section. Use software that allows you to process small sections individually.
     
  3. psulioninks

    psulioninks Forum Resident

    Location:
    KC Chiefs Kingdom
    I also meant to mention, Izotope offers an "educational" discount (I think it is 50% off for most of their products). So if you are a teacher or a student (or have either in your house), you can get their software at a substantial discount. I acquired RX 6 for half the normal selling price as my wife is a school teacher.
     
    Shak Cohen likes this.
  4. Pastafarian

    Pastafarian Forum Resident

    To take both clicks and crackle out I'm using iZotope RX2, I think this is pretty costly but free to me. Using Wavepad Sound Editor to insert silence and fade out. dBpower amp to set equal volume levels and mp3 tag, to make them iTunes friendly. Computer 5 years old Lenovo 6 GB RAM running Windows 7.

    I reverse tracks before doing auto setting declick, which is essential.
     
  5. jtw

    jtw Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Has anyone just used the adc in something like a MacBook Pro? How does it compare with a $200 stand alone adc?
     
  6. jtw

    jtw Forum Resident Thread Starter

    So, if I wanted to make raw digital files of 100 albums using something like Audacity, what are the most important things to do to make sure I didn't make the same mistake for all 100 albums. It would be a major, major drag to take these files to the vacation home and find out that they are all useless.
     
  7. c-eling

    c-eling They're made of light,We never would have guessed

    Use your ears jtw. Give your Pro a whirl. Doing transfers should be about having fun. :cheers:
    Just make sure the players you use will be compatible.
     
  8. Biggest mistake would be to have the recording level set too high and have distortion.
     
    dkmonroe and c-eling like this.
  9. Dillydipper

    Dillydipper Space-Age luddite

    Location:
    Central PA
    The only step I see as the toughest, is perfecting the actual playback into the recording stage. Because it's as hard as perfecting your own playback onto your system. Turntable; cartridge; stylus; azimuth; conection; signal issues...and all the mojo behind your own satisfactory record-cleaning process. College in the '70s was a no-brainer...maybe you had a Discwasher to wipe an LP with; maybe you'd puff a breath over the stylus...and maybe you just wouldn't give a crap about all the other steps we take care to do today.

    ...and then comes the studying-up process to get you to Needledrop Nirvana...:rolleyes:
     
  10. SKBubba

    SKBubba Forum Resident

    Location:
    Tennessee
    I started using it about a month ago. I've done over 50 albums so far. I can't imagine doing it without Vinyl Studio. Highly recommended.

    Here's my detailed review from the other day on another discussion re. this topic...

    Programs For Splicing Tracks
     
    dkmonroe likes this.
  11. dkmonroe

    dkmonroe A completely self-taught idiot

    Location:
    Atlanta
    That's really the only thing that'll make them "unusable." Before you record for the first time, check the levels and make sure that you're capturing the entire signal. Better too soft than too loud - volume can be increased in processing if desired.

    Here's how I would do it - apologies if this is too obvious and pedantic:

    1. Clean the record and put it on the turntable. Start Audacity and press Record.
    2. Lower the needle on the LP.
    3. After the last track on side 1 concludes, watch and listen carefully to make sure the fade-out is complete before raising the needle!
    4. Raise needle, flip record, use dry brush to remove possible dust. You started with a clean record but you can't be too careful.
    5. Lower the needle and track Side 2. Repeat step 3 at the end.
    6. Export the track as .WAV. You don't need to save the project in Audacity, if you export as .WAV, the raw file is done.

    Notice that Audacity is running continually from Step 1. The resulting file will be one big raw .WAV file with a gap of silence in the middle. If you want to turn it into .FLAC or .MP3, you'll want to manually de-pop and de-click or use ClickRepair or the NR tools in Audacity. And edit the sounds of the needle being lowered and the silence between sides. Split it into tracks and export as FLAC or whatever format you choose. If you want, just leave them raw and mess with them later.

    Again, sorry if all that seems obvious and simple, I figure if you're doing a hundred of them, you'd want a simple plan.
     
  12. dkmonroe

    dkmonroe A completely self-taught idiot

    Location:
    Atlanta
    That looks like a really cool program, and not too expensive. Thanks!
     
  13. jeffmackwood

    jeffmackwood Forum Resident

    Location:
    Ottawa
    I recently posted the following in another thread. It's applicable here as well. Note the footnote regarding signal processing.




    Some time ago (2013) I bought a nifty package that consists of the Audio2USB cable and Clearclick Audio Burner software. I used it once for something - and then forgot about it.

    A month or two ago I found a copy of a vinyl LP in my collection that is not, or will never be, available digitally. This reminded me of that old package.

    The steps to capture a copy of the album onto a laptop were easy: basically tap off a set of RCA outputs, plug the USB end into the laptop, fire up the burner software, hit record and play both sides of the album to create one big WAV file. However editing down the single file into individual tracks was becoming a pain, until I downloaded a free copy of Wave Editor. After a two or three minute learning curve I could easily capture all of the tracks - with lead in and lead out properly edited down. I then exported them as 320MP3 files, and imported them into iTunes - whose greatest virtue (IMHO) is its ability to edit (in this case add) lots of metadata quickly and with little fuss - which I did. I was left with a great digitized version of that album, as individual tracks chock full of metadata.

    I could have exported those tracks in other (lossless) formats (rather than 320MP3) had I wanted to.

    Very inexpensive way to accomplish this task.

    Jeff

    ps. I ran the "tap" off my main HT's vinyl section to the laptop. This allowed me to pass the signal through both an SAE5000 (to remove what few clicks and pops were present) and then through a just-refurbished Pioneer RG-1 (to add 10dB of dynamic range.) I love how good the final tracks sound.
     
  14. Pastafarian

    Pastafarian Forum Resident

    Serendipity last weekend I received 1006 minutes, 260 tracks, of music to process.

    I had no need to listen to the tracks until I'd finished, can't imagine I'd tackle it if I had to.

    I used dBpoweramp, batch convert, to reverse the FLAC tracks and convert them to WAV files. This took 4 minutes.

    Then I left iZotope to process them overnight, I had 8 hours sleep.

    dBpower amp to reverse and convert to FLAC, 4 minutes.

    Then the hard part insert 1 second silence at the beginning and fade out. My 6GB of RAM struggled to keep up with as I can do each track in 10-15 seconds.

    I got an email about a particular track which they thought may be beyond redemption, so I've put 3 files on MEGA cloud so that the result can be compared.

    There's the original first minute, the clicks removed and the final processed track.

    MEGA
     
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