Copying From Audio Cassette To Cd Via A Pc?

[ProDave]

A friend has set me a challenge.

He has an audio cassette recording of his wedding service.  It's his 50th wedding anniversary in August and he wants to be able to play part of the service at the 50th party.

But he doesn't have a cassette player any more. But I do.

So the challenge is to copy the audio cassette onto either a CD, or an MP3 file to be played at the party.

Now I think this should be possible with a PC.

It would be a right PITA to get my desktop pc anywhere near my hi fi. So I would want to do this using Mrs PD's laptop.

It's easy to get a line level stereo audio out from the hi fi.

The laptop has three 3.5mm stereo jack sockets on the front. So am I right in thinking one is a line level audio in? (the others being low level microphone in, and headphone out)

And what software do I need to take an audio input and copy it either to a CD that can be played in an ordinary CD player, or to create an MP3 file from it?

The laptop runs Windoze Vista (unfortunately)

 

[Andy™]

google 'audacity'

you can record from audio in, then save it as MP3 etc

 

[Barx]

Many laptops that have 3 ports are 2 x headphone + mic.

I have one of those easy capture device thingies but i think it is for vid + audio, no idea if it can be used for audio only.

 

[SLIPSHOD & SLAPDASH]

Second here for Audacity. I use it from my record deck.

 

[revjames]

Did this recently for a funeral service. The person in questiuon had an amazing voice and family had tapes of his singing which they wanted playing during the service and eulogy. I already use audacity so it was a simple matter of opening it up and importing audio from a tape player via line in then saving as MP3 and rendering on to a normal CD.

 

[Marvo]

I'll third the Audacity suggestion. I'd go from your cassette player line in to you laptop and capture the audio in a lossless format such as a wav file and only convert to lossy MP3 after editing that way you should get better results. You'll probably want to do some editing to sharpen the audio and maybe remove hiss etc. Once you've done that I'd use your favorite burning software (nero/cheetha or similar) to burn the wav files to disk into CDA format so it can be played in any CD player. It's very little extra work if you also make him a copy in lossy format such as MP3 for mobile device playback. 

Ps, good luck, this kinda thing is time consuming and there's a bit of a learning curve as well so I wouldn't leave it till the last minute if I were you.

 

[steptoe]

I'll go with audacity too,

the only difference is I would recommend flac , can be easier and more versatile than wav IMO.

 

[ProDave]

Great suggestions.

The three jacks on the laptop are colour coded. so what's the standard colour for the line in jack (so I don't plug into the wrong one)

 

[Andy™]

pink iirc

 

[Barx]

pink is mic, light blue is stereo line in.

 

[steptoe]

what line out should I use for powered speakers?

I have 6 sockets on my PC and the speakers work on most of them, 

:C

 

[kme]

I`ve got an external soundcard (cheap enough)( soundblaster - think it was about £20).

Connects via usb, has inputs for line (x2), sp-dif (opt), and mic ; and similar outputs.

When we used to do "in-house" karaoke, I used it as an interface between the laptop & the 12 channel mixer - original audio tracks came from the pc, fed to the mixer as line level, mixed there, outputted to (among others) minidisc, sp-dif and back to the pc ( don`t ask!).

I`d be surprised if you`ve got a laptop with a line level input, tbh - you could use a resistance network to drop the signal level, but its quite a drop - signal level is generally taken to be 0dB at 775mV ; whereas line level is 2V p-p - plus the input impedances are different

I`d go external soundcard, tbh - best quality, imo.

just as an aside - it`s rare to find a 3.5mm jack with line level in / out - I`d assume its going to have summat to do with the crosstalk at the higher peak voltages.

KME

what line out should I use for powered speakers?

I have 6 sockets on my PC and the speakers work on most of them, 

:C

I wouldn`t use a "line" out for any powered speaker - the internal amps generally expect a "signal level"

Headphone can work (especially with a digital source) ; the analogue used to create too much amplifier & valve hum at the low levels needed to satisfy the remote amp in the speakers.

If you`ve got 6 outputs, chances are you`ve got "built in" 5.1 support - you ought to be able to configure the outputs for whatever you`re plugging in

 

[steptoe]

If you`ve got 6 outputs, chances are you`ve got "built in" 5.1 support -you ought to be able to configure the outputs for whatever you`re

plugging in

hey, gimme a break here,

I dont think they are all outputs,

and, Im not massively bothered about a little bit of hum, I just want to plug my 2 little speakers and sort of woofer thingie into the PC,

you know the sort, about 20quid from the bargain bucket kind of set up.

1 stereo jack from the base/bass unit to the pc, then each pokey speaker plugs into the bass/base unit, which is powered from the mains, Im thinking probably at least 2W peak here,    :slap

 

[kme]

If memory serves, it might be the blue one. But because the base is acting as a 2.1 decoder, you would HAVE to set the output on one of them as a pcm . I think that one jack was sub and front, one was front L & R, and one was rear L & R; plus a headphone out, mic in, and ....and.....summat else - as supplied - but you have to reconfigure them if you have an external decoder

 

[OnOff]

Get one of these. They DO work:

http://www.maplin.co.uk/b-grade-portable-usb-tape-to-mp3-player-ion-tape-2-go-683360

Probably cheaper elsewhere.

I also have the turntable version. I decided to put all my vinyl onto MP3. I have a lot of 12" white label stuff from the late 80's. First off I forgot that you used to have to TURN RECORDS OVER to play the B side! Though the quality is fine I gave up after about half a dozen records, for one thing it was taking SO long and my musical tastes had changed too! I can live without the 12" singles for now and any old albums I can download.

Seem to vaguely remember building a little pre-amp circuit for my Technics deck to do the same thing years ago.........in the end I bought a proper USB deck.

 

[Technician]

I am using some software given to me some time ago.  Roxio is brilliant.

I can convert files from MP2 to 3 but while playing the original source in

to the PC, there is an impedance mismatch and a similar mismatch in signal

levels.

I have resolved this by using a step attenuator I built years ago for a similar

problem I had when I built the famous "Texan" amplifier which I still use.  The

set-up allows me to fade -in, fade-out and do editing in much the same way

as it could be done on reel-to-reel.   Remember them?

I MAY have a SPARE Roxio CD rom floating about.

http://www.vintagerecorders.co.uk/

Check out the 100YD on this site; I have one.