Soundguy said:
Wow... that's amazingly rude! You imply that my answer is wrong, then when i ask wht you believe the correct answer is.. you make a condescending comment???? Soundguy
Wow ... sorry. Thought you wanted to get a job done, not dwell on why you can't do a job with what tools you've got.
My inference was that your emphasis was on an operating system, not the app itself ... or, more to the point, you got replies indicating what it takes to get the job done, but you have to stop on the point that you can't do what Jimbrown can do with the tools he has.
So, as I rarely submit comments that I don't subscibe to myself, here is a case in point: (caution, tech stuff to follow).
A minor project this weekend was to record a block of content from a particular internet radio station that I really like. Listening via the net is fine in the house as well as on my estate using my high-power Ramsey FM transmitter but, is impossible in the car (with my capability) or at any other location without broadband.
So, I figure I'll use an old "stream-ripper" that I employed some years ago. Crap, can't find it, and don't have time to find another one that's free and actually works how I want it to.
No prob, I'll use the TV card in my PC hardwired into my AV system ... well, no go ... the s/w for it flakes out on me now.
Ok, well, I can always go "old school" and record a 6 hour block on my VCR then digitize it at my leisure. That's what I wound up having to do. More work, but will get the job done and it's mostly PC time, not "my" time.
Step 1: Record net stream onto VCR. Well, no prob except that girlfriend brought up an old Tivo to add to my existing 6 devices connected by a huge mass of cables to my PC. Had to use a "y" RCA connector on both channels to get the stream plumbed into the front of one of my VCRs. Done. Works good.
I set the VCR to SLP (6 hr) mode. The video portion is crap, IMO, but audio is quite acceptable.
Step 2: I've only been at this MP3 thing for 8 years (that I can remember) and don't think Audacity was available then so I use CoolEdit Pro for all my audio digitizing projects. (Dozens of LP's, 45's, cassetts, ... FM broadcasts.)
CoolEdit is bulletproof, if you know what you're doing. I had to set the input levels to ~-9db on the "monitor VU meter" setting and make sure I had enough HD space to commence. FYI, raw WAV files take ~10MB/min. A 6 hour block ~3.5GB. I have an NTSF partition for video stuff any way incase it runs over 4GB.
I'm digitizing at the default 44.1Khz sample rate, 16 bit stereo ... just because it all takes the same amout of time. After contacting the radio station owner, the stream is only at 64kbps ... but what do I care.
Step 3: Man, that's a big file. Wish I had a modern PC. Anyway, because I just started recording "whereever" and stopped it when it ran out of tape, I trimmed the ends to the nearest beginning/end of a tune in CoolEdit. Then I "normalized" the entire 6+ hr file to ~-2db so the resulting playback would play nicely on most any amplifier without having to really crank the knob. Got a lot of work done outside while that was happening.
Step 4: This turned out to be a non-step. I use an app called GrooveMechanic to eliminate pops, tics and hiss-noise from my LPs, etc, digitizings and thought I needed to do a hiss reduction on this project. I determined that hiss/noise was not necessary ... nice and clean after normalization.
Step 5: Split 6 hour block into 1hr parts, for conveinence sake only, and save as separate WAV files. No big deal. Time consuming for an old PC though. More seat time.
Step 6: ENCODE WAV files to MP3 format. The streaming bit rate was 64k so it made little sense to encode at anything better than that. (Yes, I essentially re-encoded an already heavily compressed stream yet again ... the result is very acceptable for my particular use.)
I have the MP3 encoder plug-in for CoolEdit so I just wrote a batch script to save all the WAV files I created to MP3 files encoded to 64kbps sampled at 22050hz stereo.
FYI, the minimum bit rate that I have heard being "acceptable" for "near CD quality" in MP3 format is 128kbps @44100hz sampling rate, 16bit stereo. That yields a file size of ~1MB/min. Via arithmetic, my files are ~0.5MB/min ... which should get me ~20hrs/MP3 CD ... or slightly less on a 512MB MP3 player.
I hope the accounts my weekend project has been of some help to you Soundguy and maybe others. The job at hand is, getting the job done, whatever the job is.
MikePA, great to hear from you! Where were you during the many land surveying discussions recently?
Cheers!
