[rescue] vinyl - wav - cd

[Carl R. Friend]

   Dave V writes:

> A buddy just gave me a stack of classic rock albums and a very high end
> turntable. 

   Good.  Save the music!  (Even if it means "blowing it to bits".)

> Has anyone, or does anyone know the drill to get these off vinyl, and
> into wave format? I have an Indigo2 (teal). My guess is that I should
> convert the audio jacks on the I2 to 4 channels, and use the sound
> mixer, but from there, I am lost.

   You'll do just fine by using the standard 2-channel (stereo)
capability of the I2.  You'll probably wind up using the "Sound
Editor" tool that comes stock with IRIX unless you have something
more user-friendly.  Record at 44.1 kHz and make *real* sure that
you're not clipping (use the meters in "audiopanel") because
digital recorders *really* hate that (there are no "ballistics"
as there are in old-style analogue recorders so when it
clips -- IT CLIPS).  You'll want to record in AIFF mode then
convert (using Sox or something akin to it) to ".wav".  Where
possible, save the file locally (as opposed to on an NFS mount)
since the data are coming in in real-time.

   Simply jack the "Tape Out" bits to the I2's line input; the RIAA EQ
bits will already be done by virtue of the "Phono In" circuitry of
your preamp (it *does* have one, doesn't it?).  Plug the "line out"
jacks to the "Tape In" and use the I2 exactly like a tape deck.

   Best practise would seem to indicate recording LP tracks as discrete
files on the computer for easy access later on.

   If you don't care too much about the absolute quality of the end
product, you can rip to MP3 format at 256k or so using something like
bladeenc.  I've done that in the past, to great advantage, using
an Indy.

   Of course if the Hollywood Mafia get wind of your activities
you may get your tail in a sling.  ;-)  They are the ones, after
all, that are trying to outlaw non-licensed (read, "non-crippled")
A-D converters.

+------------------------------------------------+---------------------+
| Carl Richard Friend (UNIX Sysadmin)            | West Boylston       |
| Minicomputer Collector / Enthusiast            | Massachusetts, USA  |
| mailto:crfriend at rcn.com                        +---------------------+
| http://users.rcn.com/crfriend/museum           | ICBM: 42:22N 71:47W |
+------------------------------------------------+---------------------+