Exporting files
Exporting files
Hi. I've just downloaded Audacity and it looks great, but I have a pretty basic question. After recording one long sound file (just through a mic) I then want to split the file up into lots of small chunks and export them all as separate files. I've discovered how to do that, but I want to keep the exported files as small as possible (so that a second of audio is about 60-70 KB), while retaining as much of the quality as possible. Not being a sound engineer, I'm not sure what settings I should use, so can anyone help please? I've done something similar on a PC using Nero's Wave Editor, and found I could export in Mono at 22050 and get perfectly reasonable quality, but I'm just not sure how to do it on my Mac with Audacity. Thanks in anticipation of someone being able to help.
Re: Exporting files
I'm not sure if this is true of other people, but I find that I cannot export short files at 22.05KHz without Audacity adding quite a bit of extra space at the end of the file, unless they've been created at that sample rate. In other words, if you've recorded at 44.1KHz, I don't think you will be able to export at 22.05KHz without this extra silence. This is a bug that needs fixing.
In general though, 22.05 KHz gives decent quality. It's impossible to say if it's "good enough" for your purposes due to subjectivity.
In order to do that without any bugs, when you first open Audacity, in the bottom left corner, change the project sample rate to 22.05KHz by clicking on the menu there. Now, record your voice and do any editing you want. When you export, click File -> Export to Wav (or use Export Multiple) and you will get a 16-bit, 22.05KHz wav file.
Check them to make sure Audacity hasn't added any extra silence to the end.
In general though, 22.05 KHz gives decent quality. It's impossible to say if it's "good enough" for your purposes due to subjectivity.
In order to do that without any bugs, when you first open Audacity, in the bottom left corner, change the project sample rate to 22.05KHz by clicking on the menu there. Now, record your voice and do any editing you want. When you export, click File -> Export to Wav (or use Export Multiple) and you will get a 16-bit, 22.05KHz wav file.
Check them to make sure Audacity hasn't added any extra silence to the end.
Re: Exporting files
Thanks very much for your help. The recording I've been using to test it is at 44,100 and curiously when I exported at 44,100, the file size is smaller than when I exported at 22,050 and I couldn't understand it, so your explanation may well be the reason why. I'll try again in due course, and watch out for any gaps!