Importing music

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Audacity 1.2.x is now obsolete. Please use the current Audacity 2.1.x version.

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Abigail
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Importing music

Post by Abigail » Mon Jun 09, 2008 1:44 am

Hello. I really have no clue how to import audio files to incorporate them into the podcast I am creating. It is basically a news show but I want to include some music. When I try and import audio from files I have saved, it says, audacity does not recognize this type of file. I'm pretty sure everything in my windows media player is saved as a wav file? I have no clue. I don't know either how to use something I play directly from the computer cd.
How do I save my music to the right type of file audacity will recognize?

steve
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Re: Importing music

Post by steve » Mon Jun 09, 2008 2:37 am

Windows Media Player (WMP) is naughty - by default it uses its own format (WMA) and to hell with anything else.
Windows is naughty - by default it hides the file type extension, so that "mysong.wav" just shows as "mysong"

To find out what format an audio file is in, right click on the file and select "Properties" then look in the "Advanced" tab.

To make WMP save as WAV, you need to go through the settings and make it save as WAV - better still, dump WMP for playing audio and install Foobar2000 - it's not as pretty as WMP, but it supports more file types, is easier to use, it's free, it allows you to change the format of files to what you want, it doesn't report back to Microsoft every 5 minutes, and it's a top quality audio player.

To import audio tracks, you first need to "Rip" the tracks from the CD as WAV files. Try "Exact Audio Copy" or "C-Dex".

The most compatible format is "44.1 kHz 16 bit Microsoft PCM WAV". These will play in anything.
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Abigail
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Re: Importing music

Post by Abigail » Tue Jun 10, 2008 2:48 am

Stevethefiddle, thank you so much for your answer. I got hooked up with foobar 2000 and ripped a cd and imported it to audacity and it worked! Yeah. Now I'm in. Thanks.

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