Converting cassette tapes to audio CD

[waxcylinder]

I've downloaded and printed out the manuals, but they dwell too much on what one CAN do, not HOW to do it.

That's alway's been the problem with software manuals (and for many hardware manauls too - like the one for my digital camera). Like most software manuals the Audacity ones are written to document the features and functionality.

But that's why we've put some work into developing the tutorials - and you're lucky as the ones for LP/tape transcription to CD/iPod/MP3 player is probably the most developed of those. Feedback on thos e as you use them would be useful, thanks.

There are a number of "un-official" tutorials on the web, including on Youtube, I've not looked at any of those for a while so i can't comment on their quality - but it may be worth a look.

WC

[J Bruce]

To Wax Cylinder
Sorry to be so dense, but I'm still not clued in. I've scoured the tutorials and the manual, but there's no reference to the things I need to do.
1. I've marked the end of a song group, about five minutes of recording, using CTRL-B. It put a red flag at the spot. Then I realize the marked ending isn't quite at the right place, so I want to change its position. I want to erase the flag. How?
Then I want to move the start of playing back say a few seconds, so I try clicking the cursor say five seconds earlier, and a new vert. line appears. But then when I click on play, or click on resume the pause key, it starts to play at the previous vert line. How do I get it to start playing where I want? (Without going back to the beginning and listening the whole five minutes)
Then too at the left of the lower "Label Track" window, there's X Label Track and a down arrow. Clicking on the arrow only allows me to move the window to above the scope line or below. Clicking on the X makes it disappear, never to be seen again. ? ? Does this have anything to do with say editing the labels? What is its function?
How does one correct a spelling mistake in a label?

[waxcylinder]

I've marked the end of a song group, about five minutes of recording, using CTRL-B. It put a red flag at the spot. Then I realize the marked ending isn't quite at the right place, so I want to change its position. I want to erase the flag. How?

This tells me that you have not taken my earlier advice and upgraded to 1.3.12 where most of these things are made much easier. In 1.3 you will need to delete all the text and then one extre delete will remove the label.
In 1.3 you can move the labels around (I can't remember if you can do this in 1.2).

Then I want to move the start of playing back say a few seconds, so I try clicking the cursor say five seconds earlier, and a new vert. line appears. But then when I click on play, or click on resume the pause key, it starts to play at the previous vert line. How do I get it to start playing where I want? (Without going back to the beginning and listening the whole five minutes)

The easiest way is to click with your cursor in the time-bar above the tracks and playing will move to there (I'm not sure if this works in 1.2 - but it is definitely a 1.3 feature).

Then too at the left of the lower "Label Track" window, there's X Label Track and a down arrow. Clicking on the arrow only allows me to move the window to above the scope line or below. Clicking on the X makes it disappear, never to be seen again. ? ? Does this have anything to do with say editing the labels? What is its function?

The X deletes the label track, the arrow displays the drop down menu (and as you have seen the dropdowns for label tracks are more limited than the dropdowns for audio tracks)

How does one correct a spelling mistake in a label?

In 1.2 you will dneed to delete all the text in the label and then retype - in 1.3 you can actually "edit" the label text (much easier)

WC

[J Bruce]

What happened to my posting earlier today asking for more help re moving the cursor line and waht to do about the red flags?
J Bruce

[steve]

What happened to my posting earlier today asking for more help re moving the cursor line and waht to do about the red flags?
J Bruce

Sorry, I've checked the Admin log and there appears to be no sign of such a post being made.

If you upgrade to Audacity 1.3.12 there are multiple ways of moving the playback cursor position, including:
Clicking with the mouse,
Right and Left cursor keys,
"<" and ">" keys (Audacity 1.3.x only)
SHIFT + "<" and ">" keys (Audacity 1.3.x only)
HOME and END keys.
In Audacity 1.2 moving the cursor with keyboard command only works while playback is stopped.

"Labels" can be moved by clicking on their "handles", or deleted as described in waxcylinder's earlier post.
Labels cannot be moved in Audacity 1.2. If they are in the wrong place you will need to delete them and create new labels.
Detailed information about labels in Audacity 1.3.12 can be found in the manual http://manual.audacityteam.org/man/Label_Tracks
The windows version of Audacity 1.3.12 includes a local copy of the manual.

Much of the functionality of Audacity 1.3.12 is simply not available in Audacity 1.2

[J Bruce]

Good news! I finally got some song titles marked in at the end of each song; maximized the volume per step 3 of tutorial; Export Multiple as .WAV to a new folder called C:Tape Music Files; called open Nero to burn a CD music disk;it did it; now have a music disk that I can play, and have tested it; the fidelity is excellent.
Many thanks to Wax Cylinder for recommending Version 1.3.12. Better explanations and tutorials.
One more request:
I found it tedious having to play through each song to get the cursor line to the end of the song as indicated by a bit of flat line and silence, so I could CTRL-M to mark and title it as the end of the previous song. There must be a way to quickly move the cursor line to just before the flat line, then start resume playing until the silence then pause and put in the title. Please advise how to do this.
One other thing that might be of value to you:
I left the tape player playing and the Audacity 1.3.12 recording while I went to lunch. When I came back, the project had stopped and the screen showed this message:
Audacity, the free, Cross Platform Sound Editor has encountered a problem and needs to close. We are sorry for the inconvenience. If you were in the middle of something, the information you were working on might be lost.
For more information about this error, click here ( ) so I clicked on it and got:
Error Signature
Appname: Audacity.exe Appver: 1.3.12.0
Mod. ver.: 9.0.30729.4148 Offset: 00024647
For what it's worth.
Oh by the way - even though the procedure stopped as noted above, I guess it saved all or nearly all the recordings and titles, because I was able to pick up where it left off.
J Bruce

[waxcylinder]

I found it tedious having to play through each song to get the cursor line to the end of the song as indicated by a bit of flat line and silence, so I could CTRL-M to mark and title it as the end of the previous song. There must be a way to quickly move the cursor line to just before the flat line, then start resume playing until the silence then pause and put in the title. Please advise how to do this.

If you zoom out you will find this much easier - I normally reord one side of an LP and then zoom out to fit the project to the screem (there is a button for that) and then you should be able to see the intertrack gaps and move the cursor there.

WC

[J Bruce]

Sorry - I apologize on two counts - I didn't realize there was page 2 of the postings - now I see several that I missed before.
Also, I didn't read carefully enough Steve's posting Feb. 13 7.02 p.m. in which he explained how to move the cursor for example to near the end of a song to get close to when it goes quiet etc. This is OK now.
Thanks to all
J Bruce

[carlgs]

I have just registered and this is my first post. I dont know very much about using this material. i purchased a Hype cassette to pc machine and it seems to be sending to computer ok, and i even found my attempt on windows media player. my problem is i cannot get any sound. i tried playing with the media player as well as audacity, with no luck. i am really unsure as setup. i am running windows vista. my media player plays fine with volume control and all.
Has anyone else had this problem???? HELP

[steve]

I have just registered and this is my first post. I dont know very much about using this material. i purchased a Hype cassette to pc machine and it seems to be sending to computer ok, and i even found my attempt on windows media player. my problem is i cannot get any sound. i tried playing with the media player as well as audacity, with no luck. i am really unsure as setup. i am running windows vista. my media player plays fine with volume control and all.
Has anyone else had this problem???? HELP

If it's a USB cassette player, see here: http://forum.audacityteam.org/viewtopic ... 17&t=53577