Audacity Forum

Am using Sony minidisc to record my own live music. Am connecting sony unit to computer (win xp) via usb and audacity recognizes the files. However, when I use audacity to open the file (have also tried import raw data), a strange waveform appears--sometimes solid blue, sometimes a single line of zig zags without the characteristic density of a waveform. When I play this waveform, the cursor races to the end and all that is produced is an electronic screech.

What are the correct steps and settings for getting the pcm hiMD file off the sony and into audacity as a wav so that it can be saved as an mp3?

I have fiddled w the settings so much, that I decided to uninstall audacity and make a fresh start. Problem is, somehow the new download and install are not fresh, but have actually preserved the memory and settings of the uninstalled predecessor. I'm stuck.

Can anyone walk me through this?

Actually I don't think that Audacity actually recognizes your file type. Audacity has a nasty habit of attempting to open filetypes that it doen's understand and what you get is the chipmunk screech that you describe (rather than a sensible error message.

Audacity supports WAV MP3 and Ogg (and in 1.3.x FLAC) - you will need to convert your MD files to one of these formats prior to loading into Audacity (you may be able to find a converter by searching t'interweb).

Your alternative is to connect your MD to the line in of your PC and play the file in and record with Audacity. This will of course go digital-to-analog in the MD player and then Analog back to digital on your PC's soundcard (rather than the direct digital route you were aiming for). This should work though - I do something very similar, except that I connect my MD through an external soundcard and then on to the PC.

And yes Audacity will preserve the preferences settings through the de-install/re-install process - 1.2 stores preferences setting in the windows registry (so if you are comfortable tweaking your registry you can remove the Audacity references in there - personally I never touch my registry, too much dark magic for me!) - in 1.3.x there is a configuration file created per user, audacity.cfg.

WC

You are absolutely correct; thanks for your suggestion...and it works!