Audacity Forum

Hi,
I have recorded a short 30 minute demo direct from my mixer onto my mini disc player. I have then recorded it onto Audacity but when i import as an mp3 and play it back it is distorting and skipping... However when i listen to the demo just on my mini disc or running it through my amp it is clear and has no distortion...
I have tried recording it with the mini disc volume down but it hasn't seemed to make any difference (only a quieter output)

Also when i am recording onto audacity it is distorting... I have been told this is correct due to the line in control on the recording volume controls being activated... Is this right? My partner has used this method several times to upload short mixes/demo's onto the pc and has not had any problems with it so why am i?

Mini Disc uses Sony ATRAC music format or PCM, not MP3. Audacity has no idea what to do with that and so plays the music badly. If you recorded the music PCM, that should have worked perfectly depending on the format. but you can get far less music on the disc.

You might be able to find converter software to manage the ATRAC music so Audacity can handle it.

You can use an adapter audio cable to connect your Mini Disc to your Deskside PC or Mac, but probably not your Windows Laptop. Many Windows Laptops do not have Line Level, Stereo connections.

Koz

http://esupport.sony.com/perl/swu-downl ... pd_id=2971

Koz

When I converted my minidiscs I wanted to avoid going digital to analog and then back to digital again. This is one of the reasons that I purchased the Edirol UA-1EX soundcard (http://www.roland.com/products/en/UA-1EX/) as it has a digital input (1/8" phone type S/PDIF optical in & out) this enabled me to remain entirely digital in the conversion process (with the exception of a couple of minidiscs which overloaded and produced clipping when I recorded with Audacity.

The problem is that when using the digital input the gain control is disabled as the device assumes the levels have been set correctly - for these I had to resort to takaing an analog output from my minidisc deck to feed to the RCA inputs on the Edirol - thus giving me management of the harware gain control on the Edirol.

Note that the UA-1EX is now superseded by the Edirol Cakewalk UA1G USB Audio Interface -see: http://www.roland.com/products/en/UA-1G/index.html

Though the earlier UA-1EX seems still to be available at some places.

WC

Thanks for your replys... I'll probably try to find some software like you suggested Koz. It just seems strange that my partner used it all the time to upload his and didn't experience any of these problems.