Equipment & software

For "how to do this" questions and answers, notes, instructions
El Ciego
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Post by El Ciego »

The best thing one can do is to simply get a clean recording with the hardware (recorder).

Most of us do not have hardware devices for sound processing. Yes, software can do almost any job that actual hardware can do... compression, limiting, reverb, noise gate, amplification etc.

But most of us do not have these hardware devices. This is good! The computer/software can do the same jobs as a lot of expensive little boxes, and keeping everything digital means that you won't introduce noise and hum from adding a chain of electronic devices.

I like my minidisc, even though I do have to convert from digital to analog (MD to PC), then process everything digitally, but I like it. I have replaced some $4000.00 worth of signal processors for a software system costing 1/20 of the cost of outboard gear. This makes me happy!

Does this help?
sc0tt-uk
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Post by sc0tt-uk »

yeah its true, software is generally the better option these days, especially if cost is a factor, and especially if what you want to work with is sex sounds. I just talk in terms of hardware because I've got more experience under my belt with it. If i ever get a chance to record again I think i'll get me a copy of audacity and do some learning.

RP - Is that bedroom above close to your pc? If it was in the next room for example, you could monitor whats going on with a decent length mic cable going straight in to your sound card and use cdex or something similar to record hours of audio. Same room as the pc would be doable i guess as long as your computer doesn't sound like a truck... mine does... you can hear it on most of my recordings unfortunately.
Of course, the sound proofing might be good in your building, and if thats the case things get tricky.
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yeppie
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Post by yeppie »

RP wrote:he he :lol: yeppie. I said software and hardware is quite different and you
said there's no big difference. I maybe don't understand what you mean
but I meanth the names for some functions are different and it's confusing
me. With good hardware and the right settings you don't have to improve
any files but I know it's impossible in some situations. How to record
sounds from a roof for instance? :?
yo rp, i know i did and than i didn´t Twisted Evil
don´t worry, i don´t want to confuse you anymore, so here´s my attempt to explain.

when sc0tt talked of hardware, i think he did not talk about our usual recording devices like mini-disc, dictaphones or mp3 players. the devices he had in mind are hardware sound processiong tools, the kind you use to improve, edit or change sounds you have recorded before. professional recording studios own tons of these devices.
but nowadays you can do most of this work on your pc using software tools. if these tools are semi-professional, they often have the same names for processes.

sc0tt used words like compressor, threshold, gate, gain, amplify and so on that he knows from hardware sound processing tools. all of these words can be found in semi-professional software like audacity and audition. that´s why i claimed that there are no big differences between hardware and software.

you said there are big differences but that might come from using different software (more consumer orientated) and from misunderstanding the kind of hardware sc0tt probably had in mind.

audio editing still is a confusing topic, right?
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mysx
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Post by mysx »

El Ciego, Thanks for the information :) Actually I wanted some MP3
player but now I'm not so sure. I'll also check what's available in the
store next time... "Inga and Sven upstairs" ha ha ha :lol:
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mysx
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Post by mysx »

sc0tt-uk, I live in a between two bigger apartments and my neighbor
upstairs do have the same small apartment and the bed is probably
right above mine. Because it's a very small apartment I cannot do
recordings when the computer is running. Too much noice. Also I
think the sound proofing in the roof is better than in the walls
and there's a floor also :cry:

But thanks for the information. It might be useful later
even if I don't understand everything right now.
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mysx
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Post by mysx »

Thanks yeppie! I still dont understand however because I cannot find
some names in in MAGIX Audio Cleaning Lab 11 deluxe or Audacity.
Maybe it's "hidden features for advanced users"? :?

Bah! I just press some buttons and listen :lol:
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mysx
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Post by mysx »

Oh... I was confused because there wasn't such functions on my old
cassette recorder. I think I should look for a good tape recorder until
there's better mp3 players, or maybe I'll get both...

Testing imageshack. It's the about screen
for MAGIX Audio Cleaning Lab 11 deluxe.
Image
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mysx
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Post by mysx »

Sorry, I mixed it all together. It would be a little easier if I could speak english :shock:

I still have some thoughs and questions...
What I've learned so far: Most MP3 players do have a microphone built-in.
There's no plug for an external mic and it's mono only. So I understand it must be very
hard to have good recordings at hotels and similar. For me however it's not necessary
to use a portable recorder because I live in a flat and are waiting to hear my neighbors.
So I'll get some bigger device for homeuse.

However, I'm still interested in MP3 players like Creative Zen Vision:M since
I need a portable equipment for my SSL collection! :) Also it should be possible to
watch movies. It's expensive and there's a 30 GB harddrive. Do anyone know if the
harddrive makes any noices? Maybe I should look for players with flash memory?
It's important i think, especially in the future if there will be better recording
options, external mic etc...

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mysx
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FLV software

Post by mysx »

Not only youtube are using FLV files. There's many sites like youtube out there.
I use to copy the FLV files from the cache folder and then I use FLV Player


But how to convert? I cannot find a free converter that is easy to use :roll:

FLV Online Converter

I don't know yet but it seems to work...

If the URL is wrong, look for the FLV file in your internet cache folder and copy the address.

Maxdave
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You Tube Files

Post by Maxdave »

I "trap" the You Tube file with http://keepvid.com, then I convert the .flv to other formats with RIVA FLV Encoder, which is a free download at http://rivavx.de
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mysx
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Re: You Tube Files + more...

Post by mysx »

Maxdave wrote:I "trap" the You Tube file with http://keepvid.com then I convert the .flv to other
formats with RIVA FLV Encoder, which is a free download at http://rivavx.de

Thanks! KeepVid was new for me and I'll check it out later. When it's about
Google Video, for some reason I get FLV mono files even the Google videos
are in stereo when copying the FLV files from the internet cache. In that
case maybe not KeepVid can help. Let's see...

I've actually downloaded RIVA FLV Encoder and player yesterday
for testing so I didn't mention it. The encoder is interesting and
I'll check if Riva's FLV Player is better than Martijn's.

Google Video and Google Video Player etc.
If you ever find/get a Google Video (GVI) with some very nice sound, to
get the very best quality there is, open the GVI file in Wordpad and copy
the URL at the bottom. Paste in IE or some download manager and you'll
get a DivX AVI which you can extract the sound from. With VirtualDub or
some other free software. The sound is usally MPEG Layer-3 that you
maybe have to convert to PCM in some cases. Well I had to do that
myself once... :oops: And you will need the DivX video codec.


When it's about extracting sound, another freeware to test...

AoA Audio Extractor

"AoA Audio Extractor provides you a handy tool to extract
audio/sound or background music from video files.

With AoA Audio Extractor, you can easily extract audio tracks from AVI,
MPEG, MPG, FLV (Flash Video), DAT, WMV, MOV, MP4, 3GP video files
and save them as MP3, WAV and AC3 formats.
It can also be used to save any portion of the audio of a video file.
AoA Audio Extractor is FREE software.

Specifications:
Latest Version - 1.1.5
Designed for Windows 98/2000/NT/2003/XP/Vista
License - Freeware
"

Last edited by mysx on 13 Jan 2007 15:41, edited 2 times in total.
Maxdave
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Audio Extractor

Post by Maxdave »

Thanks, RP, just downloaded this one.

I use vid2mp3 now, but will give this one a try too.
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mysx
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Re: Audio Extractor

Post by mysx »

Maxdave wrote:I use vid2mp3 now, but will give this one a try too.
I didn't know about vid2mp3. Where can I find it?

I've corrected my post about Google GVI files. You will need
the DivX video codec also, or the AVI cannot be opened by
VirtualDub. I had XviD installed but it didn't work.
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yeppie
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Re: Audio Extractor

Post by yeppie »

RP wrote:I didn't know about vid2mp3. Where can I find it?
Google may help:
http://www.download25.com/install/aplus ... ipper.html
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mysx
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Re: Audio Extractor

Post by mysx »

yeppie wrote:
RP wrote:I didn't know about vid2mp3. Where can I find it?
Google may help:
http://www.download25.com/install/aplus ... ipper.html
Thanks yeppie. I did google it and I only found "Aplus DVD to MP3
Ripper" where the setup file is called vid2mp3.exe. But it isn't free
and I thought he meanth something else.
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