converting cassettes to mp3

mkennedy

hi.
i'm converting some old cassettes to mp3 but tbh i'm not overly impressed with the quality of the recordings.

are there optimal settings to achieve a good quality mp3 recording, e.g should the microphone volume be as low as possible to eliminate hiss and would i need to encode to mp3 at over 128kbit/sec.

i find however that encoding an album at over 128kbit/sec results in a large (50mb plus) file

otoh, when i convert cds to mp3 i find i can get a decent quality recording encoding at less than 100kbit/sec (approx. 30mb per album).

so when converting analog to mp3 should i just expect that either the quality will be worse or the files need to be bigger to achieve any sort of quality?

or is there anything else i can do?

Wertz

Microphone? Are you recording the tapes playing on a deck through a microphone?

If so that's the prime reason for poor quality and no amount of bitrate is going to change that.

[edit] If not (and I hope not), around 128 should be fine, since the tape's analogue output isn't going to show up as much as digital signal from a CD would.

mkennedy

Wertz wrote:

Microphone? Are you recording the tapes playing on a deck through a microphone?

If so that's the prime reason for poor quality and no amount of bitrate is going to change that.

[edit] If not (and I hope not), around 128 should be fine, since the tape's analogue output isn't going to show up as much as digital signal from a CD would.

hi.
when i say "microphone" i mean i have connected the headphone output on my hi-fi to the mic input on my laptop with a cable i got from maplins (that is designed for this job).

i'm using audacity software and with this software you are given a number of options for the analog source e.g microphone, mono audio, stereo audio etc (as far as i can recall atm).

which one should i choose?

Capt'n Midnight

line input is better than mic
check the volume on the hi-fi , start at 7 (out of 10)

if you only have mic then you may need to reduce the volume level

is the sound distorted ?

mkennedy

Capt'n Midnight wrote:

line input is better than mic
check the volume on the hi-fi , start at 7 (out of 10)

if you only have mic then you may need to reduce the volume level

is the sound distorted ?

hi.
the options available in the audacity app are actually:
1) microphone
2) cd audio
3) stereo mixer and
4) mono mixer.
So should i stick with microphone?

also, i have tried recording with the hifi's volume around 7/10 and it was very distorted/unlistenable.
So i keep the volume around 2 or 3.

there is also an adjustable input volume in the audacity app itself. This is currently set at 10/10.
Is this just an alternative to adjusting the hifi's volume or should i lower this to get rid of hiss?

also, if i have already encoded stuff to my pc at under 100kbit/sec will i be to take this stuff and re-encode it at 128kbit/sec to improve it or is this pointless.

_CreeD_

Tape = Bad
Headphone out = Bad
Mic in = Bad
Laptop Soundcard = Bad
Low bit rate MP3 = ....well....you get the picture.

Each stage of the process is far from the best so while you may get to transfer some of your fave music don't expect much quality no matter how much you tweak things. Ideally you want a source with Line-out to a Line-In on a decent soundcard, then the highest encoding quality you can live with (most encoders have a frequency cut off filter and I'd advise using it set to at least cut after 16Khz, most tapes do not go higher, you could go lower to reduce hiss (at the expense of high end in the tracks themselves)).

On the re-encoding, nope you can't improve them at all...what's gone is gone. You can add some life to them again with a number of products out there (some quality Dac/Bitdepth converters etc.) but thats about it.

IrishRover

A lot of laptops have a single socket that doubles as a "line in" and a "mic" socket.

The biggest problem you are making for yourself though is that you are taking a "headphone out" socket as the source which means you are amplifying the sound before it reaches the line in of your recording device. You should have a setup where it doesn't matter what setting you put the listening volume to on your hifi, the volume of the line out remains constant. So buy a cable that will go from the left and right line out channels of your tape deck or amplifier (phono connections) and at the other end of the cable is the standard 3.5mm jack that goes into your line in socket.

Like the one here: http://www.tekcomputersuk.com/35mm-jack-to-2-phono-gold-5-meter-p-682.html

I don't know whether the line in socket on your laptop is really a mic socket so I would use a PC with a soundcard that has a proper line in socket. You don't want to use a mic socket because it may distort the sound by amplifying it too much and also it may only allow you to record in mono.