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Jim Laumann
09-01-2011, 6:29 PM
After a long search, I finally found a boom box for the shop which has a cassette player - so now I have 'toons again - have a healthly supply of my own, plus a large box of them I was given.....

Playing some of them, I hear some "hissing" and sound fade in/out - which says the tapes are dying.......

Is there software/hardware (I assume this will be a 'PC' thing) out there that I can get to convert these to CD before I loose them entirely?

Thanks

Jim

PS - Would like to do the same for all the VHS I've collected over the years as well.

Myk Rian
09-01-2011, 7:22 PM
I don't know why it was so hard to find a cassette player. They're in nearly every garage sale I go to.
Connect the output jack to the AUX-IN on the computer. Find a program you like to record.
There are many DVD-VHS decks that will record a tape directly to a DVD.

Shawn Pixley
09-01-2011, 7:25 PM
There are many analog to digital converters that you can use with your computer. After it is in your computer you could burn to a cd or add to iTunes. If the cassette is dying, I doubt you would be happy with the transfer.

Bryan Morgan
09-01-2011, 9:21 PM
It can definitely be done. The quality of the recording will be as good as the hardware and software you use to convert it or you can just take it someplace and have them do it for you. If its commercial music I'd just re-download it from gomusic.ru or itunes or whatever

Jim Sebring
09-01-2011, 10:55 PM
For converting VHS tapes to DVD try (ironically) "VHS to DVD 5.0" by honestech. I've converted most of the VHS tapes our turning club has in the library to DVD. The product works well.

David G Baker
09-01-2011, 11:47 PM
Jim,
You may need to de-magnetize (degauss) the tape play-back heads.

Bryan Morgan
09-02-2011, 12:07 AM
Jim,
You may need to de-magnetize (degauss) the tape play-back heads.

Can you still buy the wands for this? :) I have one but I'm not giving it up. :) I probably shouldn't have said that... the Smithsonian will probably want to add it to their collection. :)

Dan Bundy
09-02-2011, 6:19 AM
I did this several years ago. With Roxio on my computer, I got a stereo cable w/ 1/8 in male plugs on each end. Plugged one into the headphone jack on the boom box and the other into the microphone jack on the computer, hit play on the boom box and record on Roxio on the computer. I had to manually separate the songs in files, but that was no big trick. I'm not an audiophile so the noise, etc., didn't bother me enough to worry. I think Roxio has a few tools for that and I'm sure there are others, once the songs are digitized. Some of the cassettes were homemade recordings of old 33 1/3 lps, so not only was there cassette noise, but there was needle noise, too. Good luck. DB

Jim Laumann
09-02-2011, 9:09 AM
Forgive the semi-stupid question - just didn't envision it would be as simple as connecting a player to the PC w/ a cable. Is there a 'prefered' file format for what is captured from the cassette - what format is used by CD players? MP3? Other?

W/ regard to the quality of my cassettes - some are going down hill - others are still ok - hoping to convert those.

Thks

Myk Rian
09-02-2011, 10:39 AM
MP3 is pretty universal. You can put them on phones, players, almost anything will play them.
Another format burning software uses is .wav

Bill Edwards(2)
09-02-2011, 2:26 PM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mn4yVGLQJqQ

Curt Harms
09-03-2011, 8:20 AM
Forgive the semi-stupid question - just didn't envision it would be as simple as connecting a player to the PC w/ a cable. Is there a 'prefered' file format for what is captured from the cassette - what format is used by CD players? MP3? Other?

W/ regard to the quality of my cassettes - some are going down hill - others are still ok - hoping to convert those.

Thks

.wav is preferred for burning to CDs for best quality. MP3 for the little hand held players. Some CD players will play MP3s burned to CD as well but I'm pretty sure MP3 is a "lossy" format so I don't know what MP3s burned to CD sound like. They're probably fine in a vehicle and would likely hold a ton of songs on one CD. I've only ripped cassettes to CD so have no experience with MP3. I just got an RCA to 1/8" jack cable and hooked a cassette player to the PC's line in.

Mike Henderson
09-03-2011, 10:53 AM
Converting a cassette tape to CD will not give you excellent sound. Music on a cassette will be limited in the frequency range and will have a significant amount of noise. Your copy will never be better than what you hear (well, there is some processing software that can improve it somewhat). The .wav will give you good reproduction (no better than what you put in) but a .mp3 with a high bit rate will also give you quite good reproduction and the files will be significantly smaller.

Given that you're starting from a cassette, I'd definitely go to MP3. You can test it yourself. Burn on song in .wav and then burn it again in .mp3 (select a high bit rate) and see if you can hear the difference. But no matter what, it'll never be as good as if you bought a commercial CD of the same song.

Movies are the same. VHS converted to DVD still looks like VHS.

Mike

Shawn Pixley
09-03-2011, 11:09 AM
Mike gives sound advice. In addition to what he said, the mic input is likely not stereo so you will only have it in mono. I am tranferring some of my vinyl to digital format through my home studio. I transfer at the highest rate possible (24 bit, 88.2 kHz) and down-rez to CD. My quality is still the quality of the vinyl. I am only transfer albums that haven't been released as CD's. You need not go as complicated as this. To can get a A/D converter for less than 100$ that will give you stereo and less degradation of the sound than the mic input. But only you can detemine that the resolution is adequate for you. If you have the ears for it and the stereo to reproduce it, I would go for this.

John Lohmann
09-04-2011, 4:21 PM
I have a Behringer UFO202 interface & use Spin it again software. The software does pretty good on reducing tape hiss & works well on LP's. Read the reviews, they are mostly good. If you have a lot to digitize, it can be time consuming.

Curt Harms
09-05-2011, 8:22 AM
Mike gives sound advice. In addition to what he said, the mic input is likely not stereo so you will only have it in mono. I am tranferring some of my vinyl to digital format through my home studio. I transfer at the highest rate possible (24 bit, 88.2 kHz) and down-rez to CD. My quality is still the quality of the vinyl. I am only transfer albums that haven't been released as CD's. You need not go as complicated as this. To can get a A/D converter for less than 100$ that will give you stereo and less degradation of the sound than the mic input. But only you can detemine that the resolution is adequate for you. If you have the ears for it and the stereo to reproduce it, I would go for this.

If you use the line in jack rather than the mic jack you should get stereo AFAIK. Like Mike says, the the output quality is unlikely to be better than the source without some fancy massaging. How good does it need to be? Listening to a recording in a home theatre is one thing, Listening to a recording in a 1988 pick-um-up truck is another.

Shawn Pixley
09-05-2011, 12:28 PM
If you use the line in jack rather than the mic jack you should get stereo AFAIK. Like Mike says, the the output quality is unlikely to be better than the source without some fancy massaging. How good does it need to be? Listening to a recording in a home theatre is one thing, Listening to a recording in a 1988 pick-um-up truck is another.

Depending upon the age and type of computer, you can get stereo or mono. Only the OP can tell what he has. As the OP was using a boom box in his shop, this may be adequate. Personally, I lament even the degradation you get with an MP3 as opposed to CD's or good vinyl. I listen to Mp3's through iTunes in the shop. But I am never wowed or satisfied by the quality. As the OP was lamenting the Hiss and Fade, I don't think he would be very satisfied with the output after he went through all of the labor to input it. If he or you are happy with that, fine. If someone wanted to archive things that can't be replaced, I would go with the best transfer possible. A/D convertors inside computers are generally not as good as peripherals.

Greg Portland
09-06-2011, 5:12 PM
The option that Bill E linked is the easiest: http://www.ionaudio.com/products/audio-conversion/cassette-players

My parents converted their vinyl and cassettes using these systems and have been very happy with the results. There are hiss-elimination algorithms included with the software which will help clean up the sound. You can do the same thing with PC software but a "hit play and come back in 90 minutes" solution is very nice if you have a large number of cassettes to convert.