What is the easiest way to convert vinyl LP record albums to digital?

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I know, you're probably thinking, "Just buy the CD"... but with about 350 albums x $15 or whatever they cost now, that's $5,250 which is out of the question for now, even if I could find CDs of all of them.

What I want to do is select the tracks I like the most from each album and play them with my turntable, feed them into my computer (I use an eMac) and create either AIFF or MP3s of them. Has anyone tried this?

Thanks

[sakabatou]

1. That cold work, I think

But can your turntable connect to a computer? If it can, than all you need to do is get software that can record sound from an exernal source, ie. microphone, headset, etc.

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3. My eMac does have a Line-In audio port, and I also have iMic from Griffin

But I don't know if the signal from the turntable would be strong enough or would I have to run it through an amplifier before going to the Line-in port. Also I don't know what program I would use... maybe the Mac web sites might have some tips.

[underpants]

2. Well, I would start with some heat, you know, to shrink it

It's still gonna be tough to get it into the little plastic case.

[mainegreen]

4. You need something like this

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=1095164&CatId=193

[AirmensMom]

5. I did it.

I hooked the computer up to the stereo and played all my albums and tapes. It was very tedious. The program I used would either split the tracks or not -- but it didn't work very well. If I told it to split them, every pause was a split. If I told it not to, I had to go find where to split them myself. Still, it worked out OK.

[pitohui]

8. oh yeah it puts the tee in tedious all right EOM

.

[CarpeDiebold]

6. My dad did this a few years ago

Here, take a look at this site. It's got video of what you need and what you need to do.

Hope it helps! It was so much fun doing this, I think you'll enjoy it too :)

http://reviews.cnet.com/4520-10163_7-6226087-1.html?tag=nav

*edit* go thru the steps down at the bottom, makes it really clear about what you need to do.

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12. Thanks very much

[pitohui]

7. what we did

we did it while napster was still free, but we downloaded copies of the albums we wanted to keep from napster and then threw away the old scratchy vinyl albums

since you are just going to keep favorite tracks, you might be able to afford to do this even if you have to pay, but we were doing every song, on every album, in the original order, just as it was on the record, so the cost would have been too much for 350 albums -- and keep in mind many albums are "double" albums!

it's worth it to pay a little to save a lot of time, at first we tried to make copies of our old vinyl albums, but copying each one, then cleaning it up to remove all the pops and noise that had accumulated over the decades, it was just too much work and took too much time

we have created both CDs and MP3s and in addition you can leave music files on your computer if you have enough memory and listen to music, language lessons, etc. while you're online as well as being able to carry the music w. you

vinyl sucks! i don't know how we ever lived like that!

be aware that if you have an album, which is now on CD or has been on CD for some time, it's worth checking amazon.com for people selling used copies, if you can pick up the CD for $4 plus shipping, it's worth the time saved as long as you're not doing it for all 350 albums!

[UTUSN]

9. Roxio

Somebody else conected the turntable to the stereo and to the computer for me since I'm hopeless as a tekkie. It *is* very tedious. But the results can be great. Like, there are usuually about 10 to 12 tracks per LP of popular music, right? You pick the 2 to 5 you like. You might have to refresh your memory and give a chance to some tracks to make sure you don't trash something, meaning listening at least to the beginnings of some. O.K., so you then PLAY and RECORD onto the program---or going back, you need to play it withOUT recording first to make sure the sound levels are within a good range, not over the loudness top or too soft. Usually once you do one song from one album the rest of the ones on the same album will be fine, but when switching to a new one you might need to test again to get it uniform.

O.K., so you need to record EACH song separately. That way, you can play tracks ON THE CD by themselves if you want to. If you record ALL of one side of an LP at once, you will only be able to play the CD from start to finish.

About 20 songs fit on one CD, or like, two albums' worth. There ARE some albums that are ALL gold. I hadn't heard DYLAN's Greatest Hits in years, and wound up doing ALL of it (each track separately). Same with Randy NEWMAN's Good Old Boys album.

With classical music, like symphonies, it's a bit easier, since there are usually only 4 long sections. But like with TCHAIKOVSKY's ballets, like Swan Lake or Sleeping Beauty, where the tracks might be very short, and there are dozens and dozens, it's really tedious.

Also I was very good with maintenance of the LPs with cleaning fluids back when, but they have stacked up for YEARS, so some cheesecloth and fluid might be needed. Plus, when recording, it's annoying that one track might have a scratch on it (that might be cleaned off), but it's annoying to have to start recording that track again. Or sometimes, leave it in the recording.

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13. Thanks

[TheBaldyMan]

10. A decent sound card, a CD burner & lots of disc space

Record from turntable to hard-disk in something like DAT format, this is almost as good as vinyl sound quality, then with the right software you can clean up the audio then store it to CD in mp3 or CD-audio format.

I've never converted from vinyl to digital but do make my analogue recordings in digital format them convert them to a portable format afterwards.

There are a lot of hardware pitfalls so try and get the software from your soundcard and burner manufacturers.

I use a creative soundcard & liteon CD burner. There is no difference between recording from microphone / aux / line-in ports and a turntable so I suppose it's the same.

[sendero]

11. I painstakingly...

... took a somewhat rare (in America anyway) recording that had no prospect of ever getting in a digital format and converted it into digital format. (Straight to the Krankenhaus by Secret Oyster, a Scandinavian fusion band of the mid 70s)

It was A LOT OF WORK if you want to do it right.

I recorded each side into .wav format (use almost any recorder software).

I used a shareware program "waveflow" to slice each side into songs.

Used waveflow to carefully fix up the beginning and ending, if you don't you will hear a lot of vinly noise (ramp up the volume, ramp down at end).

I used a program called "DePopper" to get rid of the vinyl clicks and pops. I tried 3 other programs that did little or nothing, this one works well but don't be in a hurry, it is slowwwwww.

Then I converted the .wavs to .mp3. They sound *great* if I say so myself.

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15. OK thank you

[Taverner]

14. Why???? You will lose that warm sound Vinyl gives you

Especially on MP3's....

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16. Well MP3s would be my last choice. I did make AIFFs of the Rubber Soul

tracks, from a mint-condition vinyl LP, and I also bought the Rubber Soul CD itself, to compare how they sound. When played with iTunes and through headphones, they are very close in sound, but to me the one taken from LP sounds warmer and more "alive" while the one from the CD is "cleaner" and more "perfect" but a little colder and metallic-sounding.

[UTUSN]

17. What are we going to do when CDs are superceded? n/t

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18. I think that's already happening. The Wherehouse store near me is gone.