I’m looking for an app to capture some music on cassette tape and record it
to CDs.
This is a project for my wife and she wants various stuff from multiple
tapes so I’ll likely need something that allows me to edit the captured
segments - for stop/start, lead noise, etc - before I burn them.
I’m also having problems with two noise sources: the usual tape hiss and
pops and a horrendous hum problem connectiong to the only cassette player I
have that still works. Any helpful suggestions?
In the past, I’ve used Audacity to do this for LPs, recording from the line-in jack of the sound card. It can also mark each track and save each to a separate WAV file. Then I used K3B to create an audio CD from these WAVs. Here’s a link to the Audacity manual for marking and saving the tracks:
The humming noise, if it is at mains frequency 50 or 60 Hz, can be suppressed with a decoupling transformer. It is a small, 1-2 inch in size, device with an input 3.5 mm audio connector and an output 3.5 mm connector. Often the transformer can work both ways. The voltage ratio is 1-2. The price is around $30.
I am guessing that a cassette player operated with batteries (not with a power adapter) will have much less humming noise.
Once you digitize an old cassette recording and listen to it on a moderately good audio system, you will be surprised how low-quality the sound is from a modern perspective.
On 2013-10-30 06:41, Will Honea wrote:
> I’m also having problems with two noise sources: the usual tape hiss and
> pops and a horrendous hum problem connectiong to the only cassette player I
> have that still works. Any helpful suggestions?
Hum usually is a bad ground connection - assuming the equipment isn’t
faulty. A bad power supply can cause hum, too, and very bad.
–
Cheers / Saludos,
Carlos E. R.
(from 12.3 x86_64 “Dartmouth” at Telcontar)
>
> Audacity would have been my suggestion.
> In my case I considered the time and decided to re-buy the music in
> digital format.
>
I completely forgot about Audacity while looking for an app! It’s already
sitting on the disk.
Re-buying is not an option in this particular case - all the tapes were
recorded live and used in children’s choir productions during the wife’s 30
years as an elementary music teacher. She wants pieces of 20 or more tapes
for her final program…
> Once you digitize an old cassette recording and listen to it on a
> moderately good audio system, you will be surprised how low-quality the
> sound is from a modern perspective.
>
We are re-learning this most painfully. Any attempt to record a piano is a
challenge but I’m afraid that we will wind up doing just that as some of the
tapes are almost beyond recovery.
On Wed, 30 Oct 2013 05:41:10 +0000, Will Honea wrote:
> I’m looking for an app to capture some music on cassette tape and record
> it to CDs.
>
> This is a project for my wife and she wants various stuff from multiple
> tapes so I’ll likely need something that allows me to edit the captured
> segments - for stop/start, lead noise, etc - before I burn them.
>
> I’m also having problems with two noise sources: the usual tape hiss and
> pops and a horrendous hum problem connectiong to the only cassette
> player I have that still works. Any helpful suggestions?
I’ve used Audacity to do this. I picked up a cheap USB-based cassette
player on Amazon.
Audacity can be used to eliminate hum and other things - how well it does
depends on how bad the noise is.
> On Wed, 30 Oct 2013 05:41:10 +0000, Will Honea wrote:
>
>> I’m looking for an app to capture some music on cassette tape and record
>> it to CDs.
>>
>> This is a project for my wife and she wants various stuff from multiple
>> tapes so I’ll likely need something that allows me to edit the captured
>> segments - for stop/start, lead noise, etc - before I burn them.
>>
>> I’m also having problems with two noise sources: the usual tape hiss and
>> pops and a horrendous hum problem connectiong to the only cassette
>> player I have that still works. Any helpful suggestions?
>
> I’ve used Audacity to do this. I picked up a cheap USB-based cassette
> player on Amazon.
>
> Audacity can be used to eliminate hum and other things - how well it does
> depends on how bad the noise is.
>
> Jim
>
I had forgotten how useful audacity can be. Ran a quick FFT analysis to
nail the exact frequency as recorded then fed the .wav file through a tight
notch filter. Brought back memories of doing data aquisition for the AF
down a Sandia when we had to clean (literally) miles of tape to get rid of
the noise from a mis-wired ground net. The test cost a whole lot of money
and was a one-shot proposition so the filter included a mask for all the red
faces on the lab team
Turns out the noise here was straight out of the power supply - the darned
thing is so old that a couple of electrolytic caps were drying out. Amazing
how much good swapping in 50 cents worth of cap did!
> Turns out the noise here was straight out of the power supply - the darned
> thing is so old that a couple of electrolytic caps were drying out. Amazing
> how much good swapping in 50 cents worth of cap did!
That’s surely better that a lot of filtering afterwards
–
Cheers / Saludos,
Carlos E. R.
(from 12.3 x86_64 “Dartmouth” at Telcontar)
>> Ran a quick FFT analysis to nail the exact frequency as recorded then
>> fed the .wav file through a tight notch filter.
>
> Nice, I may need to give that a try myself.
>
It works pretty well - if the noise frequency is stable. If your input
(tape, in this case) speed stablity is within a couple of percent then you
can generally run a 4th order filter and get it all on a single pass but if
the speed variation gets too high you may need a series of filters and
multiple passes to kill all the recorded frequencies for the actual
playback. That’s the reason for the fft - it identifies the discreete
frequencies.
As Carlos points out, fixing the power supply was the best way for recent
material but some of this stuff went back years and used a bunch of
different recorders.
On Thu, 31 Oct 2013 20:41:08 +0000, Will Honea wrote:
> Jim Henderson wrote:
>
>>> Ran a quick FFT analysis to nail the exact frequency as recorded then
>>> fed the .wav file through a tight notch filter.
>>
>> Nice, I may need to give that a try myself.
>>
>>
> It works pretty well - if the noise frequency is stable. If your input
> (tape, in this case) speed stablity is within a couple of percent then
> you can generally run a 4th order filter and get it all on a single pass
> but if the speed variation gets too high you may need a series of
> filters and multiple passes to kill all the recorded frequencies for the
> actual playback. That’s the reason for the fft - it identifies the
> discreete frequencies.
>
> As Carlos points out, fixing the power supply was the best way for
> recent material but some of this stuff went back years and used a bunch
> of different recorders.
Yeah, this particular device actually is powered by the USB port, so I
don’t get the AC hum on it. But the recording was made on an old
cassette recorder back in the mid 80’s.
> Yeah, this particular device actually is powered by the USB port, so I
> don’t get the AC hum on it. But the recording was made on an old
> cassette recorder back in the mid 80’s.
>
This project has turned into a monster - the kids just found out that one of
my old reel-to-reel tapes holds a pick-up jam session with Steven Bishop and
Ringo Starr playing around with a mic I had developed for acoustic guitar
recording. We were sitting around the studio when Ringo slapped the pickups
all over the drum set. His formal training was as an engineer (pretty good
at that as well as music) and he got curious after hearing how well it
handled the guitar. Anyway, I got about 2 hours on tape - but I haven’t
powered up that old deck for many years. They are really ragging on me to
get it up and make a copy for them.
One of these days, I’ll learn to keep my big mouth SHUT!
On Fri, 01 Nov 2013 21:14:17 +0000, Will Honea wrote:
> Jim Henderson wrote:
>
>> Yeah, this particular device actually is powered by the USB port, so I
>> don’t get the AC hum on it. But the recording was made on an old
>> cassette recorder back in the mid 80’s.
>>
>>
> This project has turned into a monster - the kids just found out that
> one of my old reel-to-reel tapes holds a pick-up jam session with Steven
> Bishop and Ringo Starr playing around with a mic I had developed for
> acoustic guitar recording. We were sitting around the studio when Ringo
> slapped the pickups all over the drum set. His formal training was as
> an engineer (pretty good at that as well as music) and he got curious
> after hearing how well it handled the guitar. Anyway, I got about 2
> hours on tape - but I haven’t powered up that old deck for many years.
> They are really ragging on me to get it up and make a copy for them.
>
> One of these days, I’ll learn to keep my big mouth SHUT!
Best part of it was when the pianist got a little frisky and knocked his
beer into the baby grand piano in the middle of a set Now, that created
a noise that would be hard to filter…
On 2013-11-02 06:47, Will Honea wrote:
> Jim Henderson wrote:
>
>> That sounds like an incredible experience.
>>
>
> Best part of it was when the pianist got a little frisky and knocked his
> beer into the baby grand piano in the middle of a set Now, that created
> a noise that would be hard to filter…
Nay, that’s part of the show, I would not even try to filter it out
–
Cheers / Saludos,
Carlos E. R.
(from 12.3 x86_64 “Dartmouth” at Telcontar)
On Sat, 02 Nov 2013 05:47:17 +0000, Will Honea wrote:
> Jim Henderson wrote:
>
>> That sounds like an incredible experience.
>>
>>
> Best part of it was when the pianist got a little frisky and knocked his
> beer into the baby grand piano in the middle of a set Now, that
> created a noise that would be hard to filter…
Indeed, probably worth preserving just for the sounds after it.
