Old 45's (records, not guns)>

[DALederle]

This is about old 45 rpm records. The old vinyls I listened to growing up in the 1950s.
My daughter brought over a stack, 50+ of old records that her mother (my ex-wife) told her belonged to me. It was a pleasant surprize. When I went through my divorce I was just so bummed out I left and never wanted to ask my ex or even talk to her if I could help it. But that's another post for a different web board.
At any rate, she brought over these old records along with my belated father's day gift.
Here's the problem(s).
1) I don't have a turn table!
2) They are old, probably scratchy and I'm not sure they are worth keeping.
But with all that I decided I'd like to hear them again. Then it occured to me that it wold be a fun thing to do if I cold, somehow, put them on my computer and then burn them onto a cd. That way I could share them with the friends and family.
But, I just don't have a clue how to do this. With pictures I just scan them on my all-in-one printer and then copy them into folders and can send out as e-mails, paste them onto web pages or burn onto cd/dvd formats.
But what do you do with record?
Anyone have an idea or two?
Help!

Dennis A. Lederle
Lost and Confused (about a lot of things in life.)

[Big and Bashful]

I still have my full hifi including Rega Planar 3 turntable, Shure V15 cartridge, an Aiwa F770 cassette deck which was excellent when new but now needs some coaxing to get it working, and the other bits which make noises come out.
Anyway;
I use a phono pre-amp from the turntable into my soundcard, Use wave editing software to record the record onto the computer, then do some listening, if there is too much clicking etc. then I use the sound editor to de-click. DO this carefully because it also takes some of the sound you want away.
Finally, split the album into individual tracks and save as MP3 files.

It is rather time consuming if you want to do a decent job. I have seen all in one turntable/converter things, but I have always presumed that they will be cheap and poor quality, I may be wrong.

Most of the time now, if I want an album on CD, I just look for it on Amazon, or Google to find it on line, most are now available.

I have used NERO for the audio editor, there are many others, including some free editors (I think!). I used to use SoundForge which was a very powerful editor, Ah, found it! Audacity is my current favourite editor, free as well.

Now you just need a turntable and pre-amplifier...

[Uncle Al]

Try this link

This will give you the procedures to follow, what to have
and what you don't need.

Uncle Al

[crfriend]

Like B&B, I have also had very good luck in digitising old vinyl. My setup is a 30+ year-old Sony turntable (on its last legs now due to corrosion on some of the speed-control circuitry) and an SAE II integrated amplifier with phono inputs feeding a Silicon Graphics "Indy" workstation. I use the stock SGI software to do the base digitisation into AIFF format and then a MP3 coder called "bladeenc" which I have found to do a superior job to the SGI one. The results are then stored on a disk array in the other room where the MP3s can be played on any of the computers in the house or fed back into the main stereo when I want high-power playback.

Turntables can still be had, I believe; however if you're going to buy one you'll need an amp that has a phono-input to take care of the RIAA equalisation that's present on most, if not all, records. You might be able to find software filters that'll do the job after the fact, but it's just easier to alter the analogue signal before committing it to bits.

[Big and Bashful]

I have a phono pre-amp, bought because the Rotel pre-amp does not have inputs for phono level. NAD made it, something similar is probably still available.

[klaatu]

You can buy USB turntables that will record your vinyl and turn them int digital format. The ones that I know of come with software that will clean up the scratches etc. This one sells for around $100 US. http://www.ionaudio.com/products/details/ipt-usb

[Since1982]

http://www.bizrate.com/turntables/45-record-turntables/ Bingo!!!

I also have several thousand 45 records like "Whole lotta shaking goin' on" by both Bill Haley and the Comets and Jerry Lee Lewis and about 8 Elvis Presley and hundreds of other old "rock and roll" cuts. Plus at least 50 old time "black" music by greats like Fats Domino etc...

[crfriend]

Is it just me, or is there something just fundamentally wrong about the notion of a "USB turntable"?

OK, I freely admit it. I'm a bit of an "old fart". When I want analogue, I want analogue, dammit! Somehow introducing "Universal Serial Bus" technology into what's supposed to be a pure signal path just doesn't sit right. It's all about physical motion and how that motion moves coils within a magnetic field to generate voltages and how those minute voltages are lovingly amplified into what goes into the moving-coil loudspeakers (or electrostatics if you're really a tweak) that makes it all worthwhile.

I can see the "USB turntable" as a "rescue mechanism" for long-neglected vinyl, but I will also state that there is a very visceral feeling that one gets (or at least I do) from cueing a record and starting it off at precisely the right moment.

I also used to own a purely mechanical turntable that used springs and clockwork to drive the platter, and horns to amplify what the stylus picked up from the groove on a 75 RPM disc -- great stuff for when the power went out! Volume was adjusted by opening or closing doors at the "big end" of the horn. No 'lectricity required!

Time to soak the dentures and go to bed....

[Gregg1100]

Hi,
I bought a USB turntable to get all my vinyl stuff onto CD. I also have a normal belt driven turntable as part of a hi-fi system. I have found that the tone arms on usb types have no weight to them, and can skit accross the LP with little trouble, damaging the LP. So I have bought another belt driven t/table to use with the pc- wonderful place Ebay. . Usb table now gathering dust.
Just knocked up another puter running Win ME, with Roxio Easy CD Creator 5 Platinum. I found ECDC5 so easy, did what I wanted. My copy-legal, lol,- of Easy Media9 (Roxio) had added too many bells and whistles-- made it a lot harder to get into. Newer software is not always better. Reason for Win ME--ECDC5 and Win XP are not good together. Another project for the long winter evenings to come, along with getting all my photos scanned and put in order. Oh, and getting out in shed to work on my bikes. Did the wife say something about decorating too ?,- not sure I heard that bit right, lol.
Greg

[Kirbstone]

Gregg,
I place great trust in selective deafness, and where pleas about house decorating are concerned they arrive at an inaudible frequency, whether in Welsh or English (which my wife speaks)
Interesting about the Usb. record player being useless.

Tom K.

[Big and Bashful]

Is it just me, or is there something just fundamentally wrong about the notion of a "USB turntable"?

OK, I freely admit it. I'm a bit of an "old fart". When I want analogue, I want analogue, dammit! Somehow introducing "Universal Serial Bus" technology into what's supposed to be a pure signal path just doesn't sit right. It's all about physical motion and how that motion moves coils within a magnetic field to generate voltages and how those minute voltages are lovingly amplified into what goes into the moving-coil loudspeakers (or electrostatics if you're really a tweak) that makes it all worthwhile.

I can see the "USB turntable" as a "rescue mechanism" for long-neglected vinyl, but I will also state that there is a very visceral feeling that one gets (or at least I do) from cueing a record and starting it off at precisely the right moment.

I also used to own a purely mechanical turntable that used springs and clockwork to drive the platter, and horns to amplify what the stylus picked up from the groove on a 75 RPM disc -- great stuff for when the power went out! Volume was adjusted by opening or closing doors at the "big end" of the horn. No 'lectricity required!

Time to soak the dentures and go to bed....

You want to wind it up more! They are 78 rpm records, not 75, then there are 45 rpm, 33 1/3 rpm, and I have seen record players which would play 16 rpm records, but never seen records at that speed.

[crfriend]

You want to wind it up more! They are 78 rpm records, not 75 [...]

Guilty as charged, Your Honour!

[... T]hen there are 45 rpm, 33 1/3 rpm, and I have seen record players which would play 16 rpm records, but never seen records at that speed.

I believe the 16 RPM ones were used for very long-playing voice-quality recordings. I've never seen one, either, but used to have a turntable that got down to that speed.

[Jack Williams]

Okay, yes I can play my hundreds of wonderful 45s on my stacker Garrard, but the best thing to do is put them on my 1960s Row-Ami jukebox, which holds a hundred.(200 sides).
That has a 40wrms valve amp, and upgraded Wharfdale and other speakers. THE way to hear your old 45s.

[Jack Williams]

Yes, I have seen and overhauled a car radio which had 16rpm one sided 7" discs of which the owner had managed to get one or two of. Definitely voice quality, an hour on one side, blank other. 78RPM sound standard. Not the LP upgrade. Other car record players, Cadillac for instance (RCA Victor) had a stacker for 14 x 45rpm records. Much more the thing. The others were Philco, who were into creating their own new standard. Sorry.
RCA were the bods who got us the 45. There was a battle between the 33/1/3 LP and RCA's 45, but it was obvious to have both. RCA reckoned a stack of 45s would do for a symphony... Come on!

[Jack Williams]

Don't ask me about dates, but 19th century there was a joker called Thomas Edison. Not sure if he worked in an office, but he reckoned what an office needed was a dictaphone. Something that you could record a conversation on for later evidence!
So he made a cylinder coated in wax that could be mounted on a lathe, so that as it revolved, the stylus cut a spiral groove in the wax coated cylinder. Simple.
Attached to the stylus was a diaphram directly coupled to a conical horn traveling with the stylus. Talking into the horn vibrated the stylus and cut a varying groove in the wax.
Cranking it back to the beginning, there came the words: "Mary had a little lamb" The very first words that were ever recorded and played back. The rest, as they say, is history.