Darth Bubba
Member
- Joined
- Feb 7, 2021
- Messages
- 33
- Likes
- 16
Anyone here saving their vinyl disks to digital? What equipment do you use? Anyone just playing their pre-amp output into their motherboard line-inputs?
Anyone here saving their vinyl disks to digital? What equipment do you use? Anyone just playing their pre-amp output into their motherboard line-inputs?
I use a Focusrite Scarlet 2i2. I don't think interface quality matters much. Most phono pres will have a noise floor of -60 to -70dB.
I did for awhile, but with Spotify didnt see a reason Anymore. Nothing rare that needs a rip. Even metal like Warlord and Picture is on streaming.
Inner groove songs on Metal Albums have problems.
Used to. Have a couple of Tascam handheld digital recorders. Record 24 bits, 44.1 sampling rates. Keep the record level lowish, maximize after processing, usually de-clicking. The older term for this is "Needledrop", first used when 78s were being transferred to tape. Unless the only source for a needledrop is the disc, not worth it. A transfer from master tape to digital will sound better, analog disc sources are limited compared to tape or digital sources. The groove looses potential energy as the stylus moves towards the end of a side, nothing can be done to fix it.
I did a few rips using an old Edirol UA-25 USB interface connected to my DIY MC phono preamp. I haven't measured its S/N yet but noise is far lower than noise from vinyl itself. Earlier I used a Tascam CDRW-700 semiprecious CD recorder.Anyone here saving their vinyl disks to digital? What equipment do you use? Anyone just playing their pre-amp output into their motherboard line-inputs?
There are plenty of Spotify Connect devices available: https://spotify-everywhere.com/collections/audio-streamersHow are you getting Spotify to play on your sound system?
http://hifiakademie.de/?id=6.1Just curious: what phono pre-amp are you using?
Anyone here saving their vinyl disks to digital? What equipment do you use? Anyone just playing their pre-amp output into their motherboard line-inputs?
The Tascam recorders have the ADCs, 24/96 capable, but as LPs rarely have anything going on above 20k [and I can't hear that high anyway], I recorded at 24/44.1, downsampled to Redbook for the transfer to CD or file. Sometimes used the phono pre built into a receiver [big old Kenwood 9600], sometimes used a stand alone phono pre from Radio Shack that had less self-noise than the Kenwood. I dumped the results into Audacity [freeware] and used Click Repair most times. One recorder has a 3.5 mm stereo jack, the other has two mono 1/4 inch jacks. The noise floor of both recorders easily outperform the self noise of LPs, or of even the electronics of the record playing system with nothing playing. I first used a Shure 97xE cartridge, got better results with a Shure M44-7 cartridge. Note that I was transferring LP to digital formats for others, often working from damaged materials. Keeping the stylus in the groove was the most important consideration, fidelity was not as important as simply getting from one end of a disc side to the end without skipping. Yes, I had access to LP cleaning equipment [a local record shop had an ultrasonic cleaner], that oftimes was crucial. If I could find the same recording in a decent transfer from a streaming site like YouTube, I'd use that as the results would be better sounding. Again, the analog disc format is inherently faulty and nothing can be done to fix it. If the record was old and abused [and they usually were] there would be accelerated IGD and the discs would have more audible wear at the end than the beginning. The folks who produce streams at sites like YouTube or Amazon have better source materials than commercially issued LPs. When I moved to a small apartment, I gave up all the gear except the recorders, gave away all of my [2000] LPs, no longer wanted to hear my LPs, one way or another.Well, all I have are the disks - no master tapes. What equipment chain did you use to get the music off the turntable into the handheld digital recorders? By that I mean: what phono preamp, what ADC, etc.?
The pencil tool in Audacity allows for manual declicking. Click Repair catches more, takes less time. I suspect there are real-time digital declickers available now, Click Repair needs a file to work on, does not work in real time. Most of the time, if a disc really needs clicks and pops to be removed, manual declicking is too time intensive.. . . Wave Repair allowed for manual declicking. This is very time consuming but works very well. I found it took about two hours per track, so twenty hours per album. It's a tedious job but results were much better then some sort of auto declicking.
I did this only for albums that weren't available on CD or were very poor quality on CD in one case. Of course no sooner had I done all the work on some albums then it came out on CD! My vinyl copies stand up very well in comparison.
http://hifiakademie.de/?id=6.1
It's adjustable via dip switches and device is battery powered.
There's measurements in the PDF: https://hifiakademie.de/pdf/phono.pdf?si=MTYxMzMwMTk1Ny4xNDQ4fDgwLjEyOC4yMTEuNzF8IA
The pencil tool in Audacity allows for manual declicking. Click Repair catches more, takes less time. I suspect there are real-time digital declickers available now, Click Repair needs a file to work on, does not work in real time. Most of the time, if a disc really needs clicks and pops to be removed, manual declicking is too time intensive.
I'd run Click Repair backwards first, then forwards. That was recommended, I think, by the company.Years ago there was a program that had a unique approach to de-popping and de-clicking. The author(s) noticed that pops and clicks had extremely fast rise times and decay times. A "spike." Some music (cymbal strikes) have fast rise times, but always have slow decay times. Their program scanned the music backwards, looking for fast rise times, which were actually the fast decay times of the spike. It could automatically reduce the spike, or mark it for manual removal. I don't know its name, nor if it operated in the analog domain or digital domain. But it showed some pretty good thinking outside the box.
The weakest link in the electronic chain is going to be the phono preamp. Get the best phono pre you can. Amir has a positive review of the Cambridge Audio Duo, goes for about $300. No digital out, but the self noise of the phono preamp is usually a much bigger problem than the ADC:In my meanderings around Ebay I have found the NAD PP3i, NAD PP4, Rega Fono Mini A2D, Pro-Ject Phono Box USB, and the Thorens MM 088 ADC Phono Preamp units. All are devices that can take phono input and output a digital signal to my computer's USB inputs. Has anyone used one (or more) of these? Are they superior to simply feeding the output from a "normal" preamp with a phono section into a PCIe audio card in my computer and letting Audacity go to town on the captured signal?
I'd run Click Repair backwards first, then forwards. That was recommended, I think, by the company.