Anyone use Audacity?

[XB-70 Valkyrie]

I just ordered an ART analog-digital converter for conversion of LPs to digital (FLAC).
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=email&A=details&Q=&sku=844849&is=REG
(Thanks to droglus for the suggestion!) Since 2001, I have made hundreds of CDs from my LP collection using a Pioneer CD recorder. However, now that this has died, I needed something else. In a way, I am unhappy about not having CDs of the LPs in question, but, in  a sense the LP itself is the ultimate form of backup.

Anyway, this comes with Audacity, but I believe this is also a free download. Does anyone here use it? What is the best way to get started---wondering if there is any point in playing around with it before the ART unit arrives. Any thoughts? 

[Gurn Blanston]

I just ordered an ART analog-digital converter for conversion of LPs to digital (FLAC).
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=email&A=details&Q=&sku=844849&is=REG
(Thanks to droglus for the suggestion!) Since 2001, I have made hundreds of CDs from my LP collection using a Pioneer CD recorder. However, now that this has died, I needed something else. In a way, I am unhappy about not having CDs of the LPs in question, but, in  a sense the LP itself is the ultimate form of backup.

Anyway, this comes with Audacity, but I believe this is also a free download. Does anyone here use it? What is the best way to get started---wondering if there is any point in playing around with it before the ART unit arrives. Anyone use it? Any thoughts?

I use it quite a bit, however, I have never converted LP's to CD (don't have any LP's), so my experience is probably not useful to you.

I think it is an excellent tool, well worth climbing the rather steep learning curve. It does a lot now which it didn't do when I first got it, which endears it to me, as you can imagine!  I use it for doing simple little things, like cutting the applause off the end of live recordings, anything like that which requires a direct edit of the waveform.  You can also boost gain, splice short tracks together into longer tracks, capture streams, remove tiny defects (you can actually see them and clip them out), and a whole bunch of stuff that I have no real idea about.

By mistake I discovered a few years ago that the best instructions are on Wikipedia, at least they have been. If you wiki audacity, they have an in depth article on just a ton of stuff you can do.

I have been ripping since 1999, and I only have a modest suite of tools on hand, but this is certainly in it, it does a few things fairly easily that I haven't found another way to do.

[XB-70 Valkyrie]

Thanks, it's good to know at least one person with experience on this software thinks it's a worthwhile outlay of time and energy. I'm really looking forward to it actually. Obviously, for my application (LP --> FLAC), this will give me vastly more flexibility than using a CD recorder. I would like to play around with higher sampling rates/word lengths if the ART unit will allow it.

[Gurn Blanston]

Thanks, it's good to know at least one person with experience on this software thinks it's a worthwhile outlay of time and energy. I'm really looking forward to it actually. Obviously, for my application (LP --> FLAC), this will give me vastly more flexibility than using a CD recorder. I would like to play around with higher sampling rates/word lengths if the ART unit will allow it.

Well, Audacity will certainly do that. I don't have good enough hearing to tell if it does any good, but I know you do. If I was a really serious audio guy, I would have explored the ton of stuff this program does.

Oh, make sure to download the latest and greatest if the one you get with the unit is not. They add features fairly regularly.

[Parsifal]

You are probably better off downloading the most up-to-date Audacity from the web rather than using whatever version is distributed ADC you got. If you're using a Mac you won't need it at all, since OSX comes with Garageband, which can be used for the same purpose. I have not used Audacity to record analog audio, but it has a "record button" that spools to a file. Then you can tidy it up (clip off extraneous bits, etc) and export to whatever format you want. For conversion from analog sources I still record with a Sony CD recorder, but import the files in audacity and touch them up before exporting them in a convenient format for importing to iTunes or playing using foobar on a PC.

Regarding the higher bit-rates or sample depths, the unit you linked outputs 16-bit, either 44.1kHz or 48kHz. That is way higher resolution than any LP. The main thing is to carefully adjust the recording volume so that you don't clip. My experience is that the clicks and pops on the LP surface are more likely to saturate the ADC than the actual music program.

[XB-70 Valkyrie]

Thanks! I definitely plan to download the latest version--and hopefully it will work with the ART. It does comes with a "CD ROM"--whatever that is!  (My laptop does not even have an optical drive, but I do have a USB powered one). However, obviously I will not need it.

I do have excellent hearing, but I'm not really a "golden ears" audiophile by any means. I do have some high end stuff (Oracle Delphi table, Audible Illusions Modulus, etc.), but I have also been very happy with the Pioneer CD-Recorder (while it worked), and also really love my Fiio X1, which was only $100. My high-end audio dealer mentioned that I could get an Ayre ADC for only $4000! Not a chance I'll even spend half that much at this point on such a device. It would be interesting to see whether he (or I) could tell the difference between the ART and the Ayre in a blind test!

[Parsifal]

If you want to play with audacity you can always download it and import some tracks from a CD. Then you can experiment with the various features (editing, adjusting volume, exporting in different formats, etc). I've only needed the most basic features to get the job done.

[71 dB]

I use Audacity. I have written my own nyquist-plugins for it, for example crossfeed plugin plus many others which I use in music making.  0:)

[(poco) Sforzando]

I don't use Audacity, but I use Adobe Audition (formerly CoolEdit) all the time. I still use release 1.0, and I've used 3.0, but word on forums has it that Adobe started screwing it up after 3.0 so I'm staying where I am.

As for LP-CD conversions, I've done it quite a bit, but I admit my process is tedious - especially since the record player and computer are in different rooms.

1. I have a combination CD-player/recorder that lets me use the Line In function to record from all components of my system, including turntable and cassette deck.
2. I record the LP onto a CDR as my "raw" file for the CD.
3. I march the CDR into the room with the computer, and extract the files using Exact Audio Copy.
4. I use Audition to remove clicks and pops. This can be done "automatically," but I've found the results are unsatisfactory - in that the software can't always distinguish between a click and a high frequency sound. Not sure what the difference between a click and a pop is anyway, but usually if you see a large vertical line on the wave form that looks like it's out of place, chances are it's a click. Or a pop. You zoom in, select the line, and fill it in from the adjacent sounds, a bit like putting spackling on a wall. But to do this right, you have to work slowly - literally examining 10-second bits of music at a time. And always listen, listen, listen.
5. I also use Audition to remove surface noise. This consists of selecting a bit of the noise, creating what Audition calls an FFT file, and using the FFT to mask the noise on the raw file. This can produce amazingly clean, clear results. I found also when doing voiceover work on my job, the microphone would add noise of its own, and I could eliminate that using an FFT file.
6. I may use Audition to create track markers, for instance in long movements or operas. I may add blank time of a few seconds after a file if I want some space between tracks.
7. Next, I use Nero to burn my CD. There is a setting to leave no time between tracks; otherwise the software by default will pause for about 3 seconds between each track.
8. I play the CD, note any corrections needed, and make changes if needed until I'm ready for the final CD.

As I say, it's tedious. But it produces pretty good results.

Once I had an LP - Charles Rosen and some violinist (Reinhold Peters?) doing Mozart - that had a huge gash and the needle kept skipping in the groove during the slow movement of K 481. I advanced the needle to the next clean spot and did all I could; then I took another recording (Szeryng) and extracted the slow movement from that one. I spliced in the few measures from Szeryng, adjusted the tempo and dynamic by using Audition's time-stretch and amplify features, and voilà! a seamless CD. That was a lot of work.

[Scion7]

Use Audacity all the time. Just make sure your LAME is the latest/greatest that is compatible with it.  Audacity takes time to "catch up."

And btw, Audacity does many things GarageBand does NOT.  Nor does GarageBand come with OSX - it comes with new Macs - which is not the same thing.