First a word about hardware if you are even somewhat serious about recording good quality audio:
Most computer systems are sold with the minimum quality sound cards and speakers to get by: they are great for hearing the Windows "tada" system event sound. Recording quality will GREATLY be determined by the quality of your soundcard! Of course this also applies to the sound output of your system's speaker system. I would highly recommend to acquire a good sound card, such as a Sound Blaster® Audigy™ 2, that can be bought for around $120.00 as well as a speaker system, such as a Logitech Z340 33-Watts Speaker System - around $45.00, that includes a subwoofer. If you plan on archiving INTERNET Radio talk broadcasts or music.. good hardware will be well worth the cost.
Recording from microphone:
Most sound cards provide the ability to receive sound input from a microphone through the sound card microphone port. This is useful for recording voice or sounds to your computer.
1. Check Your Hardware: Verify that the microphone is firmly plugged into the microphone port instead of the headphone or speaker port. If you are not sure which port is correct, you can check the sound card to see if it is marked (sometimes with a picture of a microphone).
2. Open/ activate the Audio Editor software
3. Select the microphone device, adjust the recording volume for the highest possible performance within the recording session. Check the check box after selecting the device.
4. Click the "New" button then the "Record" button , and then speak into the microphone to test. If the microphone is plugged into the correct jack, the wave patterns on the display should move up and down . If it does not move, sound is not making it through your microphone. If the wave does move, press "Stop" button , and then press "Play" button to listen to your recording. Adjust the microphone volume and/or "recording configurations options" (explained later on this page) until satisfied with results.
5. Click the "New" button and you are now ready to record!
6. After you have finished your recording session, select "Save As" from the File" menu or click the button. Select what format to save file as (format options will vary depending on what audio editor you are using) then select path and name.
Note: The quality of your recording will greatly depend on your sound card and background clutter. If your card adds lots of extra noise to recordings you may want to consider replacement: first try experimenting with the device volume setting.
Recording from cassette player (cassette tapes) or turn table (vinyl records):
Most sound cards provide the ability to receive sound input from a device through the sound card "line-in" port. This is useful for recording from player devices such as cassette players and record players.
1. Check Your Hardware: Connect your cassette player's or turn table output to the line-in jack of your sound card using any combination of cables and adapters that do the job. For a standalone cassette player, we recommend using a simple cable with headphone and 1/8-inch stereo plugs on both ends. If your cassette deck is part of a stereo system, use the headphone output with the same cable mentioned above; you will probably need a big-to-small adapter to pull this off. With either system, make sure that bass, treble, and loudness levels are all set to zero.
2. Open/activate the Audio Editor software
3. Select the "line-in" device, adjust the recording volume for the highest possible performance within the recording session. Check the check box after selecting the device.
4. Click the "New" button then the "Record" button , and then turn on the cassette player or other output device to test. If the output device is plugged into the correct jack, the wave patterns on the display should move up and down. If it does not move, sound is not making it from the output device. If the wave does move, press "Stop" button, and then press "Play" button to listen to your recording. Adjust the line-in volume and/or "recording configurations options" (explained later on this page) until satisfied with results.
5. Click the "New" button and you are now ready to record!
6. After you have finished your recording session, select "Save As" from the File" menu or button . Select what format to save file as (format options will vary depending on what audio editor you are using).
Note: The quality of your cassette transfers will greatly depend on your sound card. If your card adds lots of extra noise to recordings you may want to consider replacement: first try experimenting with the device volume setting.
Recording from WinAmp or stream audio from Internet:
Most sound cards provide the ability to receive sound input from the speaker output (known as Stereo Mix"). This is useful for recording from any speaker output such as INTERNET radio or stream audio from the web.
1. Open/activate the Audio Editor software
2. Select the "Stereo Mix" device , adjust the recording volume for the highest possible performance within the recording session. Check the check box after selecting the device.
4. Click the "New" button then the "Record" button , and then play any sound file from the audio speaker output for testing. The wave patterns on the display should move up and down . If the wave does move, press "Stop" button , and then press "Play" button to listen to your recording. Adjust the stereo mix volume and/or "recording configurations options" (explained later on this page) until satisfied with results.
5. Click the "New" button and you are now ready to record!
6. After you have finished your recording session, select "Save As" from the File" menu or button . Select what format to save file as (format options will vary depending on what audio editor you are using).
Note: The quality of your recording will greatly depend on your sound card. If your card adds lots of extra noise to recordings you may want to consider replacement: first try experimenting with the device volume setting.
Recording configurations options:
Screen shot of the Recorder Setup screen (Click the "Properties" button to show) >>>
- Record setup controls your sound card’s record (input gain) levels. You may need to do this if your recordings are too quiet (which adds unwanted noise), too loud (which leads to clipped, distorted sound).
- ACCU Control = sets if recording without silence is enabled or not.
- Attack time = sets sounding time for the starting of recording. This is a time for non-silence detection - the time during which the level increases or decreases by 20 db. The volume will be decreased if the level is more then AGCHighLevel. And the volume will be increased if the level is less then AGCLowLevel. The rate of the volume changing is equal to (20db / AGCAttackTime).
- Attack level = sets level loudness for the starting of recording. This is a level for non-silence detection.
- Attack time = sets sounding time for the starting of recording. This is a time for non-silence detection
- Attack release level = sets level loudness for the ending of recording. This is a level for silence detection.
- Attack release time = Gets or sets silence time for the ending of recording. This is a time for silence detection.
- Auto gain control = Gets or sets a flag indicating if Automatic Gain Control is enabled or not. Auto-gain is a feature that increases and decreases microphone volume, depending on how softly or loudly the user is speaking. The user does not need to adjust the microphone volume because auto-gain chooses the amplification level to optimize tuning.
The systems installed sound card must support this feature. Note: This option works best in an environment with very little background noise. Excessive background noise can cause the microphone volume to decrease, even though the user is speaking at a constant volume.
- Auto gain High level = sets AGC high level - the maximal allowed volume level.
- Auto gain low level = sets AGC low level - the minimal allowed volume level.
- Visualization type = sets a visualization type during record. Type of a visualization. Can be 1 (recorded data isn't show during record) or 2 (recorded data show during record).
How to edit a file:
- First load the file into the editor via the "Open" menu item or button .
- Play the file via the "Play" button to determine what section of the file you want the file edited, cut, etc. ( you have the option of moving the starting point by clicking on the wave form view at any point).
- High light the section to edit by pressing the left mouse button and dragging - exactly like you would edit or select text within a word processor application.
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- Select to cut, delete selection, choose an operation, choose filter to add or what ever action to perform on the high lighted section.
- Select "Save Selection As" Or "Save" from the "File" menu (or button )and input the name and path of the new file as well as what file format (i.e. WAV, MP#, etc.) to save as.
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- A screen shot of a section of file ready to edit or perform a function:
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- See below instructions on editing just the right or left channel.
How to edit/ manipulate a single channel in a two channel stereo file:
- The software supports 2 channel stereo files. When a file is loaded.. the top wave form view is the left channel and bottom is the right channel.
- To edit JUST the left channel (top view pane) merely click on the space directly above the pane (you will se a small line separating the space from the view pane). This will highlight this pane only and "grey out" the lower (or right channel) pane. Do any editing you want (i.e. fade, amplify, whatever.. to this channel by highlighting the section, or complete display, then apply the effect to.
- To edit just the right channel (bottom view pane).. click in the space directly below the pane. This will "grey out" the top pane to allow editing of this channel only.
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- NOTE: this software does NOT support the copy/ paste/ cut functions of portions of individual channels. If you have only one channel active in the wave form and perform any of these functions it will be applied to both channels.
How do I convert the file format of an audio file (i.e from WAV to MP3):
- Load the file into the editor.
- Select to "Save As" from the "File" menu.
- Select what format to save file as.
- This will convert the file to the path, name and format selected.
How do I convert sample type of loaded file ((i.e from 8000 Hz Mono to 44100 Stereo):
- Load the file into the editor.
- Select from "File" menu "Convert Sample Type".
- Select what sample type to save file as. then Save As the file.
How to save just a portion of a loaded file as a different file:
- First load the file into the editor via the "Open" menu item or button .
- Play the file via the "Play" button to determine what section of the file you want to save as a seperate file. ( you have the option of moving the starting point by clicking on the wave form view at any point).
- High light the section to edit by pressing the left mouse button and dragging - exactly like you would edit or select text within a word processor application.
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- Select to "Save Selected File As" within the "File" menu item.
- Input the name and path of the new file as well as what file format (i.e. WAV, MP#, etc.) to save as. This saves just the portion of the file that was selected.
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- A screen shot of a section of file ready to edit or perform a function:
Keyboard edit functions within the wave form:
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Ctrl+A = Select All |
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Ctrl+X = Cut |
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Ctrl+V = Paste |
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Ctrl+C = Copy |
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Delete = Delete Selected |
Mouse functions:
1 = The user releases the left mouse button:
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in the marker's area (cursor is the "tick"), near marker. Then StartSelect and CurrentPosition properties from interface is set in accordance with marker. |
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in the stereo channels area (cursor is the "L" or "R"). One of stereo channels is picked out and all operation applies to that channel. This will not work for mono files and does not apply to deleing a channel - working to add this feature. |
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in the any waveform area. Current position is changed. |
2 =The user twice clicks the left mouse button in the marker's area:
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If cursor is situated near current marker position current marker position is added, otherwise - current cursor position is added like a marker position. |
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Cursor points to the marker. Marker is deleted. |
3 = The user releases the right mouse button:
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in the waveform area. Current area is picked out. The nearest bound is moved to the current cursor position. |
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in the stereo channels area (cursor is the "L" or "R"). One of stereo channels is picked out and all operation applies to that channel. Will not work for the mono files and does not apply to deleing a channel - working to add this feature.
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4 = The user moves the mouse with clamped left mouse button:
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in the any waveform area. Current position is picked out. Near the border of early detailed area the type of cursor is changed and user can decrease or increase dimension of current detailed area. |
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in the stereo channels area (cursor is the "L" or "R"). One of stereo channels is picked out and all operation applies to that channel. It is not work for the mono files and does not apply to deleing a channel - working to add this feature. |
"Operations" that can be applied to a loaded file:
First of all, please understand, that you must select what portion of the file to apply functions to or Select All if want to apply to the complete file. Operations...
- Amplify+ = Applies Amplify effect to the selected part of an audio file by +20% each time applied. Changes amplitude of input audio file.
- Amplify- = Applies Amplify effect to the selected part of an audio file by -20% each time applied. Changes amplitude of input audio file.
- Fade+ = Creates a fading out (loud to soft) effect in the selected part of an audio file.
- Fade- = Creates a fading in (soft to loud) effect in the selected part of an audio file.
- Delay = Makes a Delay effect in a selected part of an audio file. Delay is an echo effect that replays what you have played one or more times after a period of time. It's something like the echoes you might hear shouting against a wall.
- Flanger = a very characteristic sound that many people refer to as a "whooshing" sound, or a sound similar to the sound of a jet plane flying overhead. Flanging is generally considered a particular type of phasing (another popular effect). Flanging creates a set of equally spaced notches in the audio spectrum. Flanging is created by mixing a signal with a slightly delayed copy of itself, where the length of the delay is constantly changing. It is actually one specific type of phasing.
- Invert = Inverts the selected part of an audio file.
- Normalize = Normalizes the selected part of an audio file. Amplifies the selection part to within the specified percentage, 80%, of the maximum level.
- Vibrato = a slight variation of pitch. Vibrato equals a cyclical changing of certain frequency of input signal.
- Reverse = reverses the file. Plays backwards.
- Stretch+ = Stretches an selected part of an audio file by time of +20%. The voice audio file the speech is increased without frequency changing.
- Stretch- = Stretches an selected part of an audio file by time of -20%. The voice audio file the speech is decreased without frequency changing.
"Filters" that can be applied to a loaded file:
First of all, please understand, that you must select what portion of the file to apply functions to or Select All if want to apply to the complete file. Filters...
- Band Bass = Applies Band Pass filter to the selected part of an audio file. The Band Pass filter consists in a Low Pass and a High Pass combined together, so it allows the frequencies falling within a certain range. The Band Pass filter will act like a Low Pass and a High Pass together: it will pass only the frequencies falling within a certain range.
- Low Pass = Applies Low Pass Filter to the selected part of an audio file. A low-pass filter eliminates unwanted high-frequency noise and interference.
- High Pass = Applies High Pass Filter to the selected part of an audio file. A high-pass filter eliminates unwanted low-frequency noise and interference.
- Low Shelf = Applies Low Shelf Filter to the selected part of an audio file. Low Shelf filter decreases volume of the higher frequencies and pass the lowest.
- High Shelf = Applies High Shelf Filter to the selected part of an audio file. Reverse of the Low Shelf filter.
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