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USB turntables

splat

Nam I am
Between me and My wife we have proably about 300 Lp's , well I want to conver them to MP3's

So will I be better off Taking the Line out of my Turntable/Amp and feeding it into the Line-in on the sound card on my PC, or will I be better off using a USB turn table ?

I am leaning toward the USB turntable , but really don't know anything about who makes the good ones and which ones are trash .
 

Dartman

Old Bastard Mike
Feb 26, 2003
3,911
0
Richmond, VA
I'm thinking if you already have a nice turntable you should go with the line out to soundcard option.

Spend the money on some sound editing software to remove the hiss, clicks and pops.

Mike
 

narlus

Eastcoast Softcore
Staff member
Nov 7, 2001
24,658
63
behind the viewfinder
I'm thinking if you already have a nice turntable you should go with the line out to soundcard option.

Spend the money on some sound editing software to remove the hiss, clicks and pops.

Mike
yep! good advice.


i've been in a vinyl ripping frenzy of late.
 

splat

Nam I am
well I just got out my Old Technics Turntable , hooked it up and Nothing!!

After sitting for so long the Belt dried out and cracked to pieces. I are an Engineer so I saifd I bet I can make one ( i did find a place in the UK i can order them from ) , I take an Old Mtb tube, cut a thin 1/4 strip, rough up both end and Vulcanize them ( patch kit glue ) , let them dry, press them together nad wala , a new belt. next we will see how it plays.
 

Quo Fan

don't make me kick your ass
If you go to a hardware store and get o-rings, they usually are the same as drive belts for these type devices. I fixed a CD player like that. We used to use them in my last job when Toshiba discontinued drive belts on some sorters.
 

Westy

the teste
Nov 22, 2002
54,225
20,003
Sleazattle
well I just got out my Old Technics Turntable , hooked it up and Nothing!!

After sitting for so long the Belt dried out and cracked to pieces. I are an Engineer so I saifd I bet I can make one ( i did find a place in the UK i can order them from ) , I take an Old Mtb tube, cut a thin 1/4 strip, rough up both end and Vulcanize them ( patch kit glue ) , let them dry, press them together nad wala , a new belt. next we will see how it plays.

Awesome ghetto-rig. Bike sourced too. Rep given.
 

pinkshirtphotos

site moron
Jul 5, 2006
4,827
521
Vernon, NJ
i getto rigged one for my dad. took an old headphone jack and the speaker from a mono speaker turntable and put it into the line in on the the comp. then got a program to record line in. he loves the hiss and pops when he listens to the albums because it reminds him of the old days
 

Kornphlake

Turbo Monkey
Oct 8, 2002
2,632
1
Portland, OR
I think the preamp level of a phono is different than the preamp level of your line in... I'd run the phono out to the phono in on a receiver then from the line out on the receiver to the line in on the sound card. I'm not going to guarantee my method is better, but I think you may get a little better sound quality because you'll have real amplifiers adding gain to the signal instead of the wimpy electronics on your sound card. I'd do that before USB if you've already got a turntable.
 

Cru Jones

Turbo Monkey
Sep 2, 2006
3,025
2
Hell Track
I think the preamp level of a phono is different than the preamp level of your line in... I'd run the phono out to the phono in on a receiver then from the line out on the receiver to the line in on the sound card. I'm not going to guarantee my method is better, but I think you may get a little better sound quality because you'll have real amplifiers adding gain to the signal instead of the wimpy electronics on your sound card. I'd do that before USB if you've already got a turntable.
Agreed. If you don't already have software to use, check out Audacity. It's a free, open source sound recording and editing software.

It's a personal preference, but if the records are clean, you probably won't need to do anything to clean up the sound. IMO, most noise removal techniques take away some of the character.
 

h22ekhatch

Monkey
Jun 13, 2005
269
0
Portland
I am a vinyl junkie myself (went through the dj phase)...

I started using serato a while back and started converting some of my rare records to mp3. I tried to do some of my more common records as well, but I came to realize it is just SO much faster to download the albums than to bother messing with it.

Unless you really like the analog sound (which gets killed in the conversion anyway) or you have some rare records you won't be able to get the internet then go for it...I like soundforge. But really, if you are converting something like the beatles where you could literally BT the whole album in mp3 format in under 3 minutes it probably isn't worth the effort :)
 

splat

Nam I am
. But really, if you are converting something like the beatles where you could literally BT the whole album in mp3 format in under 3 minutes it probably isn't worth the effort :)
well part of the reason I'm doing it is to get some of the music from LP to mine and my Kids MP3 players, and at this point I want to emphasis getting music by legal means and then I'm cheap too :)