I have lots of audio cassettes that I would like to be able to transfer to CD. Some of them are no longer being made and I would like to be able to do this before the tapes become damaged or worn. What do I need to get started?
Wayne Parham Messages: 18675 Registered: January 2001
Illuminati (33rd Degree)
All you need is a good casette deck and a PC with sound card and CD burner. If you don't have those, lots of shops provide tape-to-disk transfer services. Check around at your local audio/video sales and repair shops.
Wayne, how do they make the music from the cassette tapes into digital format? Do they just play the music in the cassette tape and capture the sound to the computer?
Is a built-in sound card enough to capture the music of the cassette tape? Do I need a good microphone to capture the sound from the tape? What format is the best format for capturing or recording sounds from a tape?
Wayne Parham Messages: 18675 Registered: January 2001
Illuminati (33rd Degree)
Yes, the built-in sound card will work just fine. Connect the line in on your sound card to the line out of your casette deck. You'll probably need a dual RCA to stereo 1/8" adapter cord. Those are pretty common, sometimes even included with the sound card. If you don't have one, you can get it at Radio Shack.
Finally someone who explains how to transfer tapes to computer! I've been looking all over the place trying to find out how to do that. I have tons of tapes from the 80's and even some from the early 90's that I would love to make into CD's.
The only thing worth noting here is that the quality will be no where near that of a digital track. Just don't be surprised or it might be disappointing.
The volume controls also need to be adjusted when recording from a cassette tape player to the input on the sound card. Sometimes it is very difficult to get the volume on both correct so that you don't get a totally distorted recording on the PC. I have found that if the volume on the tape player is set low, and the volume on the sound card input is set to a medium level, it works the best. Takes a little time of trial and error to get it correct. And of course alot of patience.
Adveser Messages: 434 Registered: July 2009 Location: USA
Illuminati (1st Degree)
compguy wrote on Sat, 27 November 2010 21:06
The volume controls also need to be adjusted when recording from a cassette tape player to the input on the sound card. Sometimes it is very difficult to get the volume on both correct so that you don't get a totally distorted recording on the PC. I have found that if the volume on the tape player is set low, and the volume on the sound card input is set to a medium level, it works the best. Takes a little time of trial and error to get it correct. And of course alot of patience.
On that note, the volume has to get close to zero or it will truncate bit depth of the digital recording. If you record and the volume is only at 48db you will essentially be making an 8 bit digital file once the volume is boosted. I don't know how important the quality is, but take that as you will.
I recommend boosting the signal at the tape player rather than the computer if it is of decent quality.
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