Converting Live Recording To .wav File Via Audacity

[Shermy]

Hi Folks,

I recently made a live recording in Hi-Sp on a Hi-MD 1Gb disc with the following equipment:

NH900

MM-MCSM-4

MM-EBM-1

and the following settings:

Mics plugged into Line-in

Manual record level at 24/30

It sounds incredible!!

However, when I go to convert it to .wav files to burn onto a CD using Audacity, it slows down the speed of the tracks so much that the pitch has dropped by close to a whole step!!

I did this in real time using Audacity rather than the HiMDrenderer or Sony Wave Converter because of the way that the recorder assigned track numbers (puts them in the middle of "tracks" and sometimes one song is actually multiple tracks). There were a total of 89 track marks for 19 songs. Most of these extra tracks are the performers talking between tunes.

A few questions:

Does the HiMDrenderer tool add extra stuff on to the beginnings and endings of tracks to where, if they are combined, there will be a noticeable "transition" to the next track (be it silence or a noise)?

Does Sony's Wave converter do anything like this?

If the answer is yes to the above, I guess I'll have to go and edit my track marks.

If the answer is no, is there a way to speed up the newly created .wav files in Audacity without distorting the track in any way besides raising the pitch back up that whole step?

It took me close to 3 hours to get the actual CDs created, so I really don't want to have to spend that much more time to correct.

Has anyone else experienced this?

Thanks!

Edited February 14, 2005 by Shermy

[A440]

Hate to say it, but I think your easiest option is to just edit the track marks on the MD, upload via SonicStage and convert with Wave Converter, especially since you've already made a backup. You can eliminate unnecessary track marks pretty quickly--just Pause, << back to MARK xx, and hit the track button to remove it.

But I don't understand why Audacity would lower the pitch during a .wav conversion--it's not normal behavior.

How are you getting the music into the computer? Straight outta the headphone jack in realtime? Then saving in Audacity and "Export to .wav"? It should just record what goes in without alteration.

If you want to play with your existing wav tracks, under "Effects" in Audacity there is a "Change Pitch" option--I've never used it, but you could try it.

Wav converter doesn't add silence or noise to the beginnings or ends of tracks. Nero, and probably some other CD burning programs, give you the option for gapless burning.

[Shermy]

Thanks A440, You're always so helpful!

I uploaded the tracks into SonicStage via USB before I did any of the conversion.

That is, I played the tracks from "My Library" in SonicStage while recording it in real time via Audacity. When I played back the track to see where to fade out applause and fade in to the beginning of tracks I noticed the pitch drop somewhat, but it seems even more obvious (slower) on the burned CDs.

I've already started editing my tracks on the recorder...seems like this is going to take longer than the original process in its entirety. Oh well, the final result will be WELL WORTH IT!!

[A440]

WAIT!!!!!!!!!

If you've already uploaded the tracks once then Sonic Stage will delete them on the next upload. You'll need to wav convert the ones already in the machine and edit them.

[Shermy]

Thanks for the warning A440!!

I totally forgot about that! However, I'm planning on using the HiMD disc again, so they're going to get erased eventually anyway.

I'll let you all know how the converted files via HiMDrenderer and Sony's Wave converter turn out.

I'm also going to edit the track marks on the recorder and upload them again if the results from above aren't satisfactory. I'm still going to need to edit the tracks via Audacity.

I'm going to look up the problem I had with Audacity slowing the tracks down and post anything I find here just as a warning to others, if it is truly a common problem.

Hey, is there a way to edit track marks in SonicStage??

If not, sounds like another little annoying inconvenience from those brilliant programmers at Sony!

Edited February 14, 2005 by Shermy

[A440]

Be careful.

SonicStage won't upload the tracks a second time--it will just erase them without asking you.

I don't know if moving the track marks around on the disc will make a difference. If it does, that could be a wonderful thing.

[dex Otaku]

First: look at the new version of the HiMD upload FAQ.

Second: regarding gapless playback between tracks, this has nothing to do with what is used to convert it. If you go the analogue route and split your files, you're just as likely to get glitches or gaps as you are by any of the digital routes.

The ONLY way to ensure gapless playback on your CDs is to use one long file for all the tracks that run together and add trackmarks in your CD authoring program [Nero, among other progs, allows this].

The reason for this is that CD depends on things being a certain framerate; if your tracks are not the length of an exact number of frames, it pads the end of the track out to fill the last frame, causing the glitch.

This imposes a limitation on where track boundaries can be, which is why on CDs where everything runs together, tracks do not always end or start at the exact drumshot or note where you think it should begin. It has to be somewhere on a division of exactly 75 fps.

[Shermy]

Thanks to both of you Dex and A440 for the warning about uploading a second time wiping out the tracks on the HiMD and not uploading them.

I noticed in what I think is the HiMD Upload FAQ that you can edit tracks in SonicStage.

Do you have to have the recorder attached and delete the tracks on the HiMD disk through SonicStage so the software actually knows the tracks have been deleted? This seems pretty wacky, but I think I understand why.

This might answer A440's question of whether altering tracks on the HiMD disk will allow multiple uploads. My thinking on this is that the HiMD disk has to match what's in the SonicStage library in order to tell if a track has previously been uploaded. Of course, I'm not going to try altering the tracks on this "precious" recording and attempting to upload them again. I might do some experimental recordings of stuff I could care less about and try it. Has anyone already done this?

From that same FAQ page, it looks like I can do the track mark changes on the recorder, attach the recorder via USB, open Audacity and click on record, then press play in SonicStage in the HiMD window. So I wouldn't have to upload the tracks again.

Is my thinking correct??

I'm going to try this method. If the tracks slow down again, I'm probably going to download Total Recorder and try again. However, the last time I downloaded Total Recorder and tried to use it my system crashed (Windows XP)(this was about a year ago so improvements may have come along).

I searched Audacity's FAQs on their website for info about tracks being slower when recording via WAVE-in to no avail. I sent them an e-mail. I'll post the results if they know anything.

Edited February 15, 2005 by Shermy

[Shermy]

Well, I tried editing track marks on the recorder on tracks I actually uploaded to SonicStage and got the following message on the recorder:

TrkFromPC

NO EDIT

So, I guess I'm stuck with connecting my recorder and deleting the tracks on it before editing track marks. And I guess A440's wish for something wonderful to slip past SONY's anal retentive programmer's is just that...wishful thinking.

Back to the mixing board!

[dex Otaku]

I noticed in what I think is the HiMD Upload FAQ that you can edit tracks in SonicStage. 

Do you have to have the recorder attached and delete the tracks on the HiMD disk through SonicStage so the software actually knows the tracks have been deleted?  This seems pretty wacky, but I think I understand why. 

It seems wacky to me as well, but yes, that's how it works - delete the tracks on the HiMD using SS and from that point on SS allows the use of its editing functions on those tracks in the library.

This might answer A440's question of whether altering tracks on the HiMD disk will allow multiple uploads.  My thinking on this is that the HiMD disk has to match what's in the SonicStage library in order to tell if a track has previously been uploaded.  Of course, I'm not going to try altering the tracks on this "precious" recording and attempting to upload them again.  I might do some experimental recordings of stuff I could care less about and try it.  Has anyone already done this?

My thinking is that they impose the deletion policy to prevent this.

* Once the tracks on the HiMD are marked as uploaded, they can't be uploaded again

* Likewise, in order to edit them in SS you have to delete them from their source; this prevents fooling SS into allowing multiple uploads by editing on the HiMD itself

From that same FAQ page, it looks like I can do the track mark changes on the recorder, attach the recorder via USB, open Audacity and click on record, then press play in SonicStage in the HiMD window.  So I wouldn't have to upload the tracks again.

Um. Huh?

If you're recording via audacity, you don't have to worry about the upload restrictions at all, for one thing.

For another, if you edit the tracks on the HiMUD and then upload to Audacity - the only difference it will make is where the gaps take place. I suppose this might be useful for noting where the trackmarks are supposed to be, but why bother spending all the time editing on the HiMD at all? Why not just copy all the material from the disc to Audacity, then use Audacity to split the recording into tracks?

Perhaps I'm not understanding what you're trying to say - it just seems like an unnecessary bunch of steps from here.

I'm going to try this method.  If the tracks slow down again, I'm probably going to download Total Recorder and try again.

I'm a bit mystified as to why the slowdown happened.

While you're in Audacity, verify the following:

* sampling rate is set to 44,100Hz for recording [and when saving files]

* bit depth is 16-bit

The only reason I can think of for the slowdown would be if you had been recording at 48kHz and, for whatever reason, the rate got mixed up when saving the file or something.

[Shermy]

Um. Huh?

If you're recording via audacity, you don't have to worry about the upload restrictions at all, for one thing.

Hi Dex, I actually uploaded all the tracks into SonicStage and then recorded the tracks that were in My Library.

What I ended up doing is deleting the tracks on the HiMD and altering the track marks on the tracks in My Library. I then converted them via WAV converter. Then I opened the converted tracks in Audacity, where I amplified, faded in and faded out. No slowing down and it still sounds GREAT!!

I'll see if the settings were as you stated in Audacity, Dex and report back.

Thanks for all the help everyone!

Edited February 16, 2005 by Shermy

[dex Otaku]

Ah, goodgood.

Many happy uploads to you.