Upload and remove many track marks?

[shirleywhite]

Hi all. Made my first ever recording yesterday (a school concert). There were approx 20 "songs" but in my ignorance I recorded whole thing with auto track mark set to 1 min ( plus about 20 minutes of silence/audience noise at either end!) So although everything recorded fine - I'm wondering best way to end up with about 20 songs as atracs and/or mp3s.I've got 2 groups on a 1gb disc-first has about 160 "tracks" and 2nd about 60 tracks.(I switched off in the interval!!) Nothing has a label or anything. Could someone please advise re best thing to do next? ( I did search these forums plus consulted manual but cant find an "idiots" guide to best direction to go in - apologies if i've missed the guidance! ) I've just upgraded to SS3.4 - do I just connect and "transfer" ? But how do I get my 20 "songs" ? I actually want (for example) to delete "tracks 1 to 40" then merge 41 to 46 and label "song1" etc. Not sure if SS3.4 does all this or do I edit/merge on the RH10 first etc? Or is something like "audacity" needed.

Thanks in advance (to all you experts) - I'm not asking for huge blow by blow details here - just a (gentle) pointer in right direction. Thanks again.

[Top Cat]

Did you record via line-in?

In any case - here's a way to eliminate the unwanted track marks:

http://forums.minidisc.org/index.php?s=&sh...indpost&p=86740

Quality joining is much easier performed in hardware, i.e. on MD

As to deviding your recording into songs - it is better done in a visual sound editor like "audacity".

[mrsoul]

Whatever you do, DO NOT combine the tracks on the recorder. Just connect and identify which tracks you need (take a quick listen,etc), upload those tracks and then use the combine function in Sonic Stage. Don't delete the tracks on the Hi-MD until you have everything combined in SS.

[A440]

FIRST make sure you have SonicStage 3.4 (or at least 3.3) installed. That way you can upload again if anything goes wrong.

Top Cat says that joined tracks now upload easily since 3.3, but frankly I haven't tried it. In older versions of SonicStage, tracks that had been combined on the unit (that is, you had Track 1 and Track 2 and removed the track mark between them so they were both Track 1) would not upload and could mess up the disc. Many of us--well, at least mrsoul and me--were severely traumatized by this bug.

If that has been fixed since 3.3, that's great news.

But for safety's sake, I agree with mrsoul and suggest that you upload the whole recording to your computer. Then under Edit in SonicStage you can highlight a bunch of adjacent tracks and Combine them. Make sure you highlight them in the order you want to combine them--that is, from first to last, not from the bottom up.

[Woodgnome]

Top Cat says that joined tracks now upload easily since 3.3, but frankly I haven't tried it. In older versions of SonicStage, tracks that had been combined on the unit (that is, you had Track 1 and Track 2 and removed the track mark between them so they were both Track 1) would not upload and could mess up the disc. Many of us--well, at least mrsoul and me--were severely traumatized by this bug.

Responding - the bug of which you speak in combining tracks was a bug with 1st Gen Hi-MD units NOT sonic stage. This is the reason why the 1st Gen units had such a short product life of six months - they were effectively taken off the shelvs - put in a big skip and crushed. The fault is fixed with 2nd gen Hi-mD players and subsequently they've all been on the shelves for nearly a year. Funny that eh?!!!

Edited February 18, 2006 by Woodgnome

[shirleywhite]

Thanks for replies folks!! I'm pretty nervous about this since it is a "treasured" recording. This morning I've done a couple of things - first I played through the first half hour or so of the music ( on the rh10) (skipping the longish silence at the front) It plays fine - no gaps etc even when the track count rolls over. I then plugged my usb lead in and started SS3.4 - and clicked on the transfer icon. Ok - 2 "albums" show ( called untitled ) first one has the 150 ish tracks with no label - 2nd is about 60 tracks) I selected no 63 to play - plays fine for about a minute (mid song) - next one plays automatically - but there's a gap of about a second before next track starts - so slight gap in the song. Your replies suggest ( I think ) that I click on the transfer/upload button - everthing goes into "my library" and then I used SS edit to " add tracks 63 to 68 " together ? ( One complication is that song 2 starts halfway though track 68!! Would it be any easier for me ( abit of a non expert here!?) to simply use a cable from my minidisc player and kinda record in real time each song ??? That way I would still have my precious disc ( which I've write protected now!!) but a copy of the songs on my computer?? ( Sorry to be so thick re all of this - really appreciate you taking time and trouble to help!!)

[dex Otaku]

Simplest method -

* upload your recordings as-is

* convert to WAV as-is [this is a backup that is faster to reach than re-uploading, which you can also do]

* use SonicStage's combine function to combine the tracks

* convert to WAV again and edit as you wish

The only significant problem I've seen with the SS combine function is caused by how the hardware of HiMD acts when recording through line-in; there can be tiny repeated sections at the automatically-placed trackmarks [auto t.mark being something you can't disable when recording with line-in].

If your recordings were made through mic-in, you shouldn't get repeated chunks whether you mark manually while recording or using "time mark".

One possible problem [as you've already hinted at here] is that if you don't sort the tracks in your library correctly when selecting them to combine, then they'll be combined out of order. Simple solution: make sure they're sorted correctly before combining.

[Shozzer]

There seems to be no easy answer here as different people have had different experiences of uploading. I have a 1st generation Hi-Md and not had any problems with combining tracks on the unit before uploading. You might wish to upload all files to the PC and then download them to another MD as a back up. EDIT - as you have uploaded once, don't try again as the computer will erase the tracks on your disc if they exist in My Library. If you have done nothing with the files then you can download them as a backup. If the worse came to the worse you would still have a copy to work with. The only difference between this one and the master copy is that you would not be able to divide or copy the files as they are downloaded from the PC and the MD will nt allow you to do this. You could then try to combine the tracks (on the master copy) and then insert track marks between each song. You can also mark the parts of the recording that are not required (silences etc). To remove track marks press play and then pause. Move to the next track mark and then quickly press the T Mark button. This will remove the track mark. When you have finished, press stop to save the changes. Then press play again and move through to the places where you want to divide and then press T mark to divide. As Dex says, label the tracks before uploading so that you know the right order.

In my experience this is a lot easier than other methods of combing and dividing. Hindsight is a wonderful thing - make sure you take the time to think through want you want from the recording before you start to record! A simple check list might work.

Hope this helps - happy editing!

Edited February 18, 2006 by Shozzer

[A440]

I have first-gen units and I have just successfully uploaded tracks joined on the unit--including one that used to be a dozen little tracks. No hassles at all, and one of the uploaded tracks was 27 minutes long in PCM.

I am thrilled that this has been fixed--it must have been a software bug, not a first-gen hardware bug. I never liked combining in SonicStage because the combined tracks tended to go out of order.

Thanks, Top Cat, for finding it out.

But Shirley, it never hurts to be absolutely sure. You should make a realtime copy. You can make an analog copy with Audacity, which is free in Downloads--headphone out of the unit to line-in on the computer. Or you can make a digital copy with Total Recorder, a $12 program that records anything going through your soundcard--also useful if you want to record anything streaming on the internet. For this, you connect via USB and have SonicStage play back the recording from the disc itself, and Total Recorder captures it. Obviously don't use your computer with any other program that makes sounds, or you'll record them too.

http://www.totalrecorder.com/

Edited February 18, 2006 by A440

[shirleywhite]

Really appreciate all the advice and comments - I'm learning fast!! The recording was done via microphone. Understand now the difference between line in and mic! I've tried 2 things so far - got audacity and then with a cable from headphone on rh10 to line in on computer, I copied the first couple of songs. Seems to have worked fine. Being brave - I then used SS3.4 - transferred tracks from my second group (1 to 60) into my library - which was second half of concert. I then found song 2 ( tracks 23 to27 ) and used "combine" - it works but I've got the beginning of song3 in the combined new track. ( And I then realised i'd need track 27 (to32) for the next song!!?? I then thought - perhaps i'll carry on recording in real time through audacity!! ( when I transferred wasnt 100% sure if music would stay on the md. Still seems to be there - even though I've transferred a copy? Anyway - as mentioned above - I sure will know more when it comes to recording another concert!! Thanks again -really appreciate the help!!