Saving an old audio tape for posterity

[Don Tolson]

Hi all... I have an audio cassette of a musical production done to celebrate the 1976 Olympics in Montreal. Don't ask me how, but the cassette tape I made back then, now 28 years old, still plays reasonably well.

I don't want to chance it with this, since the performance was a 'once only' situation, so I'd like to transfer it to digital. Preferably in some format that is likely to be compatible for another 28 years.

Using MusicMatch Jukebox, I ripped from the tape to WAV format with no problems. Unfortunately, I now have approximately 82 mins of audio, which MusicMatch says it can't load to a single CD-R in 'audio' format (not enough room). It says I can only get 73 mins on a disk.

I'd like to preserve as much of the original quality as possible, and have a CD which is playable almost anywhere.

I know one of my options is to simply burn onto 2 disks -- not that bad, since there were 2 sides to the original tape. But for the sake of the extra 9 mins, it would be nice to get it all on one disk and not waste so much space.

Any ideas?

Thanks.

[claren44]

I use either Nero 5.x or Pyro2003 to burn with. The CD-R discs I buy (usually what's on sale when I'm running low :lol: ) are 80 minutes max. Early on 73 minutes was standard. If the disc itself says 73 min.,you'll need to buy some new ones to get 80 mins.
Alternately,what I do sometimes is use WinZip to create a .zip file of music files & burn them as Data files. You can only access the contents on a computer (can't play it in the car or on a portable),but it will preserve the performance.
Love & Peace,claren44

[Don Tolson]

Thanks, claren... that clears up the concern I had about what was 'on the disk' vs. what MusicMatch was saying. I think it's time to upgrade the 'burn software :lol:

OK, that takes me within 2 minutes of the overall capacity of a single disk. How about this? What Digital Audio editing software is out there that would let me eliminate some of the 'dead space' in the recording? This might get me down to a place where I can fit it on a single disk in audio format.

[James Fee]

I have run into the same problem, converting my wifes old tapes into mp3/CDs. Some of her music is on 100 minute tapes and of course that won't work. I've tried to split them up the best I can on to two CDs.

Might be time to look into DVD-Audio.. :?:

[Don Tolson]

I found a product from a Canadian company, called Goldwave. http://www.goldwave.ca/ It has an interesting variation on the Shareware concept -- it keeps track of the number of times you use the available commands. You get a max of 150 during each session, and 3000 total. After that, you have to select which features you want to use for each session.

Cost seems pretty reasonable @ $55, too.

Anyway, I'm giving that a try to see if I can get the files down to the 79 minute mark.

[Lee Yuan Sheng]

I'm pretty sure you can activate overburn and give it a shot. Test your CD-Rs before you try that though.

[Don Tolson]

I'm pretty sure you can activate overburn and give it a shot. Test your CD-Rs before you try that though.

Hmmmm, haven't heard of 'overburn'. Where do I activate it? Or is this something inherent in the burn software?

[Lee Yuan Sheng]

Well, I use Nero, and it's buried somewhere in the preferences tab. Start up Nero CD Speed first and test the CD-R to see how much it can overburn first. Also I'm not sure if Audio CD players can accept them, but like I said, it's worth a shot.

[Don Tolson]

OK, I'll have to get a copy of NERO, since none of my current burner programs include an option for 'Overburn'

Thanks for the suggestion. I'm now only 1 min. 20 secs. over. S0 close, yet so, far.....

[Don Tolson]

Thanks, Lee Yuan.. the 'overburn' worked perfectly. After using GoldWave to edit out pauses, etc., I was able to get the recording down to 80 min 20 secs and Nero was able to burn that onto a generic, garden variety CD (80 min) with no problems.

I've tested the CD on a few of the CD players around the house (some over 20 years old!) and it seems to work just fine.

Thanks to all for their suggestions!

[Lee Yuan Sheng]

You're welcome, and just to add, Lee's my surname, not the first.

[Don Tolson]

My apologies... I wasn't sure if you had 'Americanized' your name order, if you were using the traditional order.

[Lee Yuan Sheng]

It's ok, just thought I'd clarify that! :)

[sylvangale]

There is a freeware/open source program called Audacity that is great for splitting tracks of music from one long WAV.

Maybe by splitting out any silent unwanted areas you will fit a CD perfectly.

Audacity also has a "noise" filter which can remove hisses, crackles, and other sounds you get from old recordings. (It's best to sample the entire work for noise and not split to tracks and then filter for noise.