Audio recording on Ubuntu from cassette player or any other sound source?

[Graham Todd]

On Sun, 24 May 2009 09:53:47 -0500
Afan Pasalic <afan at afan.net> wrote:

> Hi,
> I got several audio cassettes/tapes with some my old stuff recorded
> in 70's. I want to transfer them to comp in mp3 format.
> 
> What application will do the best?
[snipped]

Exactly the same position as me (although my audio collection on tape
consists of recordings that go back to the fifties....)!

First, if you have any stereo recordings, make sure that you lead (from
the headphone socket?) carries a stereo signal.  These days, most do,
but there are still a few mono leads around......

For the software, I use Gramofile.  Its a command-line application,
though there is a Perl interface, but its pretty easy to use.  There is
a Debian binary of the latest version in the repositories, but its
also in the universe (multimedia) Ubuntu repos: either way, its easy to
compile from source.

Gramofile was written to transpose vinyl LPs on to computer.  You can
record a whole side and it will divide it into tracks and even remove
the hiss and crackle distortion.  By trial and error, I've found that
it will do the same for tapes of records.

The output will be in cdda .wav format, which means you can convert it
to another format easily (say .mp3 or .ogg) or you can burn tracks to
CD for them to be played directly.  If you have cdparanoia and lame
installed, try this:

cdparanoia $TRACK-NUMBER && lame cdda.wav $TRACK-NAME.mp3 && rm -f
cdda.wav

change $TRACK-NUMBER for the number of the track on the cd and
$TRACK-NAME, change that for the name you want to give the track. If
the name has spaces you'll get an error so "put quotes" around it or
give it a one word name and rename it when it's done.

[I found this in a post by Andrew Benton in the LinuxQuestions.org
site. Kudos Andrew!]

There may be other applications around but Gramofile is a must-have
application for me despite the fact that it has moved on but the
current developer has said he hasn't the time to maintain it.

You can find Gramofile at its home page at
http://www.opensourcepartners.nl/~costar/gramofile/

or by going to the Debian binary at:
http://packages.debian.org/lenny/gramofile

or for the time being in the Ubuntu repos......

-- 

Graham Todd