External sound card

[Will]

Am about to embark on a project to convert about 50 of my dad's cassette
tapes to CDs. Converted a few LPs to CD several years ago, so I've got the
basics down okay.

My challenge this time around is that I need to drop the output of my
cassette deck to my laptop has there's no way my wife will let me
disassemble the stereo set up so I can position the cassette deck next to my
desktop computer. This'll be a few weeks' worth of work, if not more....
I'll do the "clean-up" and CD-burning on my desktop.

Sooooo... am thinking that an external sound card may be in order as I've
read that integrated sound cards on laptops leave much to be desired for
this particular task. Will test this theory out shortly.

In the meantime, any thoughts wrt decent USB (preferably USB-powered) sound
cards for this project?

-Will

[Richard Crowley]

"Will" wrote ...
> Am about to embark on a project to convert about 50 of my dad's cassette
> tapes to CDs. Converted a few LPs to CD several years ago, so I've got
> the basics down okay.
>
> My challenge this time around is that I need to drop the output of my
> cassette deck to my laptop has there's no way my wife will let me
> disassemble the stereo set up so I can position the cassette deck next to
> my desktop computer. This'll be a few weeks' worth of work, if not
> more.... I'll do the "clean-up" and CD-burning on my desktop.
>
> Sooooo... am thinking that an external sound card may be in order as I've
> read that integrated sound cards on laptops leave much to be desired for
> this particular task. Will test this theory out shortly.

Integrated sound cards on laptops tend to have only mono mic-level
inputs. OTOH if these tapes are simple speech transcriptions, a typical
mono mic-level input would likely be adequate.

> In the meantime, any thoughts wrt decent USB (preferably USB-powered)
> sound cards for this project?

Behringer UCA202 would likely be more than adequate for the task.

[PanHandler[_2_]]

"Will" > wrote in message
...
> Am about to embark on a project to convert about 50 of my dad's cassette
> tapes to CDs. Converted a few LPs to CD several years ago, so I've got
> the basics down okay.
>
> My challenge this time around is that I need to drop the output of my
> cassette deck to my laptop has there's no way my wife will let me
> disassemble the stereo set up so I can position the cassette deck next to
> my desktop computer. This'll be a few weeks' worth of work, if not
> more.... I'll do the "clean-up" and CD-burning on my desktop.
>
> Sooooo... am thinking that an external sound card may be in order as I've
> read that integrated sound cards on laptops leave much to be desired for
> this particular task. Will test this theory out shortly.
>
> In the meantime, any thoughts wrt decent USB (preferably USB-powered)
> sound cards for this project?

I've had a Creative Extigy for about 6 years, no problems whatsoever. I've
probably ripped over 500 tape and vinyl recordings with no trouble. It runs
all day every day, powers up with the computer and I barely ever give it a
thought.
http://images.vnunet.com/v7_images/hardware/large/bg_creative23.jpg

Don't know anything about the seller, but here's one on eBay:
http://cgi.ebay.com/Creative-Labs-External-Sound-Blaster-Extigy-SB0130-H8_W0QQitemZ120344784222QQihZ002QQcategoryZ75518QQ ssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Joe Arnold

[WindsorFox[_4_]]

Will wrote:
> Am about to embark on a project to convert about 50 of my dad's cassette
> tapes to CDs. Converted a few LPs to CD several years ago, so I've got the
> basics down okay.
>
> My challenge this time around is that I need to drop the output of my
> cassette deck to my laptop has there's no way my wife will let me
> disassemble the stereo set up so I can position the cassette deck next to my
> desktop computer. This'll be a few weeks' worth of work, if not more....
> I'll do the "clean-up" and CD-burning on my desktop.
>
> Sooooo... am thinking that an external sound card may be in order as I've
> read that integrated sound cards on laptops leave much to be desired for
> this particular task. Will test this theory out shortly.
>
> In the meantime, any thoughts wrt decent USB (preferably USB-powered) sound
> cards for this project?
>
> -Will
>
>

http://www.turtlebeach.com/ has 3 external cards, the top one
supports up to 7.1 Dolby. They work very nicely and sound pretty good.
Better that what you will retrieve from a cassette most likely anyway.

--


> I have never seen a computer infected by botnet.
> How it is like? - Lemat


They sneeze bits all over teh internets. - Rev. Beergoggles

[Michael Black[_2_]]

On Tue, 9 Dec 2008, Will wrote:

> Am about to embark on a project to convert about 50 of my dad's cassette
> tapes to CDs. Converted a few LPs to CD several years ago, so I've got the
> basics down okay.
>
> My challenge this time around is that I need to drop the output of my
> cassette deck to my laptop has there's no way my wife will let me
> disassemble the stereo set up so I can position the cassette deck next to my
> desktop computer. This'll be a few weeks' worth of work, if not more....
> I'll do the "clean-up" and CD-burning on my desktop.
>
So buy another tape deck. They are plentiful on the used market, even
tossed out as junk. You should be able to find a good selection of used
tape decks at $10 or less. People don't want them. Then you can keep it
near the desk computer, and work on it as needed.

Michael

> Sooooo... am thinking that an external sound card may be in order as I've
> read that integrated sound cards on laptops leave much to be desired for
> this particular task. Will test this theory out shortly.
>
> In the meantime, any thoughts wrt decent USB (preferably USB-powered) sound
> cards for this project?
>
> -Will
>
>
>

[Leo Marx]

Will wrote:
>
> Am about to embark on a project to convert about 50 of my dad's cassette
> tapes to CDs. Converted a few LPs to CD several years ago, so I've got the
> basics down okay.
>
> My challenge this time around is that I need to drop the output of my
> cassette deck to my laptop has there's no way my wife will let me
> disassemble the stereo set up so I can position the cassette deck next to my
> desktop computer. This'll be a few weeks' worth of work, if not more....
> I'll do the "clean-up" and CD-burning on my desktop.
>
> Sooooo... am thinking that an external sound card may be in order as I've
> read that integrated sound cards on laptops leave much to be desired for
> this particular task. Will test this theory out shortly.
>
> In the meantime, any thoughts wrt decent USB (preferably USB-powered) sound
> cards for this project?
>
> -Will

This is what I use. It can be used with a turntable or any other audio
device.

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/381598-REG/

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/438777-REG/

JAM