I am the A/V director at my church, mostly by default because there isn't
body else who has any interest in doing it.
Right now we are recording the sermons on a MD, and I am transferring them
to a WAV files and them MP3 by means of a MD playing patched in to the back
of my PC by means of the audio in port. The recording sounds good when I
leave it as a WAV, but to post the sermon on my church's web site I have to
convert it to a MP3 preferably less than 6 MB large. That's quite a task for
a sermon 30-40 minutes long. I am recording mono, and using wave creator
3.0 to edit and convert to MP3.

I have two questions for you.
1. Is there a way to clean up an MP3 to get rid of the garble?
2. would I be better off just buying a recorder that skips the MD entirely
and records straight to a WAV or MP3 format. If so, is it possible to get
one of those units for less than $500? There isn't a lot of money in the
budget for things like this, but I could do if it were less than $500.

Mark

"Mainlander" *@*.* wrote in message
. nz...
In article ,
says...
I am the A/V director at my church, mostly by default because there
isn't
body else who has any interest in doing it.
Right now we are recording the sermons on a MD, and I am transferring
them
to a WAV files and them MP3 by means of a MD playing patched in to the
back
of my PC by means of the audio in port. The recording sounds good when
I
leave it as a WAV, but to post the sermon on my church's web site I have
to
convert it to a MP3 preferably less than 6 MB large. That's quite a task
for
a sermon 30-40 minutes long. I am recording mono, and using wave
creator
3.0 to edit and convert to MP3.

I have two questions for you.
1. Is there a way to clean up an MP3 to get rid of the garble?
2. would I be better off just buying a recorder that skips the MD
entirely
and records straight to a WAV or MP3 format. If so, is it possible to
get
one of those units for less than $500? There isn't a lot of money in
the
budget for things like this, but I could do if it were less than $500.

MD has a little problem in that the sound is lossy compressed and so it
will never be the same as a wave recording made at CD quality.

Use a PC to record it, if you have the budget for that. Use mono and
11khz sampling should be enough for voice quality. There are some
standalone hard disk recorders, but a PC can do a good enough job.

The quality of the MP3 that you output is directly related to its final
size. I assume is your problem with the MD recording or what the MP3
sounds like when you have finished compressing it?

we have a brand new PC, but when I tried recording through it, it did
something strange. THe best way I can describe it is to say the recording
levels were capped at about 50%, and after that it was just too-hot noise.
to get the sound quality good, it was wy too soft.

The MD quality is good, but the MP3 is muddy and bad, and soft.

Any suggestions?

Mark

In article writes:

1. Is there a way to clean up an MP3 to get rid of the garble?

There are better and worser MP3 encoders. You could try something else
operating on your WAV filles.

2. would I be better off just buying a recorder that skips the MD entirely
and records straight to a WAV or MP3 format.

I think so, for your application. I'm surprisingly happy with my
Creative Labs Nomad Jukebox 3. It records to an internal hard disk,
and you can record directly to MP3 format (or WAV format if you
choose). It has both a Firewire and USB port, so it's relatively easy
to transfer the files to a computer for duplication or distribution.

You need to be careful when setting the record level, and you'll
probably have to futz with the mini plug going into its line input in
order to get a reliable connection (a silly cosmetic design on the
part of Creative Labs I think) but it will do the job you need with
minimum hassle. I think it sounds just fine. I think that it might be
available for a bit under $300 now, well within your $500 budget.




--
I'm really Mike Rivers - )