Yes I know this is a car forum, but I also know there are people on here, like myself with serious audio systems.

I am looking to digitise my Vinyl collection, which is a very onerous task as it will take 20 mins per side over hundreds of albums.
So over the winter months I would like to "rip" every album to disc. I have a Roland analogue to digital converter and a copy of Audacity to look after the sound.

But what I am not looking forward to is the addition of all the Meta data, like Album, Artist, Track etc etc

Has anybody done this? What software did you use?

I have looked at a few forums, but to be honest they are not as easy to use as this one.

Thanks
David Range Rover 4.2 Supercharged 2006
Ford Focus EcoBoost 1.5 2017
MG TF 2003

Previous Cars of note
Land Rover Discovery 2
Jaguar Mk2 3.8 - Company car
MG Midget 1974 - Concours

I gave up, it’s too time-consuming when you can stream most tracks nowadays . The snag is, to add meta data, you need to record each song as a file. Check this out:

https://www.avforums.com/threads/digitising-vinyl.2384778/

Good luck with it, AFAIK there is no software that will split album recordings into individual songs, then “listen” to each track, then search online for the Gracenote meta data, then add it to each file, that has to be done manually, so is very tedious for a large collection. You might spend more time doing it than listening to the music.
Why not just buy CD’s of your favourites, and stream the rest? “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” -where’s the fun in that?

You could capture each side using Audacity and use Silence Finder to split into separate track files.

Once you have separate files, a tool like MusicBee or mp3tag could be used to apply the metadata by album and rewrite the filenames.

Still a lot more work than CDs but I think it's doable. 2016 Skoda Octavia VRS Estate
<gone>2009 FF Vogue TDV8 Buckingham Blue</gone>
<gone>2015 BMW 520D SE (not my favourite car)</gone>
<gone>2009 D3 HSE Galway Green</gone>

Last edited by MikeO on 28th Nov 2024 11:40am. Edited 1 time in total

Buy the CD on eBay for a few pounds, add to apple Music app with a portable usb dvd/cd player connected to laptop, it will have the best quality compared to vinyl and it will be available on all your devices. Cast from any device to any compatible TV/music system etc use of Siri etc 2018 SE SDV8 4.4 Byron Blue

Hi,

I have over 200 and did one, it was hopeless took me best part of a day, gave up on that idea.

In the end I bought CDs off EBAY to replicate the lot, I think they averaged £3, some more expensive some only £1, most with free postage.

Ripped them all using AVG at the time, now Windows Media own ripping option works fine, automatically searches for the album covers etc.

Once I was done, I sold them all o EBAY, those that I couldn't sell I just gave to the charity shop, so at the end of the day the whole process cost me just a few quid.

A. Fuji White / Jet 2012 4.4 TDV8 Westminster

Many thanks all a lot of useful information.
I was hoping that someone had created one piece of software to do all. What is available is very nearly there, ie use Audacity to record, clean and split into tracks, its a manual process though and then run something like AudioRanger that claims to do every thing else as well as copying tracks to Artist/Album folders, rename every track, add all the metadata and finally add album art.

However after reading all your advice especially AndyRoo's advice to buy and sell cd's second hand.

That would cut my task from some 350 - 400 albums to a much smaller list of albums that are just not available on any digital platform.

Again many thanks
David Range Rover 4.2 Supercharged 2006
Ford Focus EcoBoost 1.5 2017
MG TF 2003

Previous Cars of note
Land Rover Discovery 2
Jaguar Mk2 3.8 - Company car
MG Midget 1974 - Concours

I thought Audacity could add metadata - I am sure it can for WAV files anyway.

Chris. L405 - 4.4SDV8 Vogue
P38 - 4.6V8 HSE
Land Rover series IIA V8

Hi Chris,

Yes, you can add metadata into Audacity manually, but I think the OP was looking to automate the whole process, splitting each song track into individual files then adding album/title/artist/album artwork is mind-bogglingly tedious, and IIRC, the latter (Artwork) is impossible in Audacity.
Not sure whether or why it’s possible for CD’s, say in iTunes, but impossible with vinyl LP’s.
Maybe simply because one is digital, the other analogue? “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” -where’s the fun in that?

Agree with Gremlin that Audacity can add meta data but as he says its a manual process.

Audacity is immensely complex but only because of its range of functionality which for some it is really powerful.
For me I only want to record and split an album side into tracks, both very manual processes.
I would like to find an app that records and splits but so far I've not found one, so I will use Audacity and then run AudioRanger on an album by album basis.

Especially after the advice to buy and sell the CD's that are available. No idea why I didn't think of that, but then I am getting old

Again thanks to all, I really appreciate the advice
David Range Rover 4.2 Supercharged 2006
Ford Focus EcoBoost 1.5 2017
MG TF 2003

Previous Cars of note
Land Rover Discovery 2
Jaguar Mk2 3.8 - Company car
MG Midget 1974 - Concours

Gremlin500 wrote:

Hi Chris,

Yes, you can add metadata into Audacity manually, but I think the OP was looking to automate the whole process, splitting each song track into individual files then adding album/title/artist/album artwork is mind-bogglingly tedious, and IIRC, the latter (Artwork) is impossible in Audacity.
Not sure whether or why it’s possible for CD’s, say in iTunes, but impossible with vinyl LP’s.
Maybe simply because one is digital, the other analogue?