Transferring LP's To CD #2

You may recall last week that I talked briefly about transferring LP's to CD's following a letter that I received from a gentleman who wanted to bring his LP collection into the 21st Century. This week a reader has chipped in with a helpful piece of advice for him and others that may be thinking of doing the same.

I was interested to read your reply to Tony Chidlow in Herald Express on Sat 11/02/06 who wanted to copy LPs to CD. You may not be aware that there are a few CD recorders around that connect to your hi-fi and do exactly that. The cheapest is the Pioneer PDR609 at around £200 but may be cheaper on eBay. The advantage of this system is its simplicity by recording directly to CD. What it won't do however is reduce the clicks and pops; but if the discs are in good condition it won't be necessary. On another note, the lead you mentioned in the article to connect your record player to the computer is easily obtainable from Comet or Curry's. Peter White, Torquay

I must be honest in saying that I personally didn't even think about this as being an viable option for transferring your LP's on to CD's however now it really does take the complication out of transferring your collection to the newer format. By buying a standalone CD recorder you simply connect it to your existing Hi-Fi, start the record playing, insert a blank CD and hit the record button - There is no need to have to worry about connecting to the computer, checking sound levels, playing about with software and so on.

I have had a check on eBay and standalone CD recorders can be picked up for under £100 which would be a worthwhile investment if you had a number of LPs' to transfer or if you weren't particularly technologically minded. Of course the same technology could also be used to transfer other formats such as tape on to CD.

One of the main advantages to recording via the computer is that you can then use special software to clear up pops and cracks that are sometimes inevitable when recording off of LPs' which as Peter states you won't be able to do with the standalone CD recorder. Do ensure that your LPs' are clean and scratch free though and this shouldn't be a major concern.

I forgot to mention this last week but do remember that in instances when your records are badly scratched or damaged you could always attempt to download the equivalent MP3 tracks off of the Internet using a suitable file sharing program such as LimeWire (www.limewire.com). Usually it would be quite illegal as to download tracks in this program due to infringement of copyright however I believe that as long as you do own the original work then it is legal to download a copy off the Internet for your own use.

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