What we do….

You can do digital converting on your own PC at home, but you will need other specialist software to achieve good results as well as the element of spare time to see the job through, not to mention the stress if it goes wrong, we have the equipment and we take the strain for you….!!  Remember if you don’t want to read through the info give us a call or email.

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From Record Deck
(to)

2


The Compact Disc (CD)

The Service we offer to you…

We will convert any vinyl records or cassettes digitally to a CD (Compact Disc) format that will play as an audio CD on your hi fi, personal stereo or PC just as a regular music CD you would purchase in a shop.  Likewise cassette tapes can be converted to the CD format as well.  An audio CD will hold a maximum of 80 minutes of sound/music in the CDA format.  Generally an album is approx 20 to 25 minutes per side and consists of 16 tracks, we usually place one album per CD. 

Singles or 45s average 3 minutes per side and we will need a running order (list of track sequence) from you should you want them in a particular order on the CD.

It is important to note that the record or tape we are transferring from (i.e. your copy), is our ‘master’ therefore what you hear on the ‘master’ you will hear on the digital conversion, however we try to improve the quality where appropriate by reducing tape hiss, crackles and pops on vinyl etc, it’s a bit like doing a photocopy they only come out as good as the original; we are not record restorers (our prices reflect that), and if you require that service we can refer you to other specialist services.

What we offer is the facility to have all your old vinyl favourites on CD to be available long term for your enjoyment and pleasure, it’s certainly given my music collection an extended lease of life.  Many people do not have the time to do this sort of project themselves so we are here to do that for you at a price that I consider reasonable in consideration of what a new album costs these days.

The Finished CD…

You can have a ‘Basic Conversion’ whereby we take your LP album or Cassette tape and transfer it digitally as a Side One and Side Two track, you get all the music but no track splitting so when you play the CD it will show as Track 1 and Tack 2 and the only way to skip between individual tracks is to fast forward or rewind if your CD player has the facility, we will still enhance the quality as best possible.

 

Alternatively the full conversion method has the CD tracks numbering and track skipping as a normal CD, the inlay card on the CD jewel case will show the track number, title and the front will show the album title and artist.  I do not scan existing album covers, as visually this is impossible for me.

The Process
Once we receive your material for conversion we check your requirements to ensure we have all the relevant information at this stage, we will set up to record the material into a digital source.  Once we have the material digitally on the system we will then process the sound if appropriate to possibly enhance sound quality, possibly reducing crackle and pops from vinyl or tape hiss from cassettes.  Following this process it is necessary to split the recording into separate tracks if required, this can take time as often the actual waveform has to be scanned manually to find the correct break in the sound, the separate tracks can then be saved and the CD is then ready for writing.  We do not usually fade in and out tracks but convert what is on the master therefore it is normal to have gaps between tracks unless it is a live performance.  The converted track have to be split into separate tracks to enable track selection this can be time consuming as the gaps have to be found and tracks timings monitored.  An inlay sheet is then typed up for insertion into the jewel case (CD case), to list the names of the tracks, artist and album title. 

The CD is then ready for return to you the customer.  It may be necessary to contact you should any problems arise in the transfer that you would need to know relating to overall quality in the finished conversion it may be that the material sent was scratched or had significant wear effecting the digital quality, in this instance we may send you a sample of the work for your approval. 

We can convert a batch of individual singles for you onto CD if you only want certain tracks from an album put onto CD then we are happy to do this but please enclose a list giving the order in which you want the tracks to appear, be mindful that 80 minutes is the maximum running time on an audio CD.

As mentioned before we are dependant on the quality and condition of the materials you send us so we do our best in all situations to get as good a conversion as possible.

 

Timescales of work returned is dependant on other work in progress but again we try to achieve a turn around of not more than 7-10 days, but we cannot be held responsible for postal delays or damage to materials in transit.  You may wish to bring materials personally to save postage if you are local that is not a problem but please telephone us first to arrange this.