Converting Vinyl to MP3

[nick heppinstall]

I've decided to make some space and convert my old Vinyl to MP3's. I do have a decent turntable in the loft thats been cocooned for years but still works.

The thing is I dont know if I can be arsed to dig it out of the loft and hook it back up to the Hi-Fi.

The other option I have would be to buy a USB turntable, use it then flog it on. Anyone have any experience of these ?

I guess I could just download them. If I owned the origional on Vinyl what would be the legalities involved ?

The trouble with doing that is I probably would not be able to find some tracks and other would have a low bit rate .....

[P700DEE]

Do not buy a USB turntable if you are used to quality !! Best idea get the old turntable down , set it up and use it , you might find you enjoy it
Alternatively you can illeagally download , I always felt justified taping an album for the car having forked out for the Vinyl, not legal but fair (IMO) I also hunt down old albums in Charity shops so I can duplicate the Vinyl at minimal cost . Got any friends ?? borrow their CD copy and duplicate, not legal but again why should we pay twice for the same performance

[clonmult]

P700DEE said:

Do not buy a USB turntable if you are used to quality !! Best idea get the old turntable down , set it up and use it , you might find you enjoy it
Alternatively you can illeagally download , I always felt justified taping an album for the car having forked out for the Vinyl, not legal but fair (IMO) I also hunt down old albums in Charity shops so I can duplicate the Vinyl at minimal cost . Got any friends ?? borrow their CD copy and duplicate, not legal but again why should we pay twice for the same performance

Totally agree on that - the industry seems to want you to pay for each format shift. I rarely bought on tape, and always recorded onto high quality chrome or metal tape from a decent turntable for improved quality.

And I know its illegal, but I do agree with the idea of why not download - you've already purchased a license to play those tracks .... and to be honest some stuff out there is unbelievably difficult to get hold of, so download can sometimes be the only option.

[PJR]

I have to tell you, its really quite a chore to make a good job of it. You have to record it decently to begin with. Chop it up into separate tracks, normalise them, tag/label them.. And after all that effort, you wouldn't really want to go & spoil it by knackering it with the MP3 compression process.
If it's something rare? Then by all means go for it. But if it can be more easily sourced elsewhere, then I really would!