Software for making digital recordings?

I've been using Cubasis Go! 2.0 as a cheap (29.99) option for making extended (70 minute) digital recordings.

I use a M-Audio Quattro USB off-board audio/midi interface connected via USB to my 2nd laptop .

The problem I am finding is strange - when playing back, every couple of minutes you can hear a subtle *skip* of the music.

Thinking laterally its like the process of recording relies on a buffering/caching of segments on disk and perhaps each time the cache is cleared to start over, there is an effect upon the timing. There are three disk cache settings, but even with the highest level the problem remains.

The laptop is a PIII 850 Mhz with 384 RAM, so presuming the problem is that Cubasis Go! 2.0 isnt great for extended recordings, does anyone have recommendations for more suitably alternative software?

Thanks
Greg

 

It's possible that this will work.

It's a derivative of an MS sample app that I've been using. I've not tried it outside my systems and it's very basic and has no documentation. OTOH it's self-explanatory, free and very small.

You may encounter issues with DirectX versioning. But I think it'll either work or not.

Paul

 

Thanks for the rec. Paul. The key to my requirement is I want to end up with a continous file to ulimately cut to CD-R. Most of the music software apps expect you to either want to record short samples, or nothing that would exceed *single* length (5 minutes or so I guess). It seems beyond 4-5 minute recordings the software I have tried struggles.

The benefits of something like Cubase or eMagic is I can record at 24-bit, then compress to 16-bit. Hence I am tending toward pro-software but dont want to pay £500 squids.

What would also be of massive benefit would be if I can stipulate *track* points at a later stage so the folks I send CDs to can skip through instead of having 1 long 70 track.

This is just one of those things that is probably straightforward, but I never have the time to research it properly.

 

The thing I pointed you at will record ad infinitum into a wav file at pretty much any supported sample rate/depth.

You'll have to look to your CD writing program for track markers.

Check out Audacity as well, it's a proper free editing program, that I've used to record for an hour at a stretch.

Paul

 

greg, here are a couple of open source audio recording/editing tools that might do what you're looking for.

http://www.kreatives.org/kristal/index.php

http://audacity.sourceforge.net/about.php

Haven't used them myself, but they look like they might be worth a shot.

As for defining track points, what you could do is split the resulting 70 minute file into the desired sized chunks and them burn them in your CDR software as distinct tracks but without any 2 second gaps, thus creating a seamless mix with track cues. The following pieces of software should help you do this.

http://www.homepages.hetnet.nl/~mjmlooijmans/cdwave/

http://claudiosoft.online.fr/wavsplit.html

Anyway, hope the info is of some use.

BL21DE3

 

Paul - I'll definitely try that out this weekend, sounds like it could be exactly what I'm looking for.

BL21DE3 - I've also downloaded those, I'll give them all a spin.

Appreciated chaps!
Greg

 

Not quite free, but very good is soundforge lite aka Screenblast which can be found here
It works - and I often have to record three or four hours straight.

edited to add
It may be worth adding more memory to your PC, or a faster HD and trying that with your current software. These can have an effect. Also, for critical work try to run only the barest minimum of System apps and no other programs like email or browser, but especially CPU/memory intensive apps (eg Photoshop or video editing software).
HTH

 

A full CD is, what, 750MB or something? So if you're working with WAV files that size you probably want at least a gig of RAM...

 

Not sure you'd need memory to exceed the file size? I would say the disk cache would definitely need to though which it does on my notebook.

 

The virtual memory will of course allow you to keep running, but I'd have thought it'd be slloooooowwwwww... and memory's cheap at the moment