Converting vinyl to digital

For a long time I've wanted to convert my mom's LP jazz collection from the 50's and 60's to a digital format. Since I'm finally getting off my duff and setting up my home av system, I had my dad send me his circa 1984 Sony turntable with an Ortofon needle and I plan to connect it to a Yamaha RX V661 that in turn will be connected to my PC via toslink. I'll record in a lossless format and play around with equalizing after that.

I'm pretty comfortable with the digital side of things, but I'm kind of clueless on the analog end. I'm pretty sure I'll need a pre-amp. Does anyone have a recommendation on a reasonably priced one (<$100)? Since I will rarely use the turntable after this project (and hopefully my brothers' mid-80s alternative and puck collections) and I doubt there is much of a resale market for phono pre-amps, I'd prefer not to invest too much in it.

Also, I can only assume these LPs need cleaning. The only recommendation I found on the forum was for the Nitty Gritty systems which cost more than my receiver. What other, cheaper options are there that will clean without damaging the disks?

Thanks much,

Sam

You can buy a cheap phono preamp on Ebay or at some of the electronics sites. Just put phono preamp in your search engine.

The cheapest way to clean vinyl records is with dish washing detergent and warm water. You can use a sponge or soft brush to scrub them gingerly and dry them carefully with a towel. It doesn't get much cheaper than that.

I'll also mention that LP's don't benefit much from a lossless digital format. I dub them to 320 MP3's and I think that is overkill. They sound identical to the original and, to me, identical to the FLAC files I started with and they are half the file size. Analog vinyl is a "lossy format" in and of itself. It has lots of frequency and dynamic range compression right up front. The first thing you lose in compressing digital is dynamic range and the vinyl records don't have as much as digital to begin with.

Hi ilnoca,

I picked up and NAP PP-2 a while ago for something like $65. It works very well for a phono preamp, and is well-recommended in its price range. Look around AudiogoN and you should be able to find something.

While I agree with fmw's overall assessment on vinyl's drawbacks, I'd still encourage you to transfer and store your data in a lossless format. Just because vinyl isn't perfect doesn't mean that you should transfer it to another less-than-perfect format. Lossless will keep it as true to the original as possible.

Good luck!

fmw,
Did you equalize them after you converted the to mp3 or before? I wonder if a difference will be heard if recording to raw, equalizing and they converting to a 320 mp3. I know mp3 optimizes for a particular range, so I think if your going to equalize something just out of the mp3 optimal range you will hear a difference.

Perhaps I'm wrong, but thats my gut feeling.

Anthony

Thanks guys for the tips. fmw, your point is taken on vinyl being a lossy medium. I think I will still go ahead and record as lossless, keep those as "master files" on a bunch of old 10 and 20 GB disks from machines we surplussed at work, and end up ripping at 160 AAC. (Too be honest, I don't know if my damaged ears could tell much of a difference between 160 AAC and 320 mp3.) Half the fun of this project will be playing around with equalization; it should be a good learning experience and hopefully my idea of what sounds good won't be too off from what others find palatable.

Otto, I checked out AudiogoN and all but one of their items were over $200. Are phono preamps one of those types of items where the cheap or mid-range ones are adequate for most and the ridiculously expensive ones are at best marginally better? I want to make sure my conversions are better than tolerable, but I really can't see spending that much scratch on something I'll rarely use. (Plus, my commonsensical mom would probably knock me up the side of the head if she found out I spent $1,000 to convert her LPs!)

Thanks, Sam

agabriel said:

fmw,
Did you equalize them after you converted the to mp3 or before? I wonder if a difference will be heard if recording to raw, equalizing and they converting to a 320 mp3. I know mp3 optimizes for a particular range, so I think if your going to equalize something just out of the mp3 optimal range you will hear a difference.

Perhaps I'm wrong, but thats my gut feeling.

Anthony

Click to expand...

I did blind tests. Neither my wife nor I could hear the difference between 320 MP3 and FLAC. If you can or think you can hear a difference then help yourself. It's only disc space. Since I have lots of albums I need some space reduction just fit them on a single hard drive. They fill a 500GB hard drive now. I would need a TB hard drive to fit the same files in FLAC. FLAC files are almost 1/2 GB per album. 1000 albums fills a 500GB hard drive. Since I can't hear the difference, I'm staying with what I do now.

Gabriel, I don't equalize them. They just get the standard RIAA equalization from the phono preamp and go straight to CD-RW on a CD recorder. Then I Rip the CD-RW to MP3 on the hard drive and erase it for the next round. I don't do anything else to the files.

LP archiving

Unfortunately you have not been well informed. The issue of analog archiving, if you want to make a decent job of it, is not that simple. Let me explain

The LP was the first mass market high fidelity play back medium. It is a really high fidelity medium, make no mistake. There are some significant caveats.

The LP is easily ruined by poor handling and play back equipment. Unless handling of the disc has been obsessional, it will pick up numerous ticks pops, clicks and high scratchy surface noise. However carefully handled, the LP is one of the most durable of all media. I have LPs in my collection that I have had since a child, over fifty years, that still play perfectly. The only cleaning they have had is with a good dry brush and the use of the Cecil E Watts Dust Bug with every playing. They have never been left lying around, and always correctly returned to their jackets after playing.

The other problem is that inferior or poorly set up turntables and those with worn out styli do permanent damage to the disc.

The difference between a CD player costing a hundred dollars or less and one costing $10,000 dollars is not extreme. However the difference in performance between the turntable you describe, and a top end transcription turntable from one of the great manufacturers, such as Thorens or Garrard, with an arm from say, SME, completed with a fine pickup cartridge is light years apart.

The other thing is that setting up a turntable is a leaned skill. CD players are plug and go.

As to the fidelity of the LP, under the best of circumstances it is a match for the CD. I do have some items that I have bought on CD and the originally issued LP sounds better. That is not the fault of CD, but due to sloppy re mastering. It is true that the LP is a little deficient in dynamic range, but not by much. In the hey day of the LP, the mastering engineers and cutters were highly skilled and generally stayed in their jobs a lifetime. Most of them used manual gain riding and did not use compressors. They knew the music well and would gently and unobtrusively gain ride. They would do the same with bass now and again. However they were skilled in spacing the grooves. In the quiet passages and when there was little bass they would space the groves closer, and widen them in the louder parts with heavier bass, to avoid the dreaded grove "kissing". I have a feeling that much more care was taken with "classical" productions than "pop" ones. At least during the time of the LP. classical mastering engineers were no race to the bottom, like we have now. They generally mastered to the needs of those with superior equipment. If your turntable could not track it and plowed through the grooves ruining them for ever, tough luck! Certainly the fidelity of the LP is far superior to any MP3 file, even at the highest bit rate supported by the codec. I have verified that.

A word about cleaning. Do not clean the record with detergent and water and a cloth. That will drive dirt and deposits deep in the grooves and increase surface noise. I would try dry cleaning first, with a Hunts Brush for instance. Try and get a Cecil E Watts Dust Bug on eBay, and use it with every playing. Do not use the anti static fluid.

For wet cleaning there is no substitute for a professional cleaner from Keith Monks, Loricraft or Nitty Gritty. There are quite a few outfits that will clean records for a modest charge. If you feel compelled to try yourself, you can try a 50/50 mixture of pure isopropyl alcohol and distilled water. However without vacuum the results will be very uncertain and could drive the dirt deeper.

You don't say how many records you are planning to archive. However before spending money, I think you should see if the discs are in any condition worth archiving. I would be happy to try a couple of samples for you, and make CDs. Just let me know if you would like that.

If you want to archive, you need to know that your cartridge is in working order. The stylus should be inspected at least. Also over time the damping material in the suspensions changes compliance, severely degrading performance. Also remember Ortofon made moving magnet and moving coil cartridges, and they require very different preamps. On a turntable you describe, I doubt it has a moving coil, and feel it is most likely to be moving magnet.

If yours records are worth archiving, and you want to go ahead, then I strongly recommend you go on the site of Jerry Raskin "Needle Doctor". I have no financial interest in the outfit at all. They have been in "Dinky Town" Minneapolis for years. They have a wide range of disc equipment for all tastes and budgets. The staff are knowledgeable and helpful.

http://www.needledoctor.com/

Here are his phono preamp offerings.

http://www.needledoctor.com/Online-Store/Audio-Technica?search=Phono&range=1,50,96

He has cartridges galore and a good selection of turntables.

A word about the digital side of things. For really good results a computer has to be custom built for audio. I built mine three years ago. Also the DAC or sound card should be external to the computer, and not share the same power supply. Also the performance of professional archiving and editing software is light years ahead of the consumer products. I use Steinberg WaveLab 6. My DAC is an RME Fireface 800. As the name implies this uses a firewire 800 interconnect.

As far as codecs are concerned, in my view lossy codecs are incompatible with high fidelity sound. In the lossless formats I use Flac and vouch for it completely. Lossy codecs just change the whole balance of the music. Bass is reduced, and bass detail lost. The balance of head and chest voice of singers is changed, with overemphasis of the head voice. Strings loose their silk sheen. Brass is harsh with far too much lip over bell. There are frequent episodes of stereo collapse. In worst cases, such as heavy organ with boys voices in ambient cathedral spaces, there is gross twinking, which is excruciating. Really these lossy codecs need banishing for anything except speech. I watch a lot of opera on my system. Fortunately opera DVDs have a two channel PCM CD quality audio track, as well as Dolby Digital or DTS. I alway use the two channel PCM track the Dolby Pl IIx. The difference is obvious even to untrained listeners. Bottom line, don't archive in a lossy codec!

As far as EQ that may be required, you can do it before or after. If you are planning a lot of upgrades to your system over time, I would archive without EQ. You always EQ to the setup you monitor with.

I know this is a lot of information, and if you grew up in the digital era, may be confusing. Don't hesitate to ask questions, and as I said, I will be happy to transfer a couple of LPs before you commit any funds. By the way, I don't usually archive my LPs, I find playing them very pleasurable. If you put together a good system you may as well. Tapes are another story. Have fun!

Here are pictures of my turntables and workstation.

http://mdcarter.smugmug.com/gallery/2424008#127077056

http://mdcarter.smugmug.com/gallery/2424008#127077469

http://mdcarter.smugmug.com/gallery/2424008#127077194

Here is the turntable on my lower level system, that shows a Cecil E. Watts Dust Bug in use.

http://mdcarter.smugmug.com/gallery/2424105#127081086

Hey again,

Here's a Music Hall that would probably fit the bill. It might have just come up in the last couple hours, so you might have missed it. Some of the others are indeed >$100. The PP2 is somewhat common, so if you have time, you can wait it out. OTOH, for me, I'd probably just pop for this one here (unless you want to get deeper into it -- I do agree with TLS Guy that it's just plain fun to play LPs).

http://cls.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?preaphon&1198710085

I'm no vinyl expert, but for me, my little NAD preamp works just fine. Like any of this type of stuff, you can buy "good enough" and reasonably cheap stuff (like the NAD or the Music Hall) or you can go up and up and up in price. Yeah, the more expensive stuff will be better, but to what degree is up to the end user.

I would expect your results to be much more positive than "better than tolerable."

Good luck.

TLS, thank you very much for your exhaustive post. I appreciate your comments, and I'm persuaded by many of your arguments. The scope and goals of my project, however, are much more modest than what you've done, and the resources I'm willing and able to commit to this severely limit what I'll do.

I only have about 150-200 LP's to convert. From what I can remember, most have been well cared for and are in decent shape. Most are between 40 and 50 years old, and were played on a variety of equipment from lower-end turntables from the 60's and 70's to a Sony PS-X60 or PS-X70 with a mid-priced Ortofon cartridge from the mid-80's (I'll find out the exact models when the turntable comes this week). Fortunately, many of the albums have been released on CD, and the ones my Mom and I are most interested in (Mingus, Ahmad Jamal, and Charlie Parker) are readily purchased as re-mastered CD's. This is more of an expirement of what I can do with limited resources and how accurate (not precise) can I get to replicating the original source material. That said, I'm definitely not criticizing what you do. To the contrary, I'm amazed by it and admire the thoroughness of your set up and production.

I think I will test cleaning a couple of the albums that I know are available on CD with the alcohol and distilled water mix you mention to see how well it works. The Nitty Gritty and professional cleaning systems are just out of my scope. I might just take you up on your offer to convert a couple after I take a stab at it; be forwarned that those would be my "reference copies."

About the digital end: the analog to digital conversion would occur at the receiver and the receiver would transmit the digital signal to my sound card via toslink. If I'm not mistaken, the PC's power supply shouldn't interfere at all with this, as all the PC is doing is writing the digital signal to disc and then manipulating the written signal (equalization) before transmitting it back to the receiver which will then convert the signal to analog. Will the PSU of a decent receiver have that much impact on the process?

Again, thanks for your advice, and I'm sure to pester more as I get deeper into the project.

Analog to digital

You may well be right about your digital connection. I don't know your computer set up. Are you able to connect straight to the mother board with your optical connection or does it connect to a sound card? If it goes to a sound card you may well find you are getting two conversions in your computer. On my set up there is no sound card in the computer. The RME DAC connects to a Firewire connector on the mother board, and the RME is used for all digital conversions other than from my universal disc player. When I play CDs I just use my professional Marantz CD player as a transport.

As regards cleaning I would strongly recommend you try dry cleaning first and see how it sounds. I can assure you wet cleaning without a professional device can often make things worse. So before you take the risk, see what dry cleaning does. Start with a brush. There are several reasonable ones at "Needle Doctor". You can also put an eBay search for a Cecil E. Watts dust bug. They come up now and again, and can be bought for a modest price. Cecil E. Watts was one of the great pioneers of disc recording. He did a lot of fundamental research on cutting and play back equipment. He published a lot on disc cleaning. His "Dust Bug" is a marvel. It is a seemingly simple device, but his publications tell us it was developed after a lot of research and hard work. His imitators devices were not nearly as effective.

Thank you for your kind words. I think you are on the right lines, you will have a lot of fun and learn much. You will not be pestering, I will do my best to help in any way I can. The biggest problem in your last post is that you state that the discs have been played on a cheap record player. One of the biggest curses of the LP was that the disc was never the same again after one playing on a poor machine. This is especially true of Stereo LPs. Mono discs are more tolerant. In fact stereo discs were introduced before the were pickups that could play them well. The first pickup to do any good was Stan Kelly's Decca ffss. This was soon followed by the Ortofon SPU moving coil series. Shure and Stanton came on the scene soon after, but it took them a while to close the gap with the above. The introduction of the SME series I pick up arms was also a milestone.

Have a lot of fun and I hope to hear from you during this project. Mark.

TLS Guy said:

.

As regards cleaning I would strongly recommend you try dry cleaning first and see how it sounds. I can assure you wet cleaning without a professional device can often make things worse. So before you take the risk, see what dry cleaning does. Start with a brush. There are several reasonable ones at "Needle Doctor". You can also put an eBay search for a Cecil E. Watts dust bug. They come up now and again, and can be bought for a modest price. Cecil E. Watts was one of the great pioneers of disc recording. He did a lot of fundamental research on cutting and play back equipment. He published a lot on disc cleaning. His "Dust Bug" is a marvel. It is a seemingly simple device, but his publications tell us it was developed after a lot of research and hard work. His imitators devices were not nearly as effective.

Click to expand...

So putting the 3 drops of discwasher fluid on my discwasher brush is worse than just using it dry?

TLS Guy said:

A word about the digital side of things. For really good results a computer has to be custom built for audio. I built mine three years ago. Also the DAC or sound card should be external to the computer, and not share the same power supply. Also the performance of professional archiving and editing software is light years ahead of the consumer products. I use Steinberg WaveLab 6. My DAC is an RME Fireface 800. As the name implies this uses a firewire 800 interconnect.

Click to expand...

Its obvious I don't have as much experience as TLS Guy with LP's and records in general. However the statement regarding a dedicated PC to Audio only is errornous. A seperate power supply for the sound card though an interesting idea is unnecessary, as the PC's powersupply if rated properly for the system is more then adequate.

Regarding the cleaning ideas TLS brought up, I checked out Ebay for a Cecil E. Watts Dust Bug, a fella in Austrila is auctioning one off for $12 CAD, so it really is an inexpensive option. However, there is no credible proof that a light mixture of dish soap and water will "drive the dirt" into the recording. If anything, there is just a greater risk of poor handling of the LP resulting in further damages. So as FMW stated earlier, for a cheap and easy solution, as long as you handle the LP's carefully, this should not be a problem.

From everything the OP has said thus far, to go to the great lengths TLS Guy has stated to ensure the highest quality attainable seems moot now. These records are very old, and heavily used. Many are bound to have a number of problems that will hinder a perfect transfer.

In the end, none of his suggestions are bad at all, just may overkill for your purposes. Best of luck.

3db said:

So putting the 3 drops of discwasher fluid on my discwasher brush is worse than just using it dry?

Click to expand...

No, 3 drops of discwasher fluid, dispersed on the brush, works well. Be sure to keep that brush clean.

If you want to make your own record cleaning solution:

• Get a clean gallon jug (preferably one that contained distilled water) and add:
• 3 quarts of de-ionized or distilled water
• 1 quart of pure isopropyl alcohol (not rubbing alcohol)
• 3-4 drops of Kodak Photoflo (used in processing of film negatives)

Driving dust particles deeper into a record grove can happen if the dust is deposited on the groove walls. Washing with larger volumes of fluid can flood the groove, leaving the dust at the bottom of the groove. Copious rinsing or a vacuum fluid removal system would remove the dust better in that case.

Using water and dilute detergent can leave a sticky detergent residue on the vinyl, making it attract more dust.

I'll repeat, dishwashing detergent and judicious use of warm water and a brush works wonders on dirty records. It has been the recommended method for 50 years at least by countless writers in countless audio magazines over the years.

Personally, I use a mixture of 2/3 distilled water and 1/3 Everclear (180 proof pure grain alcohol from the liquor store) and a mechanical record washing machine because I'm lazy but I could do the same thing the machine does by hand. You can use a brush if it isn't too stiff and you don't apply much pressure. If you run out of records to clean you can always use the Everclear to spike some punch. My machine vaccums up the solution but you can use a towel instead.

fmw said:

I'll repeat, dishwashing detergent and judicious use of warm water and a brush works wonders on dirty records. It has been the recommended method for 50 years at least by countless writers in countless audio magazines over the years.

Personally, I use a mixture of 2/3 distilled water and 1/3 Everclear (180 proof pure grain alcohol from the liquor store) and a mechanical record washing machine because I'm lazy but I could do the same thing the machine does by hand. You can use a brush if it isn't too stiff and you don't apply much pressure. If you run out of records to clean you can always use the Everclear to spike some punch. My machine vaccums up the solution but you can use a towel instead.

Click to expand...

Agreed. If the detergent is dilute, it works fine. Too many people think that more is better and end up adding too much detergent.

The detergent should also be non-ionic. Most dishwashing detergents contain a common detergent called sodium laurel sulfate (aka SLS, laureth sulfate, sodium dodecyl sulfate, or SDS). It has a negative charge. If your tapwater is at all hard, it contains calcium carbonate, which when mixed with solutions of this ionic detergent, will come out of solution and deposit in the record groves. Unless you have soft rinse water, or rinse with distilled or deionized water, and you make sure that you use non-ionic detergents, you are probably better off by avoiding detergents.

Distilled water alone is aggressive enough to remove grease and oils deposited from hands and fingers. Adding alcohol will make it dry faster. Everclear has obvious advantages over toxic isopropanol. That's a good idea.

ilnoca said:

About the digital end: the analog to digital conversion would occur at the receiver and the receiver would transmit the digital signal to my sound card via toslink. .

Click to expand...

This caught my eyes I don't think your receiver will do this, that is why you may need to send the analog to a pc card that does the A/D before you make a CD but am sure others will correct me if needed Also, if the receiver will not do this A/D, you need an external RIAA box but that may have been mentioned already

mtry, I just looked at the owner's manual and I think you are absolutely right; it looks like the receiver does d to a but not a to d. So much for my assuming... It's not horrible, as I should be able to jimmy up a pc with "isolated" components" i.e., having the primary noise makers (psu and hard drives) in seperate cases from the rest of the unit. (There are some real benefits of working in IT, namely, the ready access to cheap and free parts.) I'll definitely need to reevaluate the sound card situation, as I haven't paid any attention to the a/d abilities. Oh well, it's only parts...

A question on cleaning: I'm looking at pick up a proper brush off eBay, but the vacuum is out of my reach. I'm pretty sure this won't fly, but would using compressed air instead work or would it do little more than push the dirt around?

ilnoca said:

mtry, I just looked at the owner's manual and I think you are absolutely right; it looks like the receiver does d to a but not a to d. So much for my assuming... It's not horrible, as I should be able to jimmy up a pc with "isolated" components" i.e., having the primary noise makers (psu and hard drives) in seperate cases from the rest of the unit. (There are some real benefits of working in IT, namely, the ready access to cheap and free parts.) I'll definitely need to reevaluate the sound card situation, as I haven't paid any attention to the a/d abilities. Oh well, it's only parts...

A question on cleaning: I'm looking at pick up a proper brush off eBay, but the vacuum is out of my reach. I'm pretty sure this won't fly, but would using compressed air instead work or would it do little more than push the dirt around?

Click to expand...

The only other thing that some older receivers did when an analog signal was input into it, like a vinyl, it would convert it to digital internally to process Dolby prologic but it would not output the digital signal. So that is out totally.

Whatever path you take, you will need an analog to digital conversion capability and, you will need that RIAA EQ that may be satisfied with a phono amp that may have been already suggested to you.
Not sure what else I can help you with.

TLS Guy said:

As far as codecs are concerned, in my view lossy codecs are incompatible with high fidelity sound. In the lossless formats I use Flac and vouch for it completely. Lossy codecs just change the whole balance of the music. Bass is reduced, and bass detail lost. The balance of head and chest voice of singers is changed, with overemphasis of the head voice. Strings loose their silk sheen. Brass is harsh with far too much lip over bell. There are frequent episodes of stereo collapse. In worst cases, such as heavy organ with boys voices in ambient cathedral spaces, there is gross twinking, which is excruciating. Really these lossy codecs need banishing for anything except speech.

Click to expand...

Given my own experiences with blind comparisons of mp3s to source, I'd suggest you're using pretty shoddy encoders then, to have all these problems with so many different tracks. I wonder if you'd be able to ABX a good mp3 encoding at,say, 192 VBR with LAME, versus the .wav source. I've certainly not heard these artifacts you report, as a necessary consequence of lossy encoding (I have heard BAD encodings with some nasty artifacting, though). And all lossy codecs are certainly NOT alike, so to dismiss them all under one umbrella condemnation, is not warranted.

I wouldn't archive to lossy, simply because that severely limits further conversions. Archiving to FLAC or other lossless compressed formats give maximum flexibility vs. size.

As far as EQ that may be required, you can do it before or after. If you are planning a lot of upgrades to your system over time, I would archive without EQ. You always EQ to the setup you monitor with.

Click to expand...

Either way, if the OP plans to do any significant processing of the digital files -- EQ, normalizing, nosie reduction -- he should do it in the 24- or 32-bit domain. Then when it's all done, convert the files to 16-bit for CD play, with triangular dither. I use Adobe Audition for all recording, processing, and final formatting.

Here's a good guide to LP-->CD conversion

http://www.delback.co.uk/lp-cdr.htm

The OP shoudl also be aware that a purpose-built PC is not required to to excellent LP-->CD transfer. Neither is an outboard ADC. You can get a rather fine soundcard with a noise floor down near -100dB for less than $200 (e.g. M-Audio 24/96)