Recommended Recording Parameters

[Dennis_M]

I am a novice at Vinyl Studio and plan on doing a few trial recordings before recording approximately 80 albums thereafter.

With the work I have done thus far, and from notes that I have taken, my plan is to record my albums in FLAC Format.
I suspect that there is a tradeoff between File Size and Fidelity.

My Plan is to record at a Sample Rate of 44.1 KHz. I previously recorded at a Bit Depth of 24 and a Bit Depth of 16.

From the little experience I have in this, I am gravitating on recording at a Sample Rate of 44.1 KHz and a Bit depth of 24.

Do users have any comments on this and/or have folks found that alternate settings may be recommended for specific recordings, etc?

Thanks for your input and recommendations on this.

[Steve Crook]

FLAC is a lossless compression format and there won't be fidelity problems from using it. But you'll need a PC capable of handling the CPU load of compressing. Basically any reasonably modern PC. I've been recording to FLAC at maximum (level compression for ages on a 7 year old desktop PC without any problems.

My personal preference is to record at the highest resolution possible on my equipment (24/192) and down sample for 16/48. Some will argue you can get audio effects in down sampling, but, honestly I've not noticed anything.

TBH the biggest influence in all of this will still be your source system and the post processing you do to remove clicks and noise from your recordings. I've re-recorded a bunch of albums because I built a new phono-pre and it was so much better than the one I'd originally used it was plainly audible in the recordings I just had to re-do them.

[Dennis_M]

Steve,

Thank you for your input on this.
As I want to make sure that I understand what you communicated, do you mean that you record at (24/192), and then, (ultimately) compress the audio files to (16/48)?

If so, does this mean you convert the FLAC Files into WAV, or other?

I'd appreciate it if you can clarify, as I also want to maximize Sound Quality vs. Space.
Even though I have a 500GB Drive on the Computer I am using, I think I need to consider the File Size of each Album in FLAC vs. Drive Space, etc.

Am just getting started as I had to reload Windows on this PC, but I can see that the (2) Albums I recorded in FLAC at (44.1 KHz, 24 bits/Sample) are consuming a fair amount of space.

Are you saying that you then compress these into another Format at (48/16)?

Perhaps I will experiment at recoding via FLAC at (48/16) and compare both sound quality and space used.



Am hoping to optimize Sound Quality vs. HD Space Required, etc.

Thanks again for your input.

[Steve Crook]

I use FLAC for everything. I record in FLAC format at level 8 (max) compression, it's the most space efficient lossless format. I do this at 24/192 because I want as much information as I can from the LP. Yes, it takes up a lot of space. I have close to 800 ripped LPs occupying roughly 1tb.

When I use VS to save tracks I also save them in FLAC format but at 16/48. So the process is just downsampling, not changing the format they're stored in.

I'd strongly recommend ripping to a portable USB3 drive not an internal drive on your computer, it makes it much easier to switch to using another computer or hard drive if you need to.

Also, do backups. You're going to invest a lot of your time ripping the LPs and then de-clicking and de noising them, to lose them all would be a disaster IMO. I have two backups, one kept by a friend so that I've still got the rips even if my house burns down...

I can buy a 2tb HDD for less than $100, so the size of the files isn't really a concern for me.

I hope this clarifies things a little.

[Dennis_M]

Steve,

Thanks for the rapid reply and helpful recommendations.
Your recommendation on ripping them to a portable USB makes a lot of sense.
I have been thinking and planning of getting an additional external HDD, and them I realized that I need to do a better job on understanding strategy and required storage, etc.

Thanks again for your helpful and timely recommendations.

Best Wishes, ~ Dennis M.

[Dennis_M]

Steve,

Thanks again for your recommendation on ripping directly to a USB3 Drive.
Although the concept is attractive, I need to do a little research in that:

1) I am using an old Lenovo T500 that I recently installed a 500 GB HD and upgraded to Windows 10.

2) Although I would like to rip albums directly to a USB3, I am concerned that my PC may "gate" the speed.
(i.e. not sure if I will get the same USB3 transfer rate via my T500).

3) I will check it out, and thanks again for the recommendation.

4) Worst Case: Perhaps I can record (N) Albums on my PC HD and then transfer to an external drive for storage.

5) You are certainly correct in that:

A) Given the "man-hrs." that one must invest to record and clean up Albums, Singles. etc,

B) It certainly makes sense to "think through" the planned strategy and test feasibility.

6) Ultimately, I hope to make "playlists" on my T500 via "Pi Music Player" and be able to transfer these playlists into my Android for playing in the car.

7) I am planning on using the Pi SW on my T500 and connect to my TV HDMI to play these playlists through my stereo system, but need to test the feasibility of this, as well.

Thanks again for your input and recommendations.

~ Dennis M, 2/18/2023

[Steve Crook]

Yes, the lenovo is looks old (2008 or thereabouts) and as you say, the only way to know is to try it. How much RAM do you have?

VS does have a buffer for recording so that might deal with periodic slow downs. All I can recommend is trying a recording and keeping an eye on the CPU and disk performance numbers in TaskManager and the buffer in the recording tab of VS. But I think you won't be able to do much else while you're recording...

I stream music through the house using Minimserver and RaspberryPi running Moode. I'm happy with it.

[Dennis_M]

Steve,

Thanks again for your help with this.

I have a Lenovo T560 which I use as my primary, and the T500 is one which I'd like to dedicate to recording and playing music.

The T500 has an upgraded 500GB HD, though it appears that currently 395 GB useable.

My Processor is 2.8 Ghz and I have 246 GB of useable RAM.

When I sum up the estimated Space usage of (Albums + Singles + CDs), I estimate ~ 100 GB required, (though I may need to estimate 2x that to include raw + processed files) (not sure on that).

I was looking at a 2TB portable HD, though my preference is to use a solid state, and of, course 3.0 USB as you suggested.

I can get a solid state 1 TB samsung T7 for $90; 2TB = $160.

(Although I'd like to have 2TB, the Solid State drives seem more expensive). I have seen other USB 3 drives for less $, but not sure if they are Solid state. (I can get a seagate 2B for ~ $62, but I suspect that it is not solid state.)

I do have a samsung T5 which I purchased in 2020, (though am a bit confused as the 1 TB T5 seems to list more that the 1TB T7 that I am currently looking at).

As you suggest, I need to do the experiment to see if my T500 can write directly to the external drive.

Worst Case scenario, as I know that I can record on my T500 with VS, I could, (if need be), record to T500 HD and move to an external HD, (which I will need to do in either event, given the estimated storage demands).

Thanks again for your input and help.

~ Dennis M, 2/19/2023
 

[Lewis]

When I use VS to save tracks I also save them in FLAC format but at 16/48. So the process is just downsampling, not changing the format they're stored in.

I'd strongly recommend ripping to a portable USB3 drive not an internal drive on your computer, it makes it much easier to switch to using another computer or hard drive if you need to.

Hi Steve,
one minor correction IYP.
You not only down-sample but also de-crease bit depth (from 24 to 16), when doing this you ought to dither.
Some say 16bit 44.1kHz is cheap, no-use, lean, wicked, bad. I'd say no matter how much frequency and how many bits you use for your ripping LPs, all in all such a defective long-playing PVC format (no fun) is still the matter of sound fidelity.
There is no use in digitizing @ 24 and 192 to down-grade down to @ 16 and 48. Just digitize at 16 plus 48.

[Steve Crook]

Understood. My decision to record at 24/192 was pragmatic. I didn't know what the eventual output would be, but if I had recorded in the highest resolution available to me it meant the chance of having to re-record was minimised. In the event, I went with 16/48 tracks as a trial, and have been happy with the results, but happier still that if I change my mind and go with 24/96 or even 24/192 I have the resolution in my recordings.

I do have a very good TT, arm, cartridge and phono-pre and I ultrasonic clean my LPs so I'm trying to squeeze as much information as possible from them.

Part way through recording I switched from a DIY opamp based phono (Muffsy) to a DIY (but much more expensive) valve based phono (BigBottle) and listening direct to LP the improvements were clear. Those changes survived recording at 24/192 and output at 16/48 and I ended up re-recording a bunch of LPs...
 
As far as dithering is concerned, I'd rather assumed that was being done by VS on my behalf without asking

I really like VS. It took a while to settle on a workflow I felt comfortable with, but, currently I can get from a recording to saving tracks in around 20 mins.

But, yes, LPs are basically crap, noisy and vulnerable. The only reason I have hundreds of them is that they were all there was at the time :|