MP3, CD’s and computer software

[guidosan]

Well, I think this may be a good place to seek the answers to some of my questions. I am actually wanting to convert MP3 files to wave files, and if I can do some kind of editing to get the run time down, the better. The reason I want to do this is because I have a lot of lectures and presentations of people with the MP3 format. I will listen to these CD’s in the car, and every time I restart the car, the lecture starts from the beginning, and trying to remember just where I left off is getting to be a real pain. Cassette tapes are great for what I listen to since the tape just picks up where I left off. If I can get this onto a wav format, I can put it on a cassette tape and problem solved. Also, a lot of the lectures are just over an hour long (65-70 minutes). If there was a way to edit it down to 60 minutes, then it would fit perfectly on a 60, or 120-minute tape. Any ideas will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

[Woochifer]

I use Cakewalk Pyro for sound clip editing, crossfading, and converting MP3 files to CDs. The interface is pretty good because it allows you to insert track markers and visualize the levels in graph form. The main drawback is that if you're working with any MP3 file encoded at less than 128k bitrate, Pyro sounds horrible. I believe there are other programs with similar capabilities.

[plextor guy]

my head unit has an aux out which I use to connect an mp3 player. In my case a Rio Nitrus. Rio mp3 players are the only mp3 players I know of that allow the user to set hard bookmarks (not to be confused with virtual bookmarking). If you're head unit doesn't have an aux out you can use a cassette adapter or rf transmitter. If you're listening mostly to spoken word the quality will be fine. By the way, if you're looking for an mp3 player that has bookmarking, the Rio Nitrus is an especially good buy. Very robust, outstanding battery life, bookmarking and 1.5 GB's of storage. It can be had online for about 180 dollars. It uses a new gen of 1" hard drive from Cornice. The 4GB version is supposed to be released this month for about 250 dollars.

[guidosan]

Thanks for the ideas, I'll check them out.

[BrianUDLaw]

I use a program called CDex for converting from MP3 to wav format. While it certainly does not have as many functions as Cakewalk, it does a nice job for ripping CDs and converting between different file types. Best of all, it is free.

You can download it from http://www.cdex.n3.net/