The Book of Audacity Table of Contents Acknowledgments Introduction What Can Audacity Do? What This Book Covers Audacity vs. Ardour 1. Audacity from Start to Finish Audacity Quick-Start Audacity in Detail Managing Audacity Projects Adding Audio Files: Import vs. Open Saving Your Work Selecting Tracks and Segments of Tracks Track Panel Cutting Out Unwanted Chunks Fade In and Out Making Quiet Recordings Louder Timer Record and Sound Activated Recording Mixer Board Track Metadata Final Mixdown Audio File Formats and Quality Settings Understanding File Formats Understanding Bit Depth and Sampling Rate 16/44.1, 24/96, 32-Bit Float Bitrate, Bit Depth, and File Size Now What? 2. Building a Good Digital Sound Studio on the Cheap Getting Sound In and Out of the Computer An Example Studio Sorting Out Connectors Multichannel Recording, PCI, USB, FireWire USB or FireWire? Microphones Polar Patterns Which Microphones for Which Occasions? Microphone Cables Smart Miking Microphone Preamp Speakers and Headphones Your Computer Must Have Muscle and Vast Drawers Operating Systems Portable Recording The Secret of Recording Your Own Great Audio Visit Appendix A 3. Transferring Vinyl LPs (and Other Legacy Media) to CD Preparing Vinyl LPs for Copying Eight Steps to Converting Records to CDs Audacity Settings Recording Fixing Defects Fade In, Fade Out Fixing Warps Fixing Skips and Pops Finding and Repairing Clipping Noise Removal Customizing Dynamic Range Compression Normalization Dividing a Long Track into Individual Songs Exporting to CD-Ready Files, One Long Audacity Track Exporting to CD-Ready Files, Multiple Audacity Tracks Writing Songs to a CD Copying Vintage 78s Connecting Legacy Devices to Your Computer Connecting a Turntable to Your Computer Connecting a Tape Deck Which Is Better: Vinyl, Tape, or CDs? The Digital Advantage Longevity 4. Creating and Editing Live Tracks for CD Making Good Live Recordings Portable Digital Recorder Laptop with Audacity Multitrack Recording of a Live Performance Be Nice to the Sound Crews Audacity Settings for Recording Setting Recording Volume Levels Starting, Stopping, and Pausing Recording Monitoring Your Live Recording Editing Live Recordings Editing and Downmixing Multitrack Recordings Special CD Settings in Audacity Trimming Splitting Stereo Tracks for Surgical Repairs Fixing Clipping and Too-Loud Passages Noise Removal Compressing Dynamic Range Cutting a Single Long Track into Individual Song Tracks Creating Graceful Breaks Between Songs Normalization Optional Track Metadata Final Export Writing Your Songs to CD Labeling Your CD Mass CD Duplication Combining Songs from Different Recording Sessions, Fix-its, and Special Effects 5. Authoring a Compilation CD Audio CDs There Is Not a Special Audio CD Convert MP3s to Red Book CD CD Writers and Software Three Ways to Author a CD Compilation in Audacity One Track per Song Project Single Audacity Track Compilation Project Single Audacity Track + CD-Mastering Program CD Cue Sheets and BIN Files Fixes and Cleanups Splitting Stereo Tracks for Surgical Repairs Normalization Making Graceful Fades and Song Breaks Configuring Audacity for Orange Book CDs Putting an Orange Book CD Collection Together File Formats and Quality Settings Computer Media Players Ripping CDs Ripping DVDs 6. Authoring Super High-Fidelity Audio DVDs What Are WAV, AIFF, and FLAC? DVD-Audio Overview Creating High-Quality Recordings in Audacity More Power What Bit Depth Is Best? What Sampling Rate Is Best? Saving Your Masters Creating 5.1 Surround Exporting to 16-Bit DVD-Audio Authoring Software Transferring Legacy Media Learn More 7. Creating Podcasts The Short Story Making a Simple Voicecast Audacity Settings Cleaning Up Your Recording Reducing Too-Tall Peaks Fades Normalization Export to MP3 or Ogg? Ogg Vorbis Quality Settings MP3 Quality Settings Other Lossy Formats Exporting Your Podcast Two-Person Podcasts Editing a Two-Track Recording as a Single Stereo Track Editing a Two-Track Recording as Two Mono Tracks Adding a Background Music Track 8. Becoming an Online Star File Formats and Audio Quality The Business of a Recording Artist Establishing an Online Presence Online Music Distributors Self-Hosting Selling Stuff Online To DRM or Not to DRM? Copyrights and Legal Issues Learn More 9. Multitrack Recording Tracks, Channels, and Clips How to Make Multitrack Recordings Playback Tips and Tricks Label Tracks Creating and Managing Labels Using Labels to Edit Multiple Tracks Aligning and Moving Tracks Link Tracks and Track Groups Time-Shifting Multiple Tracks at the Same Time Splitting Tracks Working with Clips Time-Shifting Inside Tracks Metronome Track Overdubbing Measuring and Fixing Latency Changing Tempo NTSC, PAL, and CDDA Frames Creating Loops Mixdown to Stereo Customizing the Mixer Board Too Loud! Clipping! Control Your Channel Mapping Multichannel Surround 10. Making Your Own Ringtones Customizing Audio for a Mobile Phone Applying Dynamic Range Compression Phone Audio File Formats RTTTL Proprietary Audio File Formats How to Transfer Files to Your Phone 11. Audacity Plugins for Special Effects Cross-Fades Generate Menu Sine Wave Example Frequency Range of Generated Tones DTMF Tones Chirps Generating Noise Test Tones Click Track Pluck Risset Drum Effect Menu Reverberation Amplify Auto Duck Change Pitch Phaser Reverse Sliding Time Scale/Pitch Shift WahWah Linux Plugins Linux LADSPA Plugins Linux Nyquist Plugins Windows Plugins Audio Effects Glossary 12. Fix-its and Cleanups Split Stereo Tracks Repeat Last Effect Noise Removal Normalization Remove Clicks and Scratches Click Removal Repair Draw Tool Truncate Silence Change Tempo Change Pitch Change Speed Compress Dynamic Range How Much Dynamic Range? Compressor Settings Chris's Dynamic Compressor Leveller Equalization Fix Timing and Latency Errors Analyze Menu 13. Configuring Linux for Best Audio Quality Using Distributions with Real-Time Kernels Specialized Multimedia Linux Distributions Building a Real-Time Kernel Latency Is Not That Scary Sorting Out Linux Audio Using ALSA Setting Recording and Playback Levels in alsamixer Master vs. PCM Multiple Sound Cards Adjusting Volume Levels Hardware Testing with alsa-utils Testing Speakers Testing Recording ALSA Applications Querying Your Sound Card Using JACK with Audacity Connecting a FireWire Recording Interface Creating Persistent Configurations JACK Settings Turning PulseAudio and Phonon Off Linux System Tweaks The Tangled History of Linux Audio Sound Cards 14. Configuring Windows for Best Audio Quality Enabling MP3 Support Enabling WMA, M4A/M4P Support Low-Latency Recording and Audio Driver Fun Tuning Windows for Best Performance Tuning Windows XP Tuning Windows Vista and 7 Configuring Windows Audio Devices 15. Customizing Audacity Customizing Audacity's Default Options Devices Playback Recording Quality Interface Tracks Import/Export Projects Libraries Spectrograms Directories Warnings Effects Keyboard and Mouse A. Audio Hardware PCI, PCI-e, PCMCIA Sound Cards PCI PCI-e PCMCIA USB Recording Interfaces FireWire Recording Interfaces Stand Alone ADC/DACs B. Glossary A–E F–J K–O P–T U–Z C. Seven Myths of Digital Audio The Myth of the Golden Ear The Myth of Burn-In The Myth of Tube Superiority The Myth of Uber Cables The Myth of Analog Superiority The Myth That You Don’t Need Tone Controls The Myth That Someone Else Knows Better Than You D. References and Resources Books