I am going to convert some of my old 33 1/3 albums to MP3. My problem is how do I clean up the new music after I have converted it? I hear some hissing noise and it does not seem as clear as when it did on the old record. Is there any free programs out there to help me or should I go buy something?
Noise could be rumble (low frequency noise) caused by the drive mechanism in the turntable. Or could be hum (60 hertz range) This could possibly be a bad ground. The last and probably most frequent is surface noise from the record itself. A lot of records were pressed on less than stellar vinyl and this sounds like very short clicks and maybe to some extent the music will sound like it was recorded at the ocean. There are a number of good quality audio restoration commercial programs that will help, but keep in mind, records will never sound like current cd's. You can make them close to as good as they were originally, but not better. The programs I've used (and liked) are Soundforge, Dart, and Nero. The first two are the most complicated, but also the most effective. I can tell you it can get addicting when I realized I had spent over four hours cleaning up one song....
