Ebay listing for sony 90 minute cassette tape. Ebay listing for sony 90 minute cassette tape. Skip navigation. VINTAGE CASSETTE TAPES MAXELL, BASF, SONY, TDK, 80'S COLLECTION - Duration: 4:53. Audio File Size Calculations. These calculations will help you to estimate the size of audio files. We did a casual experiment with a one-minute PCM file, and Windows Explorer reported it to be slightly smaller (10,337 KB) than what was predicted by the calculations below (10,584 KB). PCM stands for Pulse Code Modulation and commonly.
It's not uncommon for portable devices to sport large storage capacities that support dozens of gigabytes of available data storage. This amount of space is ideal for carrying around a good selection of your digital music library along with other types of media files. Although these larger-capacity devices remove much of the challenge of hardware storage limitations, it's still helpful to ballpark the number of songs you can stuff in your remaining free gigs of space.
Most contemporary popular music clocks in between three and five minutes of length, so most online estimators assume files of roughly that duration. However, you may have other things in your collection that can skew your estimations such as remixes or digitized 12-inch vinyl singles. These can be significantly longer than the usual song length—as can be orchestral works, operas, podcasts and similar content.
The bitrate used for encoding a song has a large effect on file size. For example, a song that is encoded at 256 Kbps yields a larger file size than the same song encoded at a bitrate of 128 Kbps. The encoding method can also affect how many songs will fit on your portable device—variable bitrate files generate a smaller file compared to constant bitrate files.
One reason the VBR vs. CBR question matters is that VBR files generally produce better sound and sometimes result in smaller files if the audio properties of the original sound support it, but they decode more slowly and thus some playback devices cannot handle them. CBR is universally accepted despite known limitations in acoustic quality.
Choosing an audio format for your particular portable is also an important factor to consider. The MP3 standard may be the most widely supported audio format, but your device may be able to use an alternative format that produces smaller files. AAC, for example, is regarded as being better than MP3. It typically produces higher quality audio and is more efficient at compression. This format could give you more songs per gigabyte than if you use MP3 alone.
Other formats, like Windows Media Audio, Ogg Vorbis, and the Free Lossless Audio Codec, can yield smaller file sizes with richer acoustic properties than MP3, but MP3 as a standard—except for Apple, which relies on AAC—means you can always play an MP3 but perhaps not any of the other types, depending on the hardware you're using.
Assuming you've opted for the more universal MP3 format for your music library, there's a really simple formula that you can use to estimate how many songs will fit in 1 gigabyte. This isn't an exact science, but it'll give you a good idea.
Take the length of the song in seconds. Then, multiply it by the bitrate of file. 128 Kbps is the standard for MP3s, but you can also find plenty in 256 Kbps and 320 Kbps. Now, take the result, and divide it by the result of 8 multiplied by 1024. That will convert from kilobits(kb) to megabytes(MB). All together, it looks like this:
That will give you an approximate size for a single song, but what about a whole library. Well, you could sit and individually calculate all of your songs, but who'd actually want to do that? Instead, take an estimate. Assume that the average length of your songs is 3.5 minutes. That's pretty standard. Now, apply the formula. Remember to multiply 3.5 by 60 to get the number of seconds.
The result is a rough estimate of 3.28 megabytes(MB) per song. Does that seem about right for your library? To figure out how many 3.28MB songs can fit in a gigabyte(GB), divide 1024 by 3.28 because there are 1024 megabytes in one gigabyte.
There you have it! You can fit roughly 312 songs on 1GB of storage.
If you really don't feel like doing all the math, you can remember that, for MP3s at a bitrate of 128 Kbps, 1 minute of audio equals about 1MB.
Assume a smartphone with 4 GB of available data storage. If your pop-music library averages 3.5 minutes per song, at 128 Kbps each in the MP3 format, then you'll have a bit over 70 hours of music available, good for nearly 1,250 songs.
With the same amount of space, your collection of symphonies clocking in at 7 minutes per track at 256 Kbps yields a bit more than 36 hours of music, a total of 315 songs.
Conversely, a podcast pushing out monaural sound at 64 Kbps and running for 45 minutes per episode gives you 140 hours of talking over 190 shows.
It's less common to download audio files to portable devices, as it was when devices like the iPod or the Zune led the market, as streaming services like Spotify and Pandora become more common on smartphones. If you're running into a space crunch, consider ditching the file library and matching your MP3s with a streaming service. You'll get the benefit of your music without losing space on your smartphone—plus, you can often download specific playlists to get you through those times when you don't have cell or Wi-Fi signals.
The MP3 format supports tags and album art. Although these assets aren't generally large, they do add a bit of extra padding to individual file sizes.
Particularly with podcasts and other spoken-word tracks, a file collapsed from stereo to mono takes up less space, often with little effect on the listening experience.
Although it's up to audio producers to select the right audio format and bitrate for their music, if you need to shave off some megabytes off your MP3 collection, take advantage of software that dynamically re-sizes MP3s or other audio files.
We’ve saved the sounds of the past on a number of audio formats over the last century. Folks cleaning out their attics often find audio reels or vinyl records and don’t know what to do with them.
Just like photos and videos, these recordings hold priceless bits of history – like grandma’s stories, or tunes from your great-uncle’s jazz band – that won’t last forever. This post shows you how to tell audio formats apart, reveals some tools and tips for digitizing them, and explains common audio terms to help you convert your aging audio to digital.
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1. Analog Sound Formats
2. Digital Audio Formats
3. DIY Audio Conversion
4. Why Digitize?
The term analog describes a physical way to store information. Analog recording devices like film cameras and tape recorders capture stimuli such as light or sound.
Then, recorders make changes to blank media like film or tape. These changes are physical representations of whatever’s being recorded, ideally at a high enough quality to look or sound the same later on.
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Early Formats | Disc Records | Magnetic Tape
The first audio recordings were clumsy in the years between their invention and practical use. Recording technology slowly improved through trial and error – some formats didn’t play back well, if at all. While you likely don’t have these recordings in your collection, it all began with these early audio formats.
Disc records, commonly just called records, were born as a better alternative to cylinders. They still used etched grooves to record audio but offered more durability, reliable playback, and mass-production.
Record sizes vary but the most common are seven, 10 or 12 inches in diameter. You can identify different types of records by their playback speed in revolutions per minute (RPM). The use of records declined with the rise of compact cassettes before making a comeback in the 21st century.
Magnetic tape recording was developed in Germany between World Wars I and II. The tape has a plastic base with a thin layer of metal particles on one side. Tape recorders convert sound and light into electrical signals that magnetize the tape to store audio, video and computer data.
A whole mess of different video and audio formats use magnetic tape, which can be stored on reels or in cassettes. Despite its vulnerability to breaks, mold and a decay called sticky shed syndrome, the tape is still used for specialty recordings today.
All digital information is stored as electronic data that can be written and read by computers and other newer technology. Digital audio formats can fit more information in less physical space than analog audio formats.
Digital audio changed the way the world records, consumes and shares sound. Here are the major digital audio formats that led up to the present.
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Compact Discs (CDs) | Digital Audio Tapes (DAT) | Audio File Formats | More Audio Formats
Over the last 20 years, digital audio files have overtaken CDs as the most popular audio format. The ability to download, share, edit and store these files through desktop and mobile platforms and the internet have once again changed the way our world creates and consumes sound.
Not every device and app is compatible with every audio file format. If you’re planning to record, edit or play back any digital audio, make sure you’re using a file type that works with your players and programs. There are other audio file formats out there, but these are the most well-known:
Economics and heavy competition drove a slew of different analog and digital audio formats, and it’s not feasible to cover them all here. If we skipped an item that you’re curious about, you can check out the Museum of Obsolete Media for a comprehensive list of audio formats.
Now that you’re an audio format expert, the next step is to convert audio to digital formats that will stand the test of time (for now). There’s bound to be an exciting new way to store and enjoy your audio sometime in the next 20 years. But until then, now is your chance to get caught up. Here’s how to save the sounds of the past for years to come.
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DIY Analog to Digital | Digital Audio Transfers | Improve Sound Quality | Audio Software
Your analog audio formats like vinyl records and compact cassettes are the most at-risk items for damage that could wreck the sound they store. There are four main steps you can take to convert analog audio to digital. Steps three and four are a breeze with the free audio software we’ll mention below.
Preserving your audio is a bit more straightforward if you already have digital formats like CDs or MP3 files.
For CDs, simply insert the discs into your computer’s CD-ROM drive, or an external disc drive that connects with a cable. For other digital storage, connect your device (ex: a flash drive or hard drive) to your computer or access your cloud storage online. The default file management programs for Windows and iOS should let you create folders and move or copy your audio into them.
Converting digital audio files from one format to another can be tricky and needs the right software. Head over to download.com and search for something like WAV to MP3 or FLAC to WMA based on the file formats you have, and which ones you need. Remember to read reviews and use caution when downloading any new software – some programs come with spyware and other add-ons that you don’t want on your computer!
Attention to quality is what sets an elite audio capture service apart. Keep these words handy when asking an audio to digital vendor to make your stuff sound better.
EverPresent captures all formats in stereo except for audio reels. We record reels in mono unless there’s a difference between the left and right sides that merits a stereo capture.
Our recommendation for editing, equalizing and denoising is to use these techniques sparingly. EverPresent’s audio team removes excessive silence and distracting white noise while preserving the integrity of the original recording.
Ready to digitize? Fill out our contact form to get an estimate on your audio conversion project!
There’s no shortage of tools for converting, editing and polishing your digital audio files. Keep in mind that while some audio software can work on basic laptops and mobile devices, most apps perform better and faster on more powerful computers.
Industry-standard programs like ProTools, Adobe Audition, and Logic are phenomenal, but they might have more bells and whistles than you’ll need for digitizing and optimizing your audio. Consider using one of these less-costly options to get the job done.
As a point of reference, EverPresent captures audio at a bit depth of 16-bit and a sample rate of 44.1kHz, initially in the AIFF file format (the Mac equivalent of lossless WAV files). Our standard service includes high-quality MP3 files at 320kbps to save disk space, but uncompressed file formats and higher sample rates are available too.
Not everyone will enjoy the process of converting audio to digital, but it’s important work with hefty benefits. To mention a few:
We’ve been stressing this benefit all along, but can’t emphasize it enough. All analog audio formats are at risk of physical damage from forces like mold, breaks, scratches and mechanical failure.
Even some earlier digital formats like CDs and DAT tapes are at risk of scratching, breaking and digital corruption. Don’t wait until it’s too late to save your family’s stash of music, audio books and oral history.
Large collections of vinyl records, compact cassettes and even CDs can take up a jaw-dropping amount of real estate. Conversely, an external hard drive the size of your wallet can hold one terabyte (1 TB) of data – that’s roughly 200,000 songs in MP3 format. It would take thousands of CDs or cassette tapes to store that much audio!
Digital audio is easy to clean and polish with the right software. You can trim unwanted portions and adjust the audio levels with just a few clicks. It’s much easier than the cutting-and-splicing technique that audio professionals endured for decades with magnetic tape.
Having a digital audio library gives you the freedom to burn mix CDs, copy old recordings for friends and family, and share sounds online. It gives you more control over your collection than vintage audio formats ever could.
We hope this post taught you how to tell audio formats apart, find the right gear, and follow best practices to digitize and manage your audio archive.
Of course, DIY audio digitizing is a great option if the time, skills and equipment don’t pose any issues for you. But if these concerns turn into barriers for you, we’re happy to help.