Going Digital

What You'll Need to Get Started

Hardware isn't a major concern if you want to record music--even a PC as modest as a Pentium MMX-166 with 32MB of RAM can do the trick. However, we suggest that your system have at least a PII-266 CPU and 64MB of RAM. If you intend to edit and clean up the music after you capture it, you will want at least 96MB of memory.

You'll also probably want to reserve 2GB to 4GB of hard disk storage space for your music library, but you can get by with less. Assume you'll need about 1MB of disk space for each minute of music converted to .mp3 format; if you record in Microsoft's .wav format (required to make CD-quality copies), you may need as much as 10MB per minute of music.

Pick the Right Sound Card

At least as important as the CPU is the sound card you use. Most current sound cards offer two types of audio-input jacks: line-level input (usually indicated with the words line-in) and microphone-level input (indicated with the word mic or a picture of a microphone). For music recording, you will need to use the line-in port--if you connect a stereo component to the PC's microphone input, the resulting sound will be muffled and soft.

Some sound cards are better than others. Those found on most laptop computers are optimized to deliver "near-CD" quality when you play music, but they're not nearly as good at recording. For desktop PCs, you can't go wrong with high-end models from Turtle Beach, Ensoniq, or Creative Labs. We found an exhaustive set of current PC sound card ratings at PC Technology AudioVisual. But don't be discouraged if your sound card is at the bottom of that list: For this story, we used a low-end Creative Labs Sound Blaster AWE64 on our desktop machine and an older Yamaha OPL-3 device in our laptop, and we got good-enough-for-folk-music results with those setups.

Setting Up Your Recording Center

You'll need to schlep your stereo components near enough to the computer for you to hook everything up. For an LP record player, you will likely need both the turntable component and your amplifier; you'll have to connect the turntable to the amp's line-inputs and then connect the line-outputs from the amp to the PC's sound card. Most cassette players provide a sufficient line-level signal without the help of an amplifier.

You must also have a stereo audio cable--with male RCA connectors (the large round plugs on your stereo) on one end and a 1/8-inch "mini" stereo (headphone-style) plug on the other end--to connect the components to the PC. Any store that sells stereos will likely carry the necessary cable; save some money and skip the high-end, gold-tipped cable, which won't make a difference in the sound your computer picks up. Once you have your cable, connect the line-out port of the playback device to the line-in port on your sound card.

Radio-frequency interference from the PC itself can put a lot of static into your music, so do the following to minimize it:

• Try to position your playback and recording devices away from other heavy-duty electronic equipment. Keep your turntable at least 3 feet away from your computer's monitor.
  
  
• Make sure that any turntable that isn't integrated into an all-in-one "minisystem" is grounded to the amp chassis through an independent grounding wire.
  
  
• If possible, attach all power supply cords to the same grounded wall outlet. Use a power strip or surge protector if you can.