I just remembered this because of another thread… I’ve been irritated by the spacing of the track breaks in my Michel Thomas french cds/mp3s, as they’re far apart and I want to be able to easily skip back and repeat short sections. I’m sure it’ll be possible to add breaks to my mp3 rips, just wondered what the easiest/best method is, any recommendations?

I’m not that clear in what you are asking but sounds like you have an album that is ripped as one big track.

If thats the case then your options are as follows

1) Re-rip the album as individual tracks instead of one big single file
2) Find or create a cue file for the album and use software such as foobar2000 that will play it back
3) Try spliting the single file into separate tracks, mp3directcut might do this but possibly better software out there now.

It’s not a single track, you’re right enough, it’s along those lines- it’s basically an album cut into several long tracks, I want to split it further into shorter tracks. So basically option 3.

MP3directcut looks just the thing- I’ll hang fire in case anyone’s got any other suggestions but I reckon it’ll do the job, cheers!

Your best bet, if you haven’t got it already, is to download Audacity…

http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

I use very expensive professional Music Production software all the time, but if I just want to quickly edit or record something easily, Audacity is brilliant! And it’s free…

But if you are using Audacity for editing MP3s, you will have to decode then re-encode to MP3 format. So you will lose some quality.
Better to use something that can split losslessly, ie Mp3DirectCut, or Mp3splt-gtk.
Or you could re-rip it as a WAV file, then edit in Audacity, before exporting as MP3.

Ah yes, good point. I’m never not working in WAV, forgot that bit. I only ever bounce anything to MP3 once I’m finished for then listening to on my iPhone or uploading to the internet.

If you have the option to work with WAV first though, then Audacity is brilliant, and you can then encode to MP3 once you’re done.

As an aside to this, does anyone know of someone who can reliably, and for reasonable cost, copy a couple of vinyl albums to digital format?
I always rip to AAC at 320Kb, if that’s a help. I have a turntable, but it’s speed control board has gone tits-up, and I don’t have an easy way to connect my Mac Mini to the old stereo.
The albums are highly unlikely to ever appear digitally, although one of them, by Beckett is on RareMP3.com, but the download link seems to be broken now: http://www.raremp3.co.uk/2008/11/beckett-beckett-1974-uk-prog-rock.html

Count, sadly I sold my turntables a couple of months ago cos I was skint and not using them, otherwise I’d do it for you….

Cheers, mboy, that seems to be the case at the mo’. 😀
A mate at work used to do it, but his system isn’t configured to enable him to get a signal to his iMac, without a fair bit of phaffing, and I really can’t justify spending money on an Mp3 turntable just for two albums.
Never mind, thanks anyway.

and I really can’t justify spending money on an Mp3 turntable just for two albums.

Aside from the fact they’re utter crap!

You want/need a proper 24bit D/A convertor that plugs into your computer via USB or Firewire, with proper audio inputs. Such as I have. Just happen to have sold my bloody turntables! Oops.

Hi mboy, I’ve actually found another link to that Beckett album that worked! Listening to it now, and while it’s not perfect, the dynamic range is a bit limited, and it’s got vinyl clicks and pops, it’s probably no worse than I could have done myself, so result, I think. 😀