Audio Recording Software

I love Audacity. Works. Free.

http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

 

Free is great. I'd go to circuit city if you have one and just read the boxes for features. You could do it online as well.

Most do fair job, but some have more features than others.

You might snoop ebay and compare with websites of the software people to gain info. Ebay has some fantastic prices.

Older software isn't always bad in audio as the basics don't change much.

Be sure it outputs to the audio format that you want.

 

Audacity would be my vote for your budget. It is a decent program for such. I use Pro Tools LE but it will run you $450 for the software and the hardware.
That is pretty complex though. The best thing I would recemmend to you thought is GarageBand but it is Mac only so you would have to spend $600 an a new computer just to run it (it does come free though) to be honest though, I had fits for about a year trying to record on a PC and finally switched to a Mac....very good choice. Every Mac that ships these days comes with very good and easy to use recording software.

But for the PC......

I have used audacity and it is probably the best of the free ones but you do get what you pay for.

 

BTW, to clarify....Pro Tools Free....which is what I started with is a free 8 track version but only runs in Mac OS 9 and Widows 98/ME

The new version that costs $450 (and come with hardware) Works with Windows XP and Mac OS X.

What OS are you currently running and what system do you plan to use with it?

 

Very funny...lol I have heard that before a million times...actually I also have an HP with Win 2k..best version of Windows ever IMO. Pro TOols free doesn't run well in 98 anyway. Pro Tools LE is great in XP but then you have to pay for it...they keep saying that they will update it for XP and OS X but.....

one of these days!

BTW...you would be suprised what I do with my Mac...and I work for an IT company!

 

I work the sound equipment at my husband's church and I have found that Adobe Audition is very efficient and easy to use. You can edit your recording and it is very easy to burn them to a CD later.

Audition can be purchased for less than a hundred dollars online from different retailers. Just do a search in Yahoo or something and you will find plenty of sites that sell it.

Good Luck in your search.

 

I have heard good things from Audition which I think used to be Cool Edit Pro but I never used it.

 

Adobe Audition, hands down. I was the production director at a Christian radio station. We started with Audacity because of the price. What we saved in time by moving to Audition more than paid for the upgrade within a week. You can work with many different types of audio files with Audition without having to convert them. We would sound track 3 hour program blocks without any difficulties. Audacity was sooooo sloooooow and would lock up on long format files.

Make sure you buy a quality soundcard. Run RCAs out of your mixer right through the sound card.

 

We or shall I say I use RealPlayer, Helix Producer.
If you are going to record for wesites it is the way to go. It can be customized to for dial-up or Highspeed access.
As far as software for just recording the service to a PC I would strongly recommend instead of a program to look into a actual CD recorder.
I use a Marantz CDR510 Live cd recorder. simple and easy to use. I think the main question is, what are you planning on using it for? Free is a good cost but is very limited. If free is what you are going for then you could use what is usually included on a PC which is a WAV recorder.

David

 

Some suggestions on sound cards are:

$35 Griffen iMic, (USB) by far the easiest to set up, no drivers needed for XP or OS X.
Very good sound quality for the money but no much of a software bundle and only standard 1/8" inputs

M-Audio Mobile Pre USB
This is a very nice interface with full size mic inputs and 1/4" line inputs but this will run $150 and comes with some software but not what you will want to use.

And, the absolute best for this purpose, is the Mbox from Digidesign. But it is $450 but comes with absolutely everything...a great USB interface and the Pro Tools software which is the best.

FWIW, I have used all of these and have really liked them. They are all cross platform products and in the case of the Mbox, comes with Windows and Mac versions of the software (think the Mobile Pre does too)

 

Dale - Does M-Audio still make the 2496 soundcard? That's what we used at the radio station for both input and output. Those cards have run 24/7 for several years now w/o a single hiccup.

DjXtreme-We used a CD recorder with the mics run through a board for field production. Nice thing there was Audition would take the *.cda file raw, you could do post-production and save it as .wav or mp3. If you aren't doing any post you can copy directly from the finalized disc.

 

I looked on their website and I didn't see it so my guess would be no. I ALMOST bought one of those about three years ago. I instead bought an Aardvard interface and it was very good but I could only use it with Pro Tools free (and of course the included Cakewalk Pro Audio, which I didn't like at all)

BTW, if used is an option, the Digidesign Audiomedia III PCI card is a great option. It comes with Pro Tools LE and works with Windows XP. They can be found for around $100 on eBay and that SHOULD include the Pro Tools software.