Time for the vinyls to be converted into something new
April 27th, 2008, 6:10 pm Teen Hobbies
Now, let me first say that Im a bit of a purist when it comes to music and actually enjoy all the little hisses and pops that punctuate all my favourite albums. Yes, I have a lot of CDs, but I also have a decent vinyl collection.
That said, I can understand where Ken is coming from. Id be devastated if any of my old albums were ever damaged so perhaps it is timely to look at how to convert them so I can put the originals away somewhere safe. Hey, you never know, my old Rainbow or Frank Zappa vinyl might be worth something some day. Im not so sure about my husbands Samantha Fox albums, though.
A quick search online and I found a point-by-point tutorial on Styli (www.styli.co.nz/vinylcd.php), a New Zealand-based online needle store.
The instructions look pretty straightforward and involve a stereo audio phono lead that will cost around $15, some freebie software from Sourceforce and a turntable with a phono output.
The author of the tutorial also recommends using Verbatim Vinyl CD-R for consistent audio quality and a long lasting recording.
Id recommend the little suckers just because they look so cool, like miniature vinyl.
When it comes to the old cassette tapes, a program called Spin It Again seems to have good reviews from various sources and has a comprehensive tutorial online (www.acoustica.com/spinitagain/cassette_to_cd.asp).
Unfortunately, this time youll have to pay out $US34.95 but there is a free trial download available.
For video, the costs to set yourself up can vary greatly, depending on the brand of video capture hardware and video software you opt for. SuperMediaStore (www.supermediastore.com/tape-tapes-to-dvd.html) has a good guide to the process.
Customerservice dramas update, week 12: I hope youre all sitting down as you read this, because you are in for a shock. Someone from Telecom has finally said were sorry. And offered a refund for all my dramas.
Okay, so it took yet another e-mail of complaint on my part to get the apology, and I still havent actually had any sort of official explanation for what it was than went wrong with my broadband connection, but at least someone has acknowledged that there was a problem.
So, thank you Dave at Telecoms customer care online division. However, Air New Zealand is still off my Christmas card list for its heavy-handed, boorish behaviour last week.
I know of someone else who had a similar change of schedule forced upon them for a domestic flight last year. They knew nothing about the change until they turned up at the airport to board their flight. Air NZ said someone had left a message but the passengers said they never received that message.
So what if my spam filters had taken a dislike to the Air NZ e-mail and stopped it hitting my inbox? Would I have been in the dark until I fronted up at Coolangatta to come home?
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