Joining the MP3 world later than some, what may be new and exciting to me, may be old hat to many of you. In fact, that very expression ‘old hat’ may be old hat to you, and cause you to run screaming from this blog. I hope that’s not the case.
Best of all possible worlds is what I hope for. Old and new, young and old, and everything in between. For in our hearts, in so many ways, aren’t we always who we have been since the beginning? Continuing to always grow of course, but the essence of us, how much does that ever really change? But I’m getting off topic, something I’ve been known to do on occasion, as you have probably realized if you’ve been here before. Ah the wonderful world of tangents…you never quite know where they’ll lead…
Back to those ‘new to me’ things. When I was first exploring MP3 players, I was amazed by the near endless selection of additional gadgets for the initial gadget. One that I find particularly useful is the USB Turntable that converts phonograph records into MP3 files. Talk about bridging the gap between old and new. While some old recordings have been digitally reissued, many wonderful albums remain locked in vinyl. Accessible only to those lucky enough to have the old records, lost or even unknown to those born in the digital age.
I know of people who can’t bear to part with these old favourites, even though they may no longer even have a way to listen to them. For a while, you rarely seemed to even see record players for sale. With the advent of MP3 players however, there seems to have been a bit of a spinoff bonus. Technology now allows us to very easily convert those old records and carry them with us wherever we go.
There’s a reasonable selection of MP3 converting turntables out there now. Many even have built-in speakers and can act as stand-alone record players, though the sound quality of the speakers is understandably limited. The main use for these devices though, is converting to MP3, and this is where they excel. Players have USB ports and/or SD card slots where you can just plug in your external storage device, and play the record as normal. Just like that, you have an MP3 file of your favourite record, converted and stored, ready to transfer to your MP3 player. There’s often several bit rate options to choose from, but I’ve found even the larger bit rates offered produce very reasonable file sizes.
I’ve selected a few places below to check out if you’re interested in seeing what’s available. It feels like a great circle is completed bringing recordings from the past, into the present, to live on in the future.
