‘Read track’ Dialog

DART CD-Recorder Basic allows you to read tracks from an audio CD, CD Text or CD+G. Since a digital (i.e., lossless) transmission is used, copying does not cause any degradation of the sound quality typical of analog systems.

To read a track from an audio CD do the following:

1. Select tracks for reading by clicking on the dot marks on their left side. Tracks marked for reading are distinguished with red bullets. To uncheck tracks click on the corresponding dot marks again. To add several track to the reading list select them and click the Add button. Several tracks may be selected by means of depressing the CTRL key and clicking the corresponding items. To add all tracks to the reading list click the Add all button. Finally, to remove items from the reading list select them and press the Remove button.

2. Select the reading speed. Be aware that in some of the available CD-R devices the error-correction mechanism is switched off at higher reading speeds - in cases like that disc surface damages or dust may introduce audible clicks into the transmitted audio material if you don’t choose the lowest speed.

3. Choose the name(s) under which the selected audio tracks will be saved. Tracks are stored in separate soundfiles called <name[xy].wav> where name is an user-defined prefix and [xy] denotes a two-digit track number.

4. Choose the desired output format. If DART audio encoders are installed, DART CD-Recorder Basic will save audio tracks in one of the available compressed formats, such as MPEG or WMA.

5. Click OK.

To add the selected CD tracks to the playlist check the Add tracks to the playlist checkbox.

CDDB support

CDDB2 [TM] Disc Recognition Service[SM] (DRS) from CDDB, Inc. is the world's largest online database of audio CD information. Each time you play a CD, your computer can access CDDB through the Internet for information about that specific disc: the name of the artist, the album title and all song titles. Goodbye tiresome typing, CDDB does it all automatically! Recognized as the most accurate audio CD identification service on the Web, CDDB has data on all kinds of music, even CDs with multiple pressings. Best of all, accessing CDDB is free for your private use.

The first time you use the service, you must register with CDDB.

Using CDDB

CD Text support

DART CD-Recorder Basic allows you to add CD Text information to your playlist at the time you are saving the original CD Text audio tracks. To read a CD Text info you need a CD-ROM drive or CD recorder which supports CD Text and which is supported for this feature by DART CD-Recorder Basic. You will know whether this is the case after opening the Read track dialog – when the CD Text format is enabled the Display CD Text information checkbox, placed in the lower part of the dialog, is active.

To copy audio tracks along with the associated CD Text information, activate the CD Text display (check the Display CD Text information checkbox) and make sure the lifted tracks will be automatically added to the playlist (check the Add tracks to the playlist checkbox).

If the Display CD Text information option is not enabled, all CD Text details will be ignored and replaced with the CDDB information – provided it is available and enabled.

Using CD Text

CD+G support (available in the CD+G version only)

DART CD-Recorder Basic allows you to read CD+G audio tracks, provided, of course, that your CD-ROM drive or CD recorder supports this format. CD+G means compact disc with graphics. The most important application of CD+G is for Karaoke.

To copy audio tracks along with the associated graphic information, check the Include CD+G information checkbox placed in the lower part of the dialog (if this checkbox is not active the CD+G feature is not supported).

If the Include CD+G information checkbox is not active and/or not checked, DART CD-Recorder Basic will rip CD+G tracks of the graphic data (song lyrics), i.e. only the audio part will be copied.

Reading and writing CD+G tracks

Saving audio tracks in a compressed format

When DART audio encoders are installed you can save audio tracks in one of the available compressed formats, such as MPEG or WMA. This feature allows you to minimize the amount of a hard disc space needed to keep audio files. Since encoding is performed on-the-fly, the audio data is NOT saved in a temporary wave file prior to compression. To activate encoding select the corresponding compression audio format (MP3 or WMA) from the Output format list (to set the default output file format use the Options dialog, available from the View menu). To preset the encoder press the Settings button.

Compressing audio files