Music in the studio

Paul Tarlow · Post by **Paul Tarlow** » Fri Dec 26, 2003 12:20 am

Santa brought me a new Dell DJ MP3 player. I've loaded the family's entire music collection (about 5100 songs!). The challenge was how to use it in the studio without subjecting it to the dust, etc.

The solution was a Belkin radio transmitter (about $30) that plugs into the earphone and transmits to a nearby radio. Now the player is in an air-tight small plastic bin and the music is coming out my old tried and true Sony boombox.

Voila!

- Paul

Tony Smith · Post by **Tony Smith** » Fri Dec 26, 2003 7:14 am

I've been considering getting a pair of wireless headphones for the same reason. Would love to have my music travel with me to the corners of the shop without wires to a CD player clipped to my belt.

Tony

Tony Serviente · Post by **Tony Serviente** » Fri Dec 26, 2003 11:22 am

Tony-just make sure you get the radio wireless, and not the infra red. IR's work fine when you're line of sight, but bend down or go behind something and you lose it. Ithaca is a pretty radio poor environment, at least for the kind of music I like. My solution was to hook my PC to my amp, and listen to on line music. Radio@netscape is a good one, as it has dozens of channels in almost all the genres, and it's free. Ads are almost non existant. There are also hundreds of radio stations that live stream, and alot of NPR shows (like This American Life) archive old programs that can be accessed anytime. Being an ex-tech, I love this stuff!

Bert Weiss · Post by **Bert Weiss** » Fri Dec 26, 2003 12:43 pm

Tony Serviente wrote:Tony-just make sure you get the radio wireless, and not the infra red. IR's work fine when you're line of sight, but bend down or go behind something and you lose it. Ithaca is a pretty radio poor environment, at least for the kind of music I like. My solution was to hook my PC to my amp, and listen to on line music. Radio@netscape is a good one, as it has dozens of channels in almost all the genres, and it's free. Ads are almost non existant. There are also hundreds of radio stations that live stream, and alot of NPR shows (like This American Life) archive old programs that can be accessed anytime. Being an ex-tech, I love this stuff!

Tony

I am about to move my office to a room directly beneath my livingroom stereo. What kind of wires do I need to make that connection. Can you make a long extension? I guess there is a headphone out jack on the MAC. I imagine that it can go in to the DVD input on the preamp, but I have no idea of the strength of the signal or where it would work best.

I am a jazz fan and there is not much available locally. I would really like to listen to WBGO, KJZZ, and KCSM... Not to mention commercial free stations during begging weeks.

Tony Serviente · Post by **Tony Serviente** » Fri Dec 26, 2003 1:12 pm

Bert-Run your headphone out from the Mac to one of the auxiliary inputs of your stereo, and that should do it. Length of the run is relatively unimportant. Try to keep it away from AC power lines to minimize hum pickup. On PC's, there are seperate audio outputs that would be used. If your Mac has this, use it instead. Using the headphone jack may disable your desktop speakers, using audio out will leave everything working. Jazz is my first choice too, and Netscape has 20 jazz and blues choices, and there are a number(and more all the time) of jazz stations around the world that live stream, so with a little looking around you'll have many choices.

Paul Tarlow · Post by **Paul Tarlow** » Fri Dec 26, 2003 1:16 pm

For those of you in radio wastelands, XM radio is an option. Best Buy had an XM boombox for about $100. I believe its $10 / month for the service. You'll never want for quality music (much commercial free) again.

- Paul

Tony Serviente · Post by **Tony Serviente** » Fri Dec 26, 2003 1:30 pm

Satellite is a great option, and they are making car units that detach so you can play it in your house, or wherever. Subscriptions are around $10 a month, and additional family are $7 or so. I've been holding back on satellite to see weather Sirius or XM wins. I don't want to own the equivalent of a Beta VCR machine.

Geri Comstock · Post by **Geri Comstock** » Fri Dec 26, 2003 2:36 pm

My new addition is the studio is books on CD. I had a CD/tape player with radio in the studio, but it's not working too well after 5 years there. I only use the radio part now.

Santa brought me a new one which I will use when i do metal work. This one will be kept far, far away from the buffing machine and the greasy dust it generates.

Books on CD are great listening material. I'm completely hooked! I started listening to them in the van on long drives to shows and they've replaced music and news talk. So now I'm completely clueless about what's going on in the world. Oh well. David will tell me if anything happens in the news that I need to know about.

Geri

Paul Tarlow · Post by **Paul Tarlow** » Fri Dec 26, 2003 2:42 pm

If you like books on tape you'll probably like these folks:

http://www.audible.com

Not only do they have books -- but they have downloadable versions of radio shows (I'm a big fan of Ira Glass' "This American Life") and periodicals.

- Paul

Geri Comstock wrote:My new addition is the studio is books on CD. I had a CD/tape player with radio in the studio, but it's not working too well after 5 years there. I only use the radio part now.

Santa brought me a new one which I will use when i do metal work. This one will be kept far, far away from the buffing machine and the greasy dust it generates.

Books on CD are great listening material. I'm completely hooked! I started listening to them in the van on long drives to shows and they've replaced music and news talk. So now I'm completely clueless about what's going on in the world. Oh well. David will tell me if anything happens in the news that I need to know about.

Geri

Geri Comstock · Post by **Geri Comstock** » Fri Dec 26, 2003 3:03 pm

Heh. Thanks, Paul. David mentioned them to me just the other day and I'd forgotten the name of their site already (middle age, holiday overload induced brain fade, I guess).

Will check them out!

Geri