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A magnetic cartridge will not output enough voltage for direct computer input. Route your cartridge output through an amplifier with magnegtic phono in jacks and tape out jacks or use a phono pre-amp from radio shack or others.

It's been a few months since I used GR, but as I remember; upon starting GR you are asked if you want to be guided for settings. Absolutely choose guidance for proper setting of levels. When clicking to start recording from the main screen a dialog box appears asking if you want GR to separate recordings automatically. This box must be checked. There is also a choice of selecting the length of silence between tracks to trigger auto separation. Set initially at 2 sec. minimum, 3 sec max. Trial to separate an entire record side into tracks by editing will fail. You are limited to 3 files (two cursor points) as I remember. If you must, separate two tracks, creating a third file of several tracks and then separate this file into three segments. Repeat as needed. Post again if this doesn't work.

Amp line out to line in on sound card should work best. Right click on the speaker icon in the right bottom corner of your PC and left click on Recording Devices. Make sure that your are configured to use line in. I once had the wrong input selected with weird results. Still got sound, but it was terrible.

I had the same problem on a PC. Found that the PC wasn't set to use the recording input I was using. Result was weak recordings with terrible quality. Setting PC to use correct recording input solved the problem. Don't know if a Mac has sound input settings, but it's worth checking.

I just purchased a new car with a cd player that recognizes mp3 and wmp files and displays Album, Artist, and song titles as they play. About nine normal length audio CDs will fit on an mp3 CD making such disks a wonderful and compact way to have lots of music available for listening during driving when istening time is available, and extends the functionality of Golden Records to enjoy old favorites easily converted from the music for tape players of much earlier technology. Golden Records seems to work even better converting tapes than vinl. Cleaner sound and quieter separation between tunes allows GR to auto separate most tunes without operator monitoring at least for the length of a tape side. Most tapes have sides so unequal in length that GR will drop out of record waiting for audio to resume on players that automatically reverse. This requires operator intervention only about every twenty minutes.

I have noticed that while playing solitaire and MP3s through media player, that audio from solitaire comes thru with music. If program you wish to multitask with generates no audio or if that audio would interact with the microphone or line input channel would be a great experiment for you to perform and let the rest of us know if it works.

A way to tell in advance of conditions under which auto-split won't work. When you place your record on the turntable count the number of separated "cuts" and compare this to the number of tunes listed on the record jacket (or record label). If they don't match, you may find that the record maker has combined related tunes into a single cut. An example is a listing: A James Bond Suite: James Bond Theme from "Dr. No" From Russia With Love Goldfinger Counting the cut separations, It came clear that the "Suite" of three songs was all contained in one cut. I could then label the resulting file as "James Bond Movie Themes", however if I want the songs separated by individual title auto-split should be turned off prior to the recording session, and the three songs manually split into separate files. Counting the "cuts" allows you to pre-plan your recording session strategy and avoid wasting the time you might otherwise spend in post-session editing.

When low recorded volume levels interfere with auto-file separation, rather than re-set the background noise level, simply uncheck the auto separation box and separate manually. I keep learnin'.

Practical thoughts on using Golden Records: Like many who subscribe to this forum, I am a new user. In the course of four days, I have encountered most of the problems talked about here and solved most of them, and offer pointers and practical concepts that were omitted from the documentation. One of the big considerations is whether to record in mp3 or wav. Mp3 allows the tag information (album, artist, etc.) to be output as part of the file. Editing file names, changing them from untitled # to a meaningful name, works both in wave and mp3; but only mp3 keeps you from the drudgery of rewriting this information in media player's database or creating disk labels. Wav format and its output to disk as a .cda file excels in quality of sound over mp3 (a highly compressed file). The casual listener will probably be happy with mp3, but audiophyles,musicians and critics will demand better quality. About 24 (more or less) cda files will fit on a CD. This is plenty to keep track of and enter label data for at one sitting. About 200 or more mp3 songs will fit on a CD which is more than practical to manage. I strive only to convert part of an extensive instrumental library to digital format for inclusion as background music for slide shows. If the same music albums have been re-mastered to disk and you count your time as minimum wage, it is probably cheaper to re-purchase the tunes than convert them. In playing an album listed in an internet database, data is automatically downloaded and you are saved from manually entering song titles, album and artist data into media player. One important item omitted from GR documentation is how to transfer converted files from GR to a computer folder without the need for first writing to disk. The second omission is how to clear files out and start anew. Here's the solution. The command bar in the interface window has "View" First click on this then click on "View Recordings Folder". You may treat the window that appears as any other file folder. Cut and paste to another computer location, copy to another location and delete unwanted files from a previous disk write. I sweated blood writing to disk and back to the hard drive until I found this simple solution. By far the greatest problem I had, and from reading this forum, other people have is recording six or seven tunes and ending up with twenty files. This occurs when very soft passages at or very near the background noise level cause the program to drop out of recording, begin, and drop out again. An occasional short drop out can be repaired by highligting two or three files and joining them with "Control-J" This creates a new file. Source files are left highlighted and can be safely deleted with "Control-Delete", leaving only the joined file in the list of files. Repeated drop outs will effect the overall content length of a passage. When encountering this type of music it is easiest to start over. In the recording menu, click on the toolbox icon, the click on the "current noise floor" On the screen that appears check the "manual setting" box and adjust noise floor to -50db. Restart the recording while carefully monitoring the sound, and click on the "split" button during the silence between songs. It ain't automation, but it's the quickest route to a good transfer. Simularly, when record makers were faced with too much music for a side, they sometimes shorten the silent spaces between cuts resulting in a dropout too short to be detected by GR and causes two songs to be recorded in the same file. If the record side had six songs and you end up with five files, you will know this happened. The solution is to play the file. In the play window, click the pause button when you recognize the space between the end of one song and the start of the next. Click the "add a cursor point" button and then click "split a file at cursor point". By and large, GR does a competent job of automatically separating songs when amplitudes are well above noise threshold levels as found in the bulk of popular music, but for pesky symphonic passages with great dynamic range the solutions above will save much teeth gnashing. Occasionaly, individual selections on a platter, will exceed the amplitude first set by so much as to endanger clipping, or conversely diminished input amplitude. Here's how to set input sound levels on the fly: In the lower right corner of the computer screen (not program screen) there's a speaker icon. Right click on this, then left click on "recording devices". There will be a green checkmark on the input device you are using. Left click on this choice, then click on "properties". Choose the "levels" tab and adjust the device volume up or down as needed. (small changes, please) Click OK and continue recording without interruption.