CDM Asks: Recording Any App (Windows and Mac)?
You the readers remain my best resource, so here goes:
What are your favorite tools for recording audio from applications that don’t have a recording/render-to-disk facility?
I’ve been stunned when I’ve seen Windows users suggest that you wire up a recorder, bounce out through the analog outs on the computer, and then re-record. Nonsense! On the Mac, we have four great options:
Much of this trickery is possible thanks to the Mac’s Core Audio — since all audio runs through Core Audio, recording is simple. But I know there are similar, if slightly less impressive, hooks on Windows. So why can’t I figure out a good way to record audio from a Windows app?
Suggestions? Which apps do you use? (My current setup is Audio Hijack + Soundflower on the Mac)
17 Comments
Leave a CommentGuest
FREE: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/
April 19, 2005 @ 3:36 pm
Indicator
I rarely have the need – but there have been a few instances where I wanted to grab an iTunes radio stream, or better yet – grab the audio from some old NES and Genesis titles playing back through Audio Overload (www.bannister.org). In those cases, Audio Hijack has been well worth the $$$ spent. I registered it before Soundflower was available, so I’ve not felt the need to check out other options.
April 19, 2005 @ 3:38 pm
admin
Audacity records, yes, but you have to get audio TO it from another app — meaning you need another tool on PC, as far as I know!
It’s worth having both Soundflower and Audio Hijack on the Mac, because they do different things: Soundflower lets you re-route audio, which Audio Hijack can’t do, but it’s limited in that your audio app has to be able to choose audio drivers. Audio Hijack is better for one-off recording in those situations. (and yes, I’ll need it for some emulated LSDJ Gameboy action, too!)
So back to how to get this to work on PC . . . come on, PC users. Email me and I’ll give you my private IM; we can get to the bottom of this! (Will report all results here.)
Peter
April 19, 2005 @ 3:40 pm
Guest
This will do the trick, but it isn’t cheap:
http://spider.nrcde.ru/music/software/eng/vac.html
I think there’s free solution somewhere, but can’t remember what it’s called.
April 19, 2005 @ 3:43 pm
admin
There’s a bunch of stuff on Tucows, all of which seems near-identical. I may just try a couple of trial versions. But I really do welcome tips — something that record from any internal (software) source like Internet radio, game emulators, things that don’t normally record.
April 19, 2005 @ 3:52 pm
Guest
Total Recorder is finicky but excellent when working. Or, get a souncard such as a waveterminal or emu with virtual routing between apps at driver level.
April 19, 2005 @ 5:06 pm
Guest
I use audacity all the time to record streams from the BBC. I just set the source to the wav out mix and it works nicely, might not be the nicest or cleanest source, but its good enough for my ipod listening…
April 19, 2005 @ 5:15 pm
Guest
In the configuration of the Creative Soundblaster Live card (old, I know) for the input device there is a choice ‘what you hear’ and you use that as the input, then any recorder (even the windows recorder program) will work.
April 19, 2005 @ 7:51 pm
Guest
http://www.ntonyx.com/vac.htm
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Virtual Audio Cable is a Windows multimedia driver allowing you to transfer audio (wave) streams from one application to another. It creates a pair of Wave In/Out devices for each cable. Any application can send audio stream to Out device, and any other application can receive this stream from In device. All transfers are made digitally, providing NO sound quality loss. VAC is a “wave-version” of the “MIDI loopback cable” like MultiMid or Hubi’s Loopback drivers.
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I think this should cover what you’re looking for.
April 19, 2005 @ 7:59 pm
Guest
All Sound Recorder supposedly works by taking sound off the sound card.
I didn’t get it to record anything but you may have better luck.
The manual is not instructive except when it come to the instructions for paying and registering the program.
I hope that a reader can come up with a solution because the I work in a court and our transcript is in a proprietary format only playable by the companies’ Windows only sound program. I would like to get a file which is not that locked down.
April 19, 2005 @ 8:14 pm
Guest
In Audacity you can select the source of the audio for recording, and the choices are (using v1.2.3) “Wave Out Mix”, “Mono Out”, “Phone”, “Line In”, Microphone”, “CD Player”. All of these are audio streams managed by Windows — no need to have audio specially routed to Audacity by some other app. Audacity also lets you set the recording quality, and then export to .wav, .mp3, or .ogg.
April 20, 2005 @ 8:21 am
Guest
Personally, I use the built in sound manager for my ESI card to route audio from one source to another. That seems to be the way to go on a PC, using a sound card’s built in routing if it has any. On a related note, I think steinberg announced that ASIO 2.1 would have some inter-program routing capabilities. Hopefully many more programs will begin to offer ASIO driver support because of this.
ATA
April 20, 2005 @ 12:04 pm
Guest
On the PC, I use Nero Soundtrax to record from any app. As long as it’s going through the sound card, I can record it.
Link: http://ww2.nero.com/us/Nero_SoundTrax.html
I got this app in the Nero Ultra Edition package, which includes all their software goodies.
Curious to see what others use.
cmreiter80@kc.rr.com
April 20, 2005 @ 12:18 pm
Guest
I rarely record like this but when I do, I use Total Recorder. I’ve been using it for a few years, it did exactly what I needed at the time so I never bothered looking into alternatives.
April 22, 2005 @ 10:48 pm
Guest
Can’t seem to find “record what you hear” in my version of Nero. Where is it located ?
April 25, 2005 @ 12:18 pm
Guest
is there anything like audio hijack for PC’s?
November 14, 2005 @ 9:19 pm
Guest
try this:
http://www.freecorder.com/freecorder3/index.php?src=www.podcastalley.com
January 14, 2008 @ 5:49 am
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