Is there a good free program that edits mp3s?

[nukesgoboom]

of all the forums that i frequent i decided this would be the place to ask.

i need a good free program that can trim and clip mp3 files, and if it could record sound with the 'what you hear' option that would be awesome.

i have an audigy 2 zs, and i am extremely unhappy with the creative wave studio that came with it. my friend was going to be on the radio at a local unveristy, so i set the wavestudio to record on the 'what you hear' option, and then i left for about an hour and a half. when i came back. it was still recording, so i stopped it, then i attempted to encode it to mp3 format. it was going fine and then it crashed at about 50%, im so fucking pissed. so anyway, please link me to a better mp3 editing program.

[DuaneJeffers]

Try Audacity ... http://audacity.sf.net

Just a suggestion.

-DJ

[gaekwad2]

To edit mp3s you should use mp3DirectCut (http://www.mpesch3.de/), it can cut them without having to decode and reencode which would hurt sound quality.

To record, maybe edit the recordings, and export to mp3 (needs lame_enc.dll, but you can use the one in the winamp plugins directory): Audacity (http://audacity.sourceforge.net/).

Both are free.

http://img168.exs.cx/img168/3954/snail8hz.png

[nukesgoboom]

thank you guys for replying! audacity and mp3cut work GREAT. i have a question about audacity though.

mp3directcut does not decompress a recordng to pcm format before encoding to mp3. my question is, does audacity compress files to pcm format before it encodes to mp3? or does it work just like mp3directcut?

thanks for your time!

[c2R]

Audacity expands the mp3 into raw format for editing, and upon save, recompresses to mp3. This is bad, but of course some editing can't be done to a compressed file directly, leaving you in those instances with no other choice

[nukesgoboom]

i see, thanks for the answer. so for the best quality, i should record using audacity, then edit with mp3directcut? or just record AND edit with mp3directcut, with no need for audacity? give me some advice.

[rockouthippie]

Record with audacity, edit with audacity and then encode to mp3 with audacity.

Audacity records in PCM, which is lossless.

For CD quality set audacity to 44100 hz sample rate 16 bit signed stereo.

That also makes WAV files that are burnable directly to CD without re-encoding.

[Michgelsen]

Originally posted by gaekwad2
needs lame_enc.dll, but you can use the one in the winamp plugins directory


Isn't it locked or something like that to prevent you from using it outside Winamp?

[gaekwad2]

No, it's the same standard dll you can get from Rarewares.