ART V2 USB Phono Plus DJ Preamp Review

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(More customer reviews)I've been monkeying with the Artcessories USB Phono Plus for about 10 days now. I bought it for the primary purpose of recording some LP records to my laptop. My ultimate goal was to make CDs and decent MP3s from my old vinyl. In combo with Audacity (free audio editing tool) and my Project turntable, this ARTcessories product has worked extremely well in every respect. I have not yet found a single shortcoming with this solid and portable little box.
A few things you should know:
1. This is a stand-alone phono pre-amp. It will RIAA adjust for phono before sending audio to your computer via USB. THIS IS GREAT FOR LAPTOPS -most laptops have only a mono microphone in miniplug that's pretty much good for nothing!
2. You could use this box as nothing more than a phono pre-amp. It has RCA inputs for phono AND a ground screw. Cool, huh? At $100 it would be a good deal if it did nothing more than that. I loop from the Phono Plus back into a Marantz receiver and then listen through some fairly decent Wharfedale speakers. I'd say that sound quality is every bit as good as the phono stage built into my Marantz.
3. This device allows you to monitor the phono input (or other input) either by means of a stereo miniplug connection or by way of a pair (L and R) of RCA outs. You could hook up typical PC speakers or subwoofer sytems to this box if you don't want to loop out to a stereo amp. You can also listen to the Phono Plus with headphones. The Phono Plus has a gain knob to ontrol output level. This is critical for headphone listening as well as for making good captures in Audacity.
4. This device will take input from line level RCA, digital toslink, digital coax, as well as from phono sources. Crazy, huh? I plan on using this box to record some local radio and TV audio by connecting it to either my tuner or by putting it where a cassette recorder would normally fit in a tape loop.
All in all, what a great toy! There is so much you can do with this unit. I've really only scratched the surface (no vinyl pun intended). I've been playing with this thing and talking about results and LP recording experiments at shiromaguro.com. See my work there. With a clean LP, I have found that recordings through the Phono Plus captured by Audacity can be ripped to CD or MP3 with no editing at all(except for maybe chopping big grabs into tracks). Sound qulaity of the product WAV or MP3 files is great.
Installation and setup are really non-issues here. Plug it in and connect all the cables. It just works.
Bottom line: if you want to grab vinyl to your PC laptop or to a PC that lacks a good sound card (one with stereo inputs) this is a great way to go. In a few weeks of shopping for my solution, I found nothing else comparable.
Why not 5 stars? My mistake. I should have given this unit 5 stars. Then again, I personally never read 5-star reviews....
Ultimately, I hope that this product will make it easy for lots of people to make some cool and unique MP3s, not just the usual CD rip stuff. Seriously, this product could single-handedly be responsible for the digitization of piles of old analog material that would otherwise be left to fade from existence. Personally I have made it a point to find out which of my old records never made it to CD --those are the ones that get digitized first!
Bravo to ART for a great product.

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The ART USBPHONOPLUS V2 is a long awaited solution to the problem of expensive USB interfaces that don't have phono preamps. The PhonoPLUS V2 is designed with DJs for DJs.Not only can you use it as a USB audio interface, but it can also be used as a standard low noise phono preamp, converting the low phono level into a line level signal. AmericanMusical.com is an authorized dealer of ART products.

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Behringer UFO202 Audio Interface Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)Over last few years we replaced all desktops in the house by laptops. One day I decided to convert an old audio cassette into MP3 like I used to do on my desktop. I realized that it was not going to be possible as the 'line-in' input which was available on desktop was missing in all the three laptops in the house. After some futile tries of trying to record through mic-in, I started researching. I somehow stumbled upon this device and decided to give it a try. All I can say is this is EXACTLY what I was looking for. Here is what you need to do if you wish to convert audio cassette into MP3 -
You need -
1. Audio cable with one end 3.5 mm jack and other end with red & white L-R audio. You may have a spare A/V cable which comes with camera or dvd players etc. (W R and Yellow ends, you do not need to plug the Y end as it is for video)
(With 'line-in' on desktop, you simply needed an audio cable with 3.5 mm on both sides)
2. Boom box or tape deck (I used boom box)
3. U-Phono202 device
Plug the 3.5mm end of the cable in 'headphone out' of the boom box. Plug the L-R inputs in the L-R inputs of the U-Phono202 and plug it into a USB port of the laptop. Play the audio cassette. You cannot hear the sound through laptop speakers, you have to plug in the headphones in 'headphone out' of the U-Phno202 in order to hear the cassette playing.
If you are using Vista, right click on the speaker icon in the bottom tray and select 'recording devices', change the recording device to the '2USB Audio Codec' (at least that's how it shows up on mine).
I haven't yet used the packaged software. I useed Audacity instead. Open (or download if you have not) Audacity. Go to 'project', select 'new stereo track' and hit record. Whatever is playing on your boombox is now being recorded on your laptop. Hit stop when your recording is done. Export the project as 'Mp3', save it in your desired location.
I suggest making some few minute test recordings to make sure your recording sounds fine or you need to reduce/increase recording volume etc.
It worked exactly as above for me and worked perfectly too. The boombox gave a terrible hiss and an extremely annoying constant background noise while playing the cassette, however the U-Phono202 filtered almost 99% of it and the final MP3 sounds extremely clean.
I wrote detailed review as I had all these questions in my mind before I began searching for the right product. Hope this helps in case you are also looking for a solution to convert your cassettes to Mp3s. Thanks for reading.
UPDATE : UPhono202 is working perfectly fine! Just wanted to mention that if your recording appears over loud and there is jarring even after reducing boom box volume and the PC volume very low, here is what you shall do - Keep the boombox and computer volumes at decent levels but reduce the microphone input 'level' - Rightclick on the speaker icon in the tray. highlight the Uphono device. Click on properties. Select 'levels' tab and reduce the level all the way to 5 or 7 and then record your clip.

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High-quality USB Audio Interface with Built-in Phono Preamp and Massive Software Package for Digitalizing Your Tapes and Vinyl Records

Get 56% OFF

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