Before using Ashampoo AudioCD MP3 Studio 2000 for the first time you should configure the program for your computer system and preferences. Select Settings in the Options Menu.
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Special Upgrade Offer to MusicCity.com Users! As a registered user of this full OEM version you are also entitled to a special, low-price upgrade to our brand-new all-in-one audio MP3 package with MP3 Encoder: Ashampoo MP3 Studio Deluxe.
You can mix WAV, compressed WAV and MP3 files in your playlists and write them all directly to the same audio CD. Just select the Add tool and add files from any location on your computer.
You can reduce the hard disk space for WAV files by 75% by storing WAV files in the 1:4 compressed format. Just select WAV 1:4 in the File Type field in the Read CD dialog.
You can normalize your tracks in real time while you are writing them to the CD. This adjusts the volumes of the individual tracks to the optimum maximum level, so that they all sound equally loud on the finished CD. Just activate the Normalize option in the Write CD dialog box.
You can move tracks up and down in the project list by pressing ALT and the Up/Down arrow keys.
Press INS (Insert) to quickly insert tracks in your projects.
You can select a number of commonly-used functions by pressing the right mouse button in the project track list.
Some older CD drives deliver better audio quality when you extract tracks from music CDs at single speed. If your extracted tracks don't sound as good as you expect try selecting Single-speed Read in the Read CD dialog.
Audio CD recording places quite a heavy load on your computer's resources. To prevent buffer underruns it's advisable not to use any other programs while you are recording audio CDs.
Some older recorders deliver better audio quality when you record CDs at single speed (1X). If your CDs don't sound as good as you expect try setting Write Speed to 1X in the Write CD dialog.
To stop the Windows CD player from activating automatically just press and hold down the SHIFT key when you insert an audio CD. This trick doesn't work in Windows 2000, however.
Ashampoo AudioCD MP3 Studio 2000 includes full Drag and Drop support. You can add tracks to your projects by dragging them into your playlist from the Windows Explorer.
If you get an error message when you try to access the CDDBâ–“ database trying closing and reopening the Read CD or Copy CD dialog or exiting and restarting the program. On some computer systems you may also have to go online manually before accessing the CDDBâ–“ database.
Use Ashampoo AudioCD MP3 Studio 2000 as a computer audio jukebox! There's no need to record playlists to CDs -- you can store them on your hard disk and play them while you work using the player controls.
You don't have to move your music tracks to add them to your playlist. Individual files on the list can be in any location accessible to the program, even on network drives.
New drivers and program updates are available from our website at http://www.ashampoo.com/support/
The processor load during CD recording also depends on your CD recorder. Some recorders place a much heavier load on the system than others.
The temporary files created when you copy audio CDs are not deleted automatically. If you don't want to keep them to make more copies of the CD you should delete them with the Windows Explorer after making your copy.
The best balance of file size and quality for MP3 tracks is generally 128Kbit/s. With this setting you won't hear much difference between the original CD tracks and the MP3 files on most systems. This is also the most popular format for distributing music files via the Internet.
Some older recorders and CD drives may have trouble with the new high-capacity 700MB/80 minutes CD media because of the closer spacing of the data tracks. This is a hardware problem, not a bug in Ashampoo AudioCD MP3 Studio 2000!
You can display the Track Properties dialog at any time by double-clicking on the track entry in the playlist.
Ashampoo AudioCD MP3 Studio 2000 includes powerful new algorithms for handling corrupt MP3 files. However, in badly-corrupted files you may experience skips and blank passages in sections where the original data could not be recovered.
Always activate DMA mode for IDE/ATAPI CD recorders and CD-ROM drives. This can radically reduce CPU load and it also significantly speeds up MP3 encoding performance. See the Installation topic in the Introduction section of the online help for details on how to activate DMA mode.
To adjust the column width for long track and file names just double-click on the divider to the right of the column heading. For example, double-clicking on the divider to the right of the Title column adjusts the Title column width. You can also adjust the column widths by dragging the dividers.
Try right-clicking in the playlist window - this displays a pop-up menu with a number of frequently-used functions for easy access.
Remember that you can only record COMPLETE audio CDs - because of the structure of audio CDs you can't add tracks later in subsequent sessions. Always make sure that your playlist includes all the tracks you want to record before you select the Write CD function!
Remember that it's not usually possible to use the entire theoretical capacity of CDs (74 minutes for 650MB mediums and 80 minutes for 700MB mediums). This is because a certain amount of space is needed for "finalizing" the CD to make it readable. It's generally a good idea to leave a minute or so free if possible.
