Speeding Up Podcasts and Audio Books
My killer feature for the iPod is something that probably doesn’t appeal to you. Ok, maybe some of you, but not many. It’s the feature that Apple introduced with the 4G iPods back a couple of years ago. The feature is the ability to speed up (or slow down) audio without changing the pitch (if you are familiar with variable speed tape recorders, you understand that simply speeding up the playback of something tends to also make the speaker sound like a chipmunk).
I have no idea what I would do with this feature, but it just made me want
an iPod even more. Is it available on Shuffles? (I'm thinking no?)
Hey Meredith, my guess is no (at least there's nothing about it on Apple's
site), but the shuffle is not the best choice for listening to spoken word.
Unless you are just listening to one audio book. Otherwise the lack of a
screen makes navigation amongst different tracks pretty painful. If you
are looking for something at a lower price point, you can get plenty of
older iPods on eBay for a cut rate, and of course there are other MP3
players out there that cost less but offer just as many (if not more)
features...
Also take a look at Transcribe! from http://www.seventhstring.com ... for
the same price it's a much cooler program than ASD in terms of flexibility,
especially if you want to do more with it than just speed up sound files
(and it costs the same). To my ear it also does a better job than ASD of
speeding up or slowing down files if that IS what you want it to do and
comes in Mac and Windows versions. It has a free demo available, so at
least compare the two before deciding.
Craig, thanks for the heads up. I guess this is a better solution at least
for those with Macs or running Linux - well, maybe the only solution?
Audacity is great for this, at an unbeatable price ($0).
http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ (though SourceForge seems to be down at
time of posting)
The ability to slow down your audiobook or podcast can be useful for those
listening to something in a language in which they aren't fluent. When you
can only speak a little of a language, it can be difficult to understand
someone talking fast or even at a normal rate.
Matt, thanks. I knew about Audacity but not that it had this feature. I
downloaded the beta and it seems to work well. The main problem is that I
can't figure out how to do batches , if this is even possible. I'm not
that familiar with the program, but if there is a way to do this, it's not
obvious and streightforward, not has the documentation been updated to
include such new functionality. The other "problem" I found was that it
takes a while to load each audio file. Nothing huge, maybe 30 second for a
30-minute show. But this does add to the time needed to convert a file,
and if you are doing many, it can add up. On the other hand, you can't
beat the price! :)
1 program - Cool edit Pro.
Levi, you're right about Transcribe! not offering batch or MP3 export, but
the speed IS variable from 5% to 200% in 1% increments.
Sox (Sound Exchange) is another great program for modifying digital audio.
It comes bundled with most Linux distributions. It has many filters
including speed up or slow down.
In audible, you can do a bath convert if you import multiple files into a
project and the select all and then do the conversion.
I would like to speed up a song on a CD, I've imported it on i-tunes but
there's no features for doing this. any tips?
Kai, as I mentioned in this article, there are various programs that will
let you speed up mp3 files, including Audacity, which is free. You could
try one of these which would let you speed it up to the exact speed you
want.
I use a program called music morpher made by audio4fun. It batch converts
very simply and effectively. I regularly listen to books and lectures at
250% speed. When I'm reviewing something I've already heard, I get up to
350%. Though I don't hear every word at that speed I get every concept. I
swear by speed listening. It's the first method I've found for really
expanding bandwidth. My podcast is available in both normal and 150% speed
on my site. I'm still waiting for a site called podfast.com that speeds up
all of your podcasts for you.
hmm.
i want to speed up a song kind of like a mix.
any way i can do tht for free?
Kaitlyn, you can use any of the programs I list for doing the same thing
with music. Audacity is the main one that is free.
yes.. i agreed,definitely we save lot of time when we speedingup podcasting
audio books,audio book time increases then listener lose his
concentration.audible is a great site for audio books.
www.karaditales.com
this is called speed listening. the BOT(books on tape) available every
where can be listened to on an old fashioned player|recorder which can
yield play rates of 33% or greater in some cases, but one must adapt your
ears for the whiny sound. these recorders almost all have built in
speakers as well. cost about 25 to 40$. i await an device for easily
converting audio cds to speed listening files.
Sorry Scott, but I don't think I'd want to listen to tapes of books that
sound like chipmunks, besides which those players are not to portable, and
I do a majority of listening while driving or walking...
Does anyone know of any MP3 player for Nokia handphones with this kind of
feature?
Just for completeness, there is an MP3 player that plays back at varying
speeds (1.3x, 1.5x, 0.5x, 0.7x), the RadioYourWay LX. But users have
experienced button failures after a while, so I can't recommend it for
everyone. Also, it costs $200 with 128MB and an SD slot--its
distinguishing capability is timer recording of AM and FM radio, also does
line-in recording:
http://www.pogoelectronics.com/radioyourway.html
One of my usability nightmares switching from Windows Media Player to
iTunes was having to lose the ability to speed up my music. Right now I'm
listening to a book on MP3 at 1.0 speed on my 5.5 G iPod. I know I can
speed MP3s up manually as you said--I've been editing music for years using
GoldWave or Audacity; but with Windows Media Player, it was never
necessary, since there's simply a speed dial. With the iPod/iTunes you
have to get an external program to permanently speed it up, and that's just
rarely worth it as you've noted. The iPod & iTunes need a native speed
dial. Yes, it's financially viable, not just because of audiobook
listeners, but because of the blind--those who listen to books because they
can't see always listen to their books at super speeds, commonly up to 4x
speed! And there are 10M blind people in the US. Speed dials have always
been a common accessibility accomodation which iTunes simply didn't value.
Hi Colin, I may not have mentioned this in my blog entry, but you can use
the iPod's own speed-up feature by simply converting the mp3 to an aac file
in iTunes and then renaming the extension from .m4a to .m4b. So you don't
necessarily need a third-party app. Although you will only be able to
speed it up by 25% and not a customized amount...
My husband would love this. He currently has a 1GB iRiver that speeds
podcasts in mp3 format up to about 40% (not fast enough) and wants a player
with more capacity. He cannot listen to them at normal speed now (picture a
dog with his head hanging out the car window going 100 miles an hour - this
is how the man likes to receive his information). I have scoured the
internet looking for a player for him. This program won't do it (conversion
is too slow). I'll keep my fingers crossed. If someone is working on it,
maybe it means there is a market for it and my husband is not the only
freak who likes to listen this way.
Wow, I haven't been keeping up with all the MP3 players out there but I'm
glad there are ones like the iRiver that speed stuff up like the iPod, and
40% is a lot better than the iPod. Now we just need this to show up in
more players and have a variety of speeds. Why not just let the user
select the exact speed they want at any given moment, just like a volume
dial? You could go from normal to +200% or -200%?