Ham Radio Deluxe has a built-in audio grabber and audio playback. This feature requires a connection from your radio the your sound card in your computer or an external sound card interface.
Audio Grabber
The audio grabber stores incoming audio in MP3 files using the MP3 tags to store information about the radio settings (or any other information you feel to be important).
An alternative to MP3 would be Windows Media format (WMA) but the programming of WMA files is rather complex.
To display the audio grabber select Audio Grabber from the Tools menu. By default the Audio Grabber is docked at the bottom of your Ham Radio Deluxe Screen. By grabbing the top bar o the Audio Grabber you can un-dock it and make it a separate window. To re-dock the wind grab the top bar of the Audio Grabber and start moving it into your Ham Radio Deluxe window. You will see arrows at the four edges plus four arrows in the middle of the screen. Move the Audio Grabber over the desired arrow and it will dock in that location.
Record
Here you have the standard recording buttons. From left to right:
- Record,
- Stop,
- Reset current recording,
- Restart (close current file first),
- Browse for MP3 files.
You also set a file limit – a downside of MP3 is that the tags are written at the end of the file when it is closed, so to avoid losing information in the event of an unexpected event it is best to use more, smaller files.
Folder
Here you select the folder where the MP3 files are stored.
Quality
Here you select the bandwidth and quality. Modern computers have more than enough CPU power to support a very high quality. A bandwidth of 4.5 kHz is usually acceptable unless you are recording a WFM broadcast.
Soundcard
Select the soundcard that you are recording from.
Tags
Here you see the values stored in the MP3 tags. To change the values just add the new text and then press Apply.
Audio Browser
Use the audio browser to playback MP3 files. To open the Audio Browser, select Audio Browser from the Tools menu. You can also start the Audio Browser by clicking on Browser in the Folder tab within Audio Grabber.
Peter PH1PH came across IrfanView – an excellent freeware utility.
MP3 Player Options
Player
Select MP3 player – a basic MP3 player is built into Ham Radio Deluxe, however you can select an alternate player such as the excellent Windows Media Player. Press Default to select the default player.
Folder
Select the folder to browse
Select default folder
Refresh the current folder
Audio File
Select a file to play from the list at the bottom of the window.
Play currently selected file
Pause
Start again
Stop
From
Start at beginning of file
Set From at the current position
To
To end of file
Set To at the current position
Use the From and To slider positions to select the part of the file to repeated over and over and over again. This is useful for determining exactly what the station was sending.
Other Options
The other options are:
- Copy – copy the selected files to another folder.
- Delete – delete the selected files.
- Move – move the selected files to another folder.
- Rename – rename the selected file.
- Artist / Album / Title / Description – change the MP3 tags.