NCH Software RecordPad Sound Recorder

NCH Software RecordPad Sound Recorder This user guide has been created for use with RecordPad Sound Recorder Version 5.xx NCH Software

Technica Support If you have difficuties using RecordPad Sound Recorder pease read the appicabe topic before requesting support. If your probem is not covered in this user guide pease view the up-to-date RecordPad Sound Recorder Onine Technica Support at www.nch.com.au/recordpad/support.htm. If that does not sove your probem, you can contact us using the technica support contacts isted on that page. Software Suggestions If you have any suggestions for improvements to RecordPad Sound Recorder, or suggestions for other reated software that you might need, pease post it on our Suggestions page at www.nch.com.au/suggestions/index.htm. Many of our software projects have been undertaken after suggestions from users ike you. You get a free upgrade if we foow your suggestion.

RecordPad Sound Recorder Contents About RecordPad Professiona Sound Recorder... 2 Recording Contros... 3 Hash Fied Reference... 4 Command Line Options... 5 Keyboard Shortcuts... 8 Options... 9 Register Software... 10 Software License Terms... 11 Genera Find and Pay Recordings... 12 Options Options ~ Record... 15 Options ~ Output... 17 Options ~ Transmit... 18 Options ~ Genera... 20 Options ~ Keys... 21 Screen References Backup Audio... 22 1

About RecordPad Professiona Sound Recorder RecordPad is an advanced sound recording appication. Using the RecordPad Professiona Sound Recorder you can: Record voice messages or announcements. Automaticay use a preseected fie ength, name and voume. Export fies to a oca foder in wav, mp3 and aiff format. Record fies in the background whie running other programs. Contro recording from the command ine. System Requirements Windows 98/Me/2000/XP/Vista/7/8 Pentium 300 or higher CPU 32MB or higher RAM Sound Card 2

Recording Contros Beow are the main function buttons in RecordPad. These buttons are a shown by defaut, but the View menu may be used to hide the buttons you don't want to be shown. Pay (Space bar) Pays the ast recording. Record (F5) Cick this button to start a new recording, or continue a paused recording. Pause (F6) Cick this when you want to pause a recording and continue it ater. To continue recording after pausing the fie, cick the record button again. Restart (Home) Seect this option to restart your current recording. Stop/Save (F7) Cick this to finish and save your current recording in the recordings ist. Options (Ctr+O) Cick this to open the Options window. Recordings (Ctr+L) Deete(Ctr+D) Cick this button to deete the ast recording made. After cicking this, the ast recorded fie wi not appear in the Recordings Window. Buy Onine Cick this to purchase a RecordPad software icense and registration. For more detais, pease refer to Register Software. Hep (F1) To view the hep documentation for RecordPad, cick the Hep menu and seect Hep Contents. 3

Hash Fied Reference The foowing fieds can be used in Fie Name Format. Note that in order for a fienames to be unique, you must incude either %autonumber% or %SS% in your Fie Name Format. %autonumber% - auto increase number %YYYY% - current year %MM% - current month %DD% - current day of the month %HH% - current hour %MIN% - current minute %SS% - current second Note: that the fie name format shoud not contain any other string or characters after %autonumber%. 4

Command Line Options You can easiy contro RecordPad from command ine. The usage of command ine is as beow: recordpad [command] [options] COMMAND: -record [format] [format settings] Start recording. The output fie wi be put in the output foder as set in the current settings. If "prompt for fie name" is enabed, you wi be prompted for a fie name before recording begins; otherwise, a fiename wi be automaticay generated based on the current settings. Format Options: wav: record in wav format mp3: record in mp3 format aif/aiff: record in aiff format Format Settings Options: If you don't specify each of the format settings, RecordPad wi use the current format settings to record the fie. Wav fie: -s <sfreq> -m <nchans> -b <bitrate> where: -s <sfreq>: samping frequency of output fie(hz) -m <nchans>: number of channes -b <bitrate>: set the bitrate in bits Bitrate Encoding (CBR) mp3 fie: -cbr -b <bitrate> [-h] -m <mode> [-p] where: -b <bitrate>: set the bitrate 8/16/24 etc -h: higher quaity, but a itte sower -m <mode>: (s)tereo, (j)oint, (f)orce or (m)ono (defaut j) -p: error protection Bitrate Encoding (VBR) mp3 fie: -vbr -b <minbitrate> -B <maxbitrate> -q <n> -m <mode> [-p] where: -b <minbitrate>: specify minimum aowed bitrate -B <maxbitrate>: specify maximum aowed bitrate -b <minbitrate>: specify minimum aowed bitrate 5

-b <minbitrate>: specify minimum aowed bitrate -q <n>: quaity setting for VBR. defaut n=4, 0 = high quaity, bigger fies. 9 = smaer fies -m <mode>: (s)tereo, (j)oint, (f)orce or (m)ono (defaut j) -p: error protection Aiff fie: -s <sfreq> -m <nchans> where: -s <sfreq>: samping frequency of output fie(hz) -m <nchans>: number of channes -recordfie <fiepath> [format settings] Start recording to a specific fie. Pease refer to the above section on how to set format settings. -pause Pause recording. -stop Stop recording (if recording) or Stop payback (if paying). -pay Payback current recording (must first execute the -stop command). -done Finish recording the current fie. -restart Restart recording. -resume Resume recording after it has been paused. -outdir <dirpath> Set the output foder to which RecordPad exports fies. -exit Exit RecordPad. OPTIONS: -show 6

Show RecordPad when it is running. This is the defaut setting. -hide Hide RecordPad when it is running. -exitifstop Exit RecordPad if recording is stopped. -ms <miiseconds> Save the current recording fie and exit RecordPad automaticay after specified number of miiseconds. 7

Keyboard Shortcuts The foowing ist shows shortcuts for the most common tasks used in RecordPad. Main Window Pay Space Record F5 Pause F6 Restart Home Stop & Mark Done F7 Deete Last Recording Ctr+D Open Recordings Window Ctr+L Access Program Options Ctr+O Open Hep Documentation F1 Exit (Turn Off) RecordPad At+F4 Find & Pay Recordings Pay F9 Edit Audio Ctr+E Save As Ctr+S Send to Emai Now Ctr+N Burn Fies to CD-ROM Ctr+B Compress and Back Up Fies Ctr+G Convert Sound Fie Format Ctr+M Transcribe with Express Scibe Ctr+T Deete Ctr+Deete Seect A Ctr+A Rename F2 Update Now (Rescan for new recordings) F5 Cose Find & Pay Window Esc 8

Options Open the Options Diaog Box by using the menu Fie -> Options. Record Output Transmit Genera Keys 9

Register Software A purchased software icense and registration is required for using RecordPad after the tria period expires. You shoud be abe to test a the features of RecordPad during the tria period. Thereafter, you must purchase a software icense (registration). This is easiest to do onine at www.nch.com.au/recordpad/register Once you have purchased and activated your RecordPad icense, enter the registration code you receive in your emai into the Register RecordPad window, found from the Fie menu of the program. Enter your RecordPad Registration Code exacty as it appears. Pease note, the code is case sensitive - if you enter it incorrecty, the registration code wi not be accepted. We recommend you copy and paste the code into the registration window. If your registration code is not accepted... 1. Check you have entered the registration code exacty as it appears in the emai that was sent to you. 2. If the registration purchased a whie ago for a previous version of the software you must purchase an upgrade at www.nch.com.au/upgrade. For more information, pease visit the ink http://www.nch.com.au/support/reg.htm. 10

Software License Terms 1. The copyrights in this software and any visua or audio work distributed with the software beong to NCH Software and others isted in the about box. A rights are reserved. Instaation of this software and any software bunded with or instaed-on-demand from this software is icensed ony in accordance with these terms. 2. By instaing, using or distributing this software you, on your own behaf and on behaf of your empoyer or principa, agree to be bound by these terms. If you do not agree to any of these terms, you may not use, copy, transmit, distribute, nor insta this software - return it to the pace of purchase within 14 days to receive a fu refund. 3. This software, and a accompanying fies, data and materias, are distributed "as is" and with no warranties of any kind, whether express or impied except as required by aw. If you intend to rey on this software for critica purposes you must test it fuy prior to using it, insta redundant systems and assume any risk. 4. We wi not be iabe for any oss arising out of the use of this software incuding, but not imited to, any specia, incidenta or consequentia oss. Your entire remedy against us for a caims is imited to receiving a fu refund for the amount you paid for the software. 5. You may not use this software in any circumstances where there is any risk that faiure of this software might resut in a physica injury or oss of ife. You agree to indemnify us from any caims reating to such unauthorized use. 6. You may copy or distribute the instaation fie of this software in its compete unatered form but you may not, under any circumstances, distribute any software registration code for any of our programs without written permission. In the event that you do distribute a software registration code, you wi be iabe to pay the fu purchase price for each ocation where the unauthorized use occurs. 7. Use of statistics coected by the software is subject to the NCH Software Privacy Statement which aows automatic anonymized coection of usage statistics in imited circumstances. 8. The contract arising out of this agreement is governed by the aws and courts of the Austraian Capita Territory. 11

Genera - Find and Pay Recordings Find and Pay Recordings Open the Find and Pay Recordings diaog box from the Find & Pay menu item, or pressing the Find & Pay Toobar button. A recordings in the specified recording foder wi be isted. This Program ists the coumns associated with each recording fie. Paying a Recording To pay a recording seect it and press F9. When the Pay Contro Box opens you can move back and forward within the recording using the eft and right arrow keys. To pause payback press the spacebar. To stop and go to the beginning press Esc. To move to the beginning press Home. To move to the end press End. To go back to the ist of recordings press Enter. Edit Audio This wi open the seected recording in Wavepad: A fu featured professiona sound editor for Windows. When editing audio fies you can cut, copy and paste parts of recordings and, if required, add effects ike echo, ampification and noise reduction. WavePad works as a wav editor or mp3 editor but it aso supports a number of other fie formats incuding vox, gsm, rea audio, au, aif, fac, ogg and more. The program is designed to be a very easy and intuitive to use for audio editing. Within minutes you wi be abe to open or record a fie and edit it. But if you take time to expore the other features you wi find many powerfu toos for editing audio designed with the professiona sound engineer in mind. Wavepad comes in two versions a free basic version and a masters edition. Downoading this software wi provide you with a free tria version. Save As This wi save the seected recording to a different position in a oca or networked foder. To save the recorded fie on your hard drive, seect the recording and cick the "Save" button. Enter the fie name and cick OK. Send to Emai Now The seected fie wi be attached to a defaut emai and sent to the address you specify. Burn to CD-ROM The seected fies wi be imported into Express Burn. Express Burn is aso the fastest CD/DVD writing program in the word using proprietary optimizing systems. It wi aso create an index fie which it wi begin burning immediatey to a data CD. 12

Compress and Backup Are your fie sizes getting too arge, or do you wish to ensure you have a backup of your audio? Compress and Backup wi provide you the choice of burning straight to a CD after compression or to a Backup Foder. It can compress in 3 different formats. The choice of compression depends on the particuar audio settings that determined the quaity of the sound fie that was recorded. Pease test that the compression type is sufficient in size and quaity of audio for a sampe fie. Compressing and backing up does not effect your origina audio recording. Convert Sound Fie Converts the audio fie(s) to a different format using Switch. Switch audio fie converter is very easy to use. With the seected fies added into Switch, seect the format you want to use, and then cick the convert button. Switch supports converting to wav (PCM, ADPCM+, alaw+, ulaw+, and others), mp3, au, aif/aiff, gsm, vox, raw, ogg, fac,.rss,.amr+ and more. Transcribe Aow simpe and easy dictation of fies using Express Scribe. This computer transcriber appication features variabe speed wave payback, foot peda operation, fie management and more. This program is free. Deeting a Recording To deete recordings, seect them and cick on the Deete button. You can seect more than one recording by hoding down the Shift key whie seecting. Foder Tab By defaut, Find and Pay ists ony recordings in the oca record foder. You can change the defaut foder for hoding your audio fies or you can change the aternative foder to suit your needs. If you want to pay fies over your oca area network, insta this program on the other computer and point it to the foder that the Find and Pay Window is referencing. View Fiter Tab The View Fiter Tab aows searching and fitering on what is dispayed in the ist view. You can search or fiter what is shown by the text in each coumn, by the duration of the audio or by the date of the recording. Speech Search Tab 13

On the 'Speech Search' tab you can choose to search for keywords in the recordings. You must seect an instaed Speech Recognition engine (eg. Dragon Naturay Speaking, IBM Via Voice). Microsoft suppies a free 'Speech Command and Contro' engine (fiename actcnc.exe) and this can be ocated using an internet search engine. Pease note any speech engine used must support Context Free Grammars. You can aso optionay seect a trained speaker for the engine. If mutipe times are found on your speech search cicking on the fie wi provide a ist of the "key found at" times. Speech searching paces a bookmark to hod the pace in the audio when mutipe times are found so you can jump to the keyword. Pay Options Tab Set the sound device you use to pay your audio fie, aso s et the Variabe Sow and Fast Speeds that you can use the vary the speed of payback. Cicking 'Update Now (Rescan for new recordings)' wi add or remove any recordings that have been made or deeted since the ast update. 14

Options - Options ~ Record Recording Record Device If you have more than one sound card instaed, use this ist to seect the card you want to use for recording. Input Channe Use this pu down ist to seect the input channe for recording. The recommended setting is "Microphone" or "Mic-In". If you have probems using the mic-in setting, seect Windows Record Mixer and open the Windows Record Mixer to manuay adjust settings. Record Voume Adjust the recording voume using this fader. When the eve is set correcty, the eve dispay on the Main Window wi just touch into the red when recording. If you have seected Windows Record Mixer, you can cick on the button "Open Windows Record Mixer" for manua mixer settings. Voice Activate Leve This contros voice activated recording. The defaut settings is -18dB. If recording starts too eary, increase the setting to up to -10dB to reduce sensitivity. If recording does not start or words are chopped off at the end, reduce the eve to -20dB to increase sensitivity. A sider wi appear on the main window when this feature is enabed. With this contro you can adjust the eve before you begin recording, and visuaize when then audio being recorded wi trigger voice activate. You can aso enabe and disabe this feature by right-cicking on the voume meter on the main window. Note: You shoud adjust the Record Voume Leve first. Voice Activate probems are often due to incorrect record eve settings. Untick this option if you don't want to use voice activate recording. Pause RecordPad after Second(s) When Voice Activate Leve is enabed, you can specify how many seconds to wait before RecordPad comes into waiting status. Create New Fie when Timeout occurs When RecordPad is paused when the above time is reached, if this option is checked, the current fie wi be saved and a new fie wi be started. Maximum Recording Time Enabe Checking Enabe this option if you want to pace a imit on the ength a recording can reach. 15

You can seect the maximum ength in the Window to the right. Time Reached. Seect "stop recording" to just cose and save your recording when the maximum recording time has been reached. Seect "create new recording and continue" to generate a new recording when the first recording has finished. Launch recordings window when you stop recording Check this box to dispay the Find and Pay Recordings diaog every time you stop recording, where a recordings are isted and more options for working with the fie are dispayed. See the Find and Pay Recordings topic for more information on the diaog. 16

Options - Options ~ Output Output Format Use the Output Format menu to seect the fie format you want to save a record in (wav, mp3 or aif). You can adjust the compression eve or bitrate for the fie by cicking the "format settings" button. Note that if you are unfamiiar with different wav and mp3 formats you may want to eave RecordPad on the defaut fie format settings. RecordPad aways record AIFF fies in 44100 Hz sampe rate and stereo mode. You can then use Switch Audio Converter (which can be downoaded from nch.com.au/switch) to convert to the desired format settings you want. Destination Foder This option ets you seect the foder to which RecordPad exports fies. To use this option, either type in the foder where you want to save RecordPad fies, or use the browse button on the right to ocate the foder. Output Fie Name Seect the "Prompt for fie name before starting recording" option if you want to seect a different name for each fie recorded. Cick "View Sampe" to view a sampe fie name using current settings. Seect the "use this fie name format" when you want to define the fie name before you start recording. See the Hash Fied Reference section for more information on automatic fie names. Cick "Reset Auto Number to 0" to reset auto number to 0. 17

Options - Options ~ Transmit Send recordings by emai If this option is seected, RecordPad wi send a recordings to the specified emai address as an attachment to an emai. This can be usefu if you want to isten to recordings remotey. By defaut RecordPad uses MAPI to send emais using your MAPI emai software (e.g., Outook, Eudora, etc.). Check that your version of emai software supports MAPI and set it to be the defaut MAPI cient. If you have probems using MAPI, RecordPad can aso send emais directy using your ISP's SMTP server. Open "Emai Send Settings" and seect the "Use SMTP to send emai directy to server" option and enter the name of your ISP's SMTP server (e.g., smtp.yourisp.com). For more information, pease refer to Probems sending Emais using MAPI and SMTP. Upoad recordings via internet using FTP If you have a FTP server or a website (with FTP access), seect this option to make RecordPad upoad a recordings to your server. This can be usefu for backup purposes or to make the recordings avaiabe on the internet (either pubic or private depending on your FTP server setup). You must enter the ftp server (e.g., ftp.yourdomain.com), your username, password and the exact fu foder into which you want the fies upoaded (e.g., /home/yoursite/www/recordings). If you have any probems with the FTP setup, we strongy recommend you attempt to ogin manuay with FTP software (e.g., WS_FTP, CuteFTP) to doube check you have the correct fu path to the upoad foder. For more information, pease refer to Probems when connecting to an FTP server. Mirror a recordings to this foder If you have a backup drive or want to backup a recordings over the network, you can use this option. Note that recordings are ony transferred after recording and compression is compete. Run externa.exe This is an advanced option to aow IT professionas add other transmit features to RecordPad. For exampe to use a proprietary codec or to insert the fie in a database. If this option is ticked, after RecordPad has competed recording the fie, it wi run the specified.exe program. The program is usuay a command-ine program. The name of the fie can be sent as an argument using %s which RecordPad repaces with the fu path to the fie. Remember to incude the fu path to your.exe (encose it in "") and to encose the %s in inverted commas too. An exampe might be "C:\Program Fies\MyProgram\myexe" -myoptions "%s". Prompting 18

In the Prompting section, you can seect whether recordings are automaticay sent upon competion, or if you woud ike RecordPad to verify that you woud ike to send the recording first. Other Do not send when ength is equa to or ess than (seconds) To prevent sending short recordings that are unusabe, enter a cutoff ength in seconds into the edit box. 19

Options - Options ~ Genera Tone With these options you can choose to have a tone pay when RecordPad starts or stops. Cick the top box to pay a tone when the recording starts, and the midde box to pay a tone when it stops. In some environments you are required to pay a tone whie recording. To do this, tick the box "Sound record tone every (secs)" and enter the number of seconds between tones in the edit box. Startup Run RecordPad when computer starts Cick this box to have RecordPad automaticay open when the computer starts up. Start recording automaticay when RecordPad runs Cick this box to have RecordPad automaticay start recording whenever the software runs. Low Disc Space Warning Warn when hard drive space is ow (beow MB) RecordPad wi warn you when your hard drive space is running ow. Enter a number into the edit fied, in megabytes, when you woud ike to be notified of ow disk space. 20

Options - Options ~ Keys To open System-Wide Hot Keys Settings use the menu Options -> Hot-Key. When you are working with RecordPad open in the foreground, you can contro recording using the Standard Recording Buttons. You can aso assign 'hot' keys that can be used to contro recording whie you are working in other appication with RecordPad in the background. To do this, use the Keys tab of Options. Cick Add, press the key that you want to use (incuding At or Ctr if required) then seect the command. To change an existing hot key, seect the hot key and cick "Change...". To deete an existing hot key, seect the hot key and cick "Deete...". Note: Hot key assignments override the standard key assignments. 21

Screen References - Backup Audio The "Backup Audio" diaog can be used make a backup copy of an audio recording to a recordabe CD or a seected drive or foder. Note: Other data associated with the audio wi not be backed-up with the audio. Compress and Copy Seected Fies to Seect where to backup the audio: CD (using Express Burn) The compressed audio wi be recorded to a CD, as data fies, using Express Burn. If Express Burn is not aready instaed on your machine, it wi be automaticay downoaded and instaed for you. A shared network or oca foder The compressed audio fie wi be copied to the seected drive or foder. Audio Compression Seect the fie format and codec for compressing the audio. 22