How to physically speed up MP3s for CD burning?

August 29, 2009 1:28 AM

How can I speed up the tempo of some MP3 files and burn them onto a CD for faster playback?

For audio books / podcasts, I play them in Winamp with the Pacemaker plugin setting the tempo 20% ~ 30% faster as I can comprehend much faster speaking.

How can I do this for off-computer use? Specifically, make an MP3 disc to play in my car. I'm sure the MP3 file would have to be physically altered before it is burned onto a CD, so what tools are out there that will do this?

Here is one answer I found on the Winamp forum but it is not a viable solution because some the audio books I have are over 12 hours long.
 

posted by querty to computers & internet (5 comments total)

You need to edit each MP3 file individually.

The basic way to do this would be with an audio editor - Audacity is a popular choice. But that will be quite slow doing one MP3 at a time, so you will probably want a way to do several files at once.

Someone might be able to suggest a way you can automate the process using an audio editor and your operating system, but here is a shareware program that seems like it would do what you want. The limitation is that it will only work for 30 days, but if it does the job and you still need it after that, $20 seems like a price worth paying.

After you're done, burn the new MP3 files to disc like usual.
posted by so_necessary at 2:04 AM on August 29

use a video ( or audio ) editing program. You can do alot with those. I have Sony Vegas 7 and i love it. You can speed up or slow down almost any file. It can be expensive, but if you want somrthing cheap, then find a website where you can download a movie/ audio editing software for free
posted by xopaigexo at 5:22 AM on August 29

If you are comfortable with the command line Rubber Band is an open source tool for time stretching ("timestretch" would be the keyword to google for this particular task, by the way). You would need a Linux or OSX system for this though.

The advantage to this is that with one command you could have it run through and produce sped up versions of every file in a directory instead of having to do all the repetitive mouse action on every file.
posted by idiopath at 5:45 AM on August 29

For the record, my Sandisk Fuse has a setting that does this, I believe. It only works on podcasts, I think. It was $40, so if you have a 1/8 jack in your car (check your radio, it may be easy to install one on the back of the radio) you wouldn't be out very much money and you could stop burning annoying cds.
posted by sully75 at 5:48 AM on August 29

O.K. Reading comprehension fail on my part:

Win32 version of the rubberband command line tool. (I presume you are using windows, usually when people do not specify an OS that means they use Windows).
posted by idiopath at 5:49 AM on August 29