Combining .mp3 files

August 13, 2005 3:29 PM

Simple audio question. I want to take several .mp3 files and combine them into one... nothing fancy though if I could get a fade between them I would be thrilled. Windows and free are the only prerequisites.
posted by cedar to Technology (10 answers total)

Best answer: Audacity.
posted by rfordh at 3:33 PM on August 13, 2005

ACiD, by Sonic Foundry/Sony.
posted by dirtynumbangelboy at 3:37 PM on August 13, 2005

rfordh nails it--Audacity can be used to import and edit MP3 files all the live-long day, with plenty of effects (including fades) thrown in--though to save your output as MP3s you will also need to download the LAME encoder and do some very minor and basic setup.
posted by enrevanche at 3:45 PM on August 13, 2005

For the MP3 bit, I like Speeks frontend. LAME itself is command-line, which may be your style, but need pichers.
posted by Jack Karaoke at 3:56 PM on August 13, 2005

Also, MP3 Direct Cut, it's less than 100KB in size, yet is a full MP3 editing program. It's not quite as fully featured as Audacity, but it loads MP3s instantly and doesn't do all that 'importing' business.. it works on MP3s directly.
posted by wackybrit at 4:17 PM on August 13, 2005 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: Thanks... Audacity seems to be the ticket. You know, once I figured out copy and paste wasn't just for text. The LAME thing wasn't too bad, once I downloaded it and set the path it worked fine.

This is some good fun.
posted by cedar at 4:45 PM on August 13, 2005

If you are at all concerned about audio quality, you won't use Audacity. It's transcoding your MP3s. I use MusiCutter or MP3 Direct Cut—wackybrit is right.
posted by Monochrome at 9:59 PM on August 13, 2005

Take Monochrome/Wackybrit's advice, if you want to maintain sound quality.
posted by ascullion at 7:38 AM on August 14, 2005

No fade, just a brutal jumpcut, but no fancy software required either:

copy /b a.mp3+b.mp3+c.mp3 abc.mp3
posted by flabdablet at 9:03 AM on August 14, 2005

[9 months later] I'm doing the opposite of what the original poster is - splitting a long file into several smaller ones - and went with the mp3 Direct Cut suggestion. It is small and obvious enough to do the easy bits, though I'm sure it can do a lot more if I played with it. Thanks for the suggestion, wackybrit, Monochrome, and ascullion.
posted by whatzit at 2:44 PM on May 14, 2006