Bumper bundle of questions.

OK, so I've got a bunch of questions, covering many areas, but since they're all vaguely to do with Karaoke, they can go here.
1) I may soon have two monitors, both run from the standard monitpr output, the thing with fifteen pins, I think. How can I run them simultaneously? Do I need a box of tricks? If so, what, where, and how much?
2) I've seen a bunch of Karaoke CDs. Looks like the format is CD+G. Can I rip them to my HD, and use them like the others I have? If so, what program do I need?
3) One of the sets of CDs had an MP3 option. I'm guessing that won't have any graphics, or is it just lazy labelling by Amazon?

I'm tempted to risk a fiver, but I've had no experience of this. I bought a karaoke collection from someone who was retiring, and all this ripping lark had been done already. Thanks folks.

PS. This one might have had some use for Jim's 3 year old party. http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B...e_epc__1p_0_ti

Hi Peter

1: http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_tr...at=0&_from=R40

2: not free , but very good http://www.powerkaraoke.com/src/prod_powercdgburner.php

Free but have never used it , http://www.softpedia.com/get/CD-DVD-...-G-Toolz.shtml

3: All my CD+G rips have the following format , one cdg file and one mp3 file per song , both files are named the same , ie

Beatles - blackbird.mp3 and Beatles - blackbird.cdg , in this case the mp3 is 2.4mb and the cdg is 1.2mb

Cheers

Daryll

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Excalibur

OK, so I've got a bunch of questions, covering many areas, but since they're all vaguely to do with Karaoke, they can go here.
1) I may soon have two monitors, both run from the standard monitpr output, the thing with fifteen pins, I think. How can I run them simultaneously? Do I need a box of tricks? If so, what, where, and how much?
2) I've seen a bunch of Karaoke CDs. Looks like the format is CD+G. Can I rip them to my HD, and use them like the others I have? If so, what program do I need?
3) One of the sets of CDs had an MP3 option. I'm guessing that won't have any graphics, or is it just lazy labelling by Amazon?

I'm tempted to risk a fiver, but I've had no experience of this. I bought a karaoke collection from someone who was retiring, and all this ripping lark had been done already. Thanks folks.

PS. This one might have had some use for Jim's 3 year old party. http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B...e_epc__1p_0_ti

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What desk you using? Usually take monitors via aux send and either pre or post mix ,will bell you in a bit.

As Daryll mentioned in his reply, answer 1 is a splitter.
I have a couple of the type he has linked to and I also have an 8 way splitter box which to be honest, was only about £25.00. It's small and perfect if I want to use 2 x Monitors and 2 x Projectors.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by deltic

What desk you using? Usually take monitors via aux send and either pre or post mix ,will bell you in a bit.

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Visuals, not sound. Look forward to the call.

Daryll and Gary, thanks a lot fellas. That's what I love about this forum. Imay start a thread, or resurrect an old one if such a one exists.

Hi Peter. Been a while since we've had any karaoke queries on here!!

I'll try and offer some input:

1. The VGA splitter is the device you need. Plus extra VGA cables to reach your monitors (I'm presuming they won't be side by side). Buy a VGA Extension cable such as this VGA Ext cable as normal VGA cables usually have two identical connectors (ie they don't have male and female connectors therefore, if you use these, you will also need a "gender-changer" such as VGA Gender Changer. You can get multi-input/output splitter boxes but, for just running two monitors, this is overkill.

2. Yes you can rip from CD+G to HDD. Simple as that, eh? Well, no. Not at all. Getting the software to do the job is the easy bit (CD+G Ripper is the tool I always used but there are several). The hard bit is actually getting a CD/DVD drive that has the ability to read the extra layer of data that stores the graphics on the disc in the first place. Not all drives have this ability. Use Nero's free Nero InfoTool utility to show you info about your drive. This will tell you if your drive has the ability to do this. At the same time, if your drive can read the discs it's even less likely that it can write karaoke files to disc (although I'm aware you're not asking to do this but this might help others who want to it). Your drive needs to be able to write sub-channel data in RAW format. If it can't do this, it can't create CD+Gs. With a compatible drive and the appropriate software, CD+G ripping is quite an easy an straight-forward process. The software converts each track in to two files - one containing the audio (often in .MP3 format file) and one containing the graphics (in .CDG format) and will name them with exactly the same filename with the only difference being the file extension. Both files also have to be stored in exactly the same location. Your karaoke player software will read both files. Your extraction software may also offer to convert to a zipped or .BIN format. Essentially, these are the two files stored as one file. A word of warning, though. Not all software karaoke players can handle zipped or .BIN files and require you to extract them before they can loaded.

3. I'm suprised this question hasn't really been answered. From memory (so I hope I'm right!!), Amazon do offer karaoke versions of download tracks. Only they don't come with on-screen graphics. They are simply the backing music in MP3 format. The same applies to karaoke files in iTunes. I've never seen the point of this. I've also seen this issue raised several times on various forums (eg "Help!!! How do I disply graphics from karaoke songs I've downloaded from Amazon?").

Hope this helps!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Excalibur

OK, so I've got a bunch of questions, covering many areas, but since they're all vaguely to do with Karaoke, they can go here.
1) I may soon have two monitors, both run from the standard monitpr output, the thing with fifteen pins, I think. How can I run them simultaneously? Do I need a box of tricks? If so, what, where, and how much?
2) I've seen a bunch of Karaoke CDs. Looks like the format is CD+G. Can I rip them to my HD, and use them like the others I have? If so, what program do I need?
3) One of the sets of CDs had an MP3 option. I'm guessing that won't have any graphics, or is it just lazy labelling by Amazon?

I'm tempted to risk a fiver, but I've had no experience of this. I bought a karaoke collection from someone who was retiring, and all this ripping lark had been done already. Thanks folks.

PS. This one might have had some use for Jim's 3 year old party. http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B...e_epc__1p_0_ti

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Hello

To best split the VGA signal into two outputs, something like this is needed Click Here

The Karaoke CDs you refer to on Amazon are the 100 Hits Karaoke range [These are actually Music Factory - Mastermix Karaoke productions] and are great little collections to have [I have the whole 00 Hits Karaoke collection on CD+G]... Remember though if you Intend to rip the CD+G discs to a HDD you will need the Pro Dub Licence with Graphic Uplift.
Your best option for the future is to buy mp3+g digital downloads from places like Selecta Track at www.selectatrack.com [Other legal download sites are available].

The best software to use to rip a CD+G [On most CD/DVD system] Power CD+G Burner 2 from Power Karaoke at www.powerkaraoke.com [You can tweak all the settings to how you like/want to rip the discs].

NOTE! Works with most of modern CD/DVD burners (drive has to be MMC-compatible and has to support DAO/96 mode).
Power CD+G Burner works under Windows 8/7/Vista/XP/2000. It should work under Windows 98/ME, but you need ASPI drivers

The Amazon downloads of Karaoke tracks are just mp3 and do not come in mp3+g format [There are mp3+g data/DVD discs from Zoom you can buy from Amazon].

I hope this information is off help to you :)

Thanks

Glenn