Steinberg Clean Plus 4.0 Complete package

...to purchase the upgrade from Steinberg for unlimited use, which cost me about six quid. I did hear it mentioned that they now come with the upgrade already included in the software, but you will need to find this out on the back of the box. This is a good bonus as it will allow you store more than one album by the same artist onto a single disk.
Conclusion...
Usefull if you still have lots of vinyl that you would like to make more accessible ... more

If like me, you have lots of vinyl hanging around the house from your once favorite artists that you cannot bear to part with, then this is the answer. Copy your nostalgic collection to CD and leave the vinyl in the loft! There are two versions of this product to look out for.
1. Software only.
This application assumes that you already have the required hardware to transfer from LP or tape, the other is supplied with a pre-amp which does all the work for you. If you go for the software version you will need to ensure that your LP or tape goes through an amplifier before reaching the PC. If you have an all in one midi system you should be ok, all you need to do is connect the line out(s) on your stereo to the line in(s) on your PC. However if you have separate hi-fi-units connect the record deck or tape to the amplifier first then the PC as described above.
2. Software with pre-amp.
This is the best choice if, like me you only have the record deck. The pre-amp takes the place of the old clunky amplifier and is also an extra gadget to add to your hardware collection! This is a sort of triangular shape measuring115mm high x 45mm wide x 130mm deep. It comes with a lead to connect to your PC’s line in, all you need to do is connect the right and left outputs from the record or tape deck to the 2 inputs on the front of the unit.
Once installed ,he software is both comprehensive and easy to use. There in an assistant mode which will walk you through the required steps to copy your music to the computer from start to finish until you get the hang of it. You may find the resulting recording you have made is too quiet or too loud when finished, this is easily remedied by simply selecting the correct input and output volume modes on the unit ( 3 setting for each, low, medium and high). All my recording have come out fine by leaving them both on the medium setting. Within the software there is also a master volume slider for finer adjustment.
Now for the fun part……
Once you have recorder the whole album onto your PC, the program will look for the breaks between tracks and suggest where each song starts and ends, this may take a few minutes depending on the spec of your PC. The program doesn’t always get it right but it is easy to change this manually. A good feature is that you can virtually eliminate the gaps between tracks so it runs almost continuously even though you can still jump to an individual track if desired.
Several additional features are also available, you can run the tracks through various filters to clean up the track which tends to remove some of the annoying crackling you get on vinyl. You can play with the inbuilt graphic equalizer to give more bass or treble and also change the way you listen to the music by running it through the surround sound module. There are other effects such as reverb, echo, noise and fuzz, but these are of no real use if you just want to reproduce your music onto disk.
One thing to look out for is the MP3 converter, my software came with only 20 exporting trials to MP3 and I had to purchase the upgrade from Steinberg for unlimited use, which cost me about six quid. I did hear it mentioned that they now come with the upgrade already included in the software, but you will need to find this out on the back of the box. This is a good bonus as it will allow you store more than one album by the same artist onto a single disk.
Conclusion...
Usefull if you still have lots of vinyl that you would like to make more accessible to listen to.
Expect to pay between £50 - £60 depending if you purchase from the internet such as dabs.com, or the old fashioned way on the high street at PC World. 

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