A lot of great music was recorded in the early part of last century and released as 78-rpm records. Because that music mostly falls under public domain now, there are sites dedicated to preserving, digitizing, and distributing them. Check out the Internet Archive’s collection of hundreds of artists at www.archive.org/audio/collection.php?collection=78rpm.

The American Library of Congress also has a weighty collection of music as well as interviews and narratives that stretch from last century to this one. See memory.loc.gov/ammem/browse/ListSome.php?format=Sound+Recording. For north-of-the-border music history, check out the Virtual Gramophone at www.collectionscanada.ca/gramophone/index-e.html.

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Adapted From: iPod and iTunes QuickSteps

The iTunes Radio capability is an easy fit with the rest of the program’s options and offers a huge variety of channels—certainly a lot more than what’s being broadcast on your standard radio these days.

1. Start iTunes on your computer.
2. Click Radio in the Source pane.
3. You’ll see the main pane filled with categories of radio streams, such as ’50s, international, and jazz. Click the arrow next to the one that interests you.
4. Whichever stations are currently broadcasting will appear underneath the category you choose. Double-click one to begin streaming.

Because stations come and go, you should occasionally refresh the list. Just click Refresh in the top right of iTunes, and all categories recently opened will be repopulated.

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Adapted From: iPod and iTunes QuickSteps

The iTunes Radio capability is an easy fit with the rest of the program’s options and offers a huge variety of channels—certainly a lot more than what’s being broadcast on your standard radio these days.

1. Start iTunes on your computer.
2. Click Radio in the Source pane.
3. You’ll see the main pane filled with categories of radio streams, such as ’50s, international, and jazz. Click the arrow next to the one that interests you.
4. Whichever stations are currently broadcasting will appear underneath the category you choose. Double-click one to begin streaming.

Because stations come and go, you should occasionally refresh the list. Just click Refresh in the top right of iTunes, and all categories recently opened will be repopulated.

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Just because a streaming station isn’t in the official Apple roster doesn’t mean that iTunes won’t play it. You can easily pick from a huge variety of stations supported by Shoutcast and Live365. You can add them to your musical library or, more conveniently, you can create a playlist for streaming radio and add the stations you want. Note: if you listen to Live365, you’ll hear ads.

1. Create a new playlist and call it something like MoreRadio.
2. Use your web browser and go to www.shoutcast.com or www.live365.com. Use the site’s navigation to find a station that interests you.
3. Click the Play button, which should bring up a dialog box asking what you want to do with the file (which bears the extension .pls). Choose to save the file in a new folder somewhere (it’s up to you exactly where). It’s a good idea to rename the file by what it contains, such as “metal.pls” or something similar, so that you can keep track of different stations.
4. Open your empty new playlist and drag the .pls file. At first it won’t look like much, but once you double-click it, the song name category should fill with more detail.
5. You can add as many of these stations as you’d like. Just remember that even though it’s a playlist, you can’t expect to listen sequentially (because the stations, unlike songs, don’t end). Since most of these streams stay up continuously, you’ll have to manually click another if you want to change channels.

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Keep in mind these same techniques can be used for recording from cassette tapes, radio, 8-track tape, or just about anything else. For some formats, you’ll want to process them a little more to make them sound a little less hissy.

1. Download and install your audio program (try Audacity at audacity.source forge.net, Goldwave at goldwave.com, or Sound Forge). Get it up and running according to its maker’s directions.
2. Connect the cable from your stereo to your computer. Choose Line-In as the audio source. (Some soundcards have several different lines in. If you’re not getting any sound in the next step, make sure you’ve picked the right one.)
3. Choose Preferences In and pick the quality you want to record in. 44100 Hz is good. (That’s CD quality.) Be sure that inputs are set to Stereo.
4. Pick a loud song and start playing the record. Then start recording; this is just to get an idea of the sound level. You should see waveforms forming like a mountain range, but these should never go into peak red territory. If they do, adjust the volume down.
5. Once you have a good idea of the sound levels, start recording the album. You can split up the songs later or record them one-by-one now.
6. Once you’ve recorded the songs, take a listen and make sure they sound good. You can use the Normalize effect or processing to raise the sound to normal levels without peaking. Other processing you might want to consider is noise removal or pop/hiss removal, depending on what’s offered by your software.
7. If you’re hoping to also burn CDs from these songs, do it now, before you convert them into MP3s. After conversion they will lose some sound quality. To burn to CD, you can use iTunes, the software that came with your burner, or whatever audio editing program you’re using now. (Sound Forge’s is very sophisticated.)
8. If you want the album separated into songs, you can use the cursor in the program to isolate each song’s audio and then cut and paste it into a new file, just like you might do with text or pictures. Or, if you want a solid album, you can join the recordings of both sides into one big file.
9. Once you’ve got your tracks the way you want them, you can convert them to MP3s. For most programs it’s a simple matter of selecting Save As or Export As MP3.
10. Download and install dBPowerAmp and right-click files to label them so that they’re not all called Untitled or Track 1. That way, the proper info will show up in iTunes and on your iPod. (You can also import these songs into iTunes and change the info there, but it’s too easy to lose track of the songs in iTunes when they’re untitled.)

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If you’re the type to do it yourself, replacing the iPod’s battery is a possibility. It’s not advised unless you’re prepared to take a chance of causing further damage to ports, jacks, or even the Hold switch. It could cost a maximum of $250 to get Apple or someone else to repair a damaged iPod (aside from battery repairs, which are a special case at $99, no questions asked). That’s why it’s generally a better idea to pay someone else to replace the battery and assume that risk.

If you want to save money and attempt the DIY battery replacement on your lonesome, iPodResQ sells kits for the 1G–3G iPods for $30 plus shipping. Or, if you’re not sure what’s wrong with it, they’ll also diagnose other iPod problems for $29 and give a repair quote (shipping and “iBox” shipping box included). If you want to do it yourself at your own risk (DIYOR), the basic theory is that you pry the metal backing off of the iPod (or, in the case of the Mini, wedge apart the metal case and pop the two glued halves apart), disconnect any ports that are in the way, put in a replacement battery (available online for $29 and up), reconnect the ports, and pop the case back together again. More detailed directions are also easily found online.

 

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You can publish iMixes to a public area in iTunes where other users can hear 30-second samples of the songs they don’t already own and buy the songs they like, or maybe even the whole playlist. Publishing an iMix is easy, and all the action takes place right within iTunes.

1. Create a playlist for publication of up to 250 songs.
2. Click the little arrow to the right of the new playlist (Figure 1).Figure 1: Who knows, maybe your skills as a tastemaker will gain you a reputation on iTunes; if not, at least you can share music samples with friends.
3. Click the Create button in the warning window that pops up telling you that it’s going to send your song information to the Internet. iTunes will only publish songs it can identify in the iTunes Music Store. (It’s legal to own MP3s of your music, by the way, in case you’re paranoid about sending evidence of that ownership over the Internet.)You can’t publish an iMix that contains songs that iTunes cannot find in the iTunes Music Store. This causes problems with any songs that either aren’t licensed for sale on iTunes or are improperly titled, whether you ripped them from CDs or got them from some other source.
4. If you’re not already signed in to iTunes, you’ll need to do so now (Figure 2).Figure 2: If you forgot your password, Apple can e-mail it to you.
5. Fill out a title and description (Figure 3); when people listen to your iMix, they’ll see both displayed within their iTunes window.Figure 3: Now the world will know about the unlikely cover of “The Legend of Xanadu” by the British band, The Fall.
6. That’s it; now when you make an iMix and share it, recipients will have to pay to hear more than a 30-second sample, unless they already own the songs on the playlist. To send out the link, click the Tell A Friend button (Figure 4).Figure 4: To see all of your iMixes, click See All iMixes By This User. The stars are what listeners will use to rate your mix.
7. Other iTunes users will be able to rate your iMix, driving it higher or lower in the ratings. Apple will save your iMix for one year.
8. To get the URL for your iMix, right-click the album art on the upper left and select Copy iTunes Music Store URL when it pops up (Figure 5).

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1. If you have folders of music anywhere else but in the default location where iTunes puts them normally, you’ll need to bring those folders to the new computer manually—or, if you have enough disc space, have iTunes copy all the music listed in the iTunes Library from wherever it is on your computer, to the default iTunes directory so you can grab everything in one chunk to put it on an external hard drive. To do this, go to Advanced | Consolidate Library and choose a location on the external hard drive to save your consolidated iTunes Library to.

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2. If you don’t have a hard drive, burn data CDs or DVDs of all the music in your iTunes Library to bring to the new computer. Physically move your whole iTunes music folder (in Windows, it’s in My Documents\My Music\iTunes) to the new computer using your weapon of choice: an external hard drive, an online storage locker, your home network, or burned data CDs or DVDs.

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ColorWare specializes in covering various electronics devices with a layer of resilient paint. Send your iPod to them and it’ll come back much more unique than it was before you sent it in. However, they do not assume responsibility for data stored on your iPod, so make sure to back up everything on there to your computer’s hard drive before you send your iPod off.

1. Browse www.colorwarepc.com for the color you want. You can pay extra for “color combinations,” which most commonly paint the front of an iPod one color and the scroll wheel another. Arrows are usually painted white or black, whichever helps them stand out more.
2. You’ll see prices listed underneath the various models. That’s because ColorWare sells prepainted iPods (and laptops and game consoles, for that matter) in various configurations and over 20 colors. If you’d rather buy a new iPod than have your old one painted, you can buy one on the site. Otherwise continue to step 3.
3. At the top of the ColorWare website, click Services, and on the next page, choose Apple Services.
4. Here, choose either Apple iPod (one color, more variety, $50–$65) or Apple iPod Color Combos (two colors, less variety, $85).
5. Choose your color, clicking View Options to see what each one looks like. Then, pick your iPod model.
6. If you own an iPod dock, still use the earbuds that came with the iPod, or use an iTrip FM transmitter, consider getting that colored the same tone ($10–$20 each).
7. Pay for the service on colorwarepc.com, or use the alternate payment options (or call the customer service number).
8. Print out the order slip from ColorWare’s website and fill it out.
9. Box your iPod up into the packaging it came with if you had it shipped; otherwise, put it in the original box and put that inside another cardboard box, perhaps with Styrofoam peanuts or other more environmentally friendly padding.
10. Attach the order slip you printed out in step 8 and send it off to the address specified on ColorWare’s site (in Winona, Minnesota).
11. You’ll get your iPod back in about 10 days, and you’ll be astounded by the new coating, which gets rid of old scratches and is more resistant to new ones.

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ColorWare specializes in covering various electronics devices with a layer of resilient paint. Send your iPod to them and it’ll come back much more unique than it was before you sent it in. However, they do not assume responsibility for data stored on your iPod, so make sure to back up everything on there to your computer’s hard drive before you send your iPod off.

1. Browse www.colorwarepc.com for the color you want. You can pay extra for “color combinations,” which most commonly paint the front of an iPod one color and the scroll wheel another. Arrows are usually painted white or black, whichever helps them stand out more.
2. You’ll see prices listed underneath the various models. That’s because ColorWare sells prepainted iPods (and laptops and game consoles, for that matter) in various configurations and over 20 colors. If you’d rather buy a new iPod than have your old one painted, you can buy one on the site. Otherwise continue to step 3.
3. At the top of the ColorWare website, click Services, and on the next page, choose Apple Services.
4. Here, choose either Apple iPod (one color, more variety, $50–$65) or Apple iPod Color Combos (two colors, less variety, $85).
5. Choose your color, clicking View Options to see what each one looks like. Then, pick your iPod model.
6. If you own an iPod dock, still use the earbuds that came with the iPod, or use an iTrip FM transmitter, consider getting that colored the same tone ($10–$20 each).
7. Pay for the service on colorwarepc.com, or use the alternate payment options (or call the customer service number).
8. Print out the order slip from ColorWare’s website and fill it out.
9. Box your iPod up into the packaging it came with if you had it shipped; otherwise, put it in the original box and put that inside another cardboard box, perhaps with Styrofoam peanuts or other more environmentally friendly padding.
10. Attach the order slip you printed out in step 8 and send it off to the address specified on ColorWare’s site (in Winona, Minnesota).
11. You’ll get your iPod back in about 10 days, and you’ll be astounded by the new coating, which gets rid of old scratches and is more resistant to new ones.

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