how to cut a wav file precisely?

[Lastman369]

I've got the tracklisting of a music album in the following format (the audio is one long wav file!):

       1  |  0:00.00 |    2:53.71   |           0      |      13045      
       2  |  2:53.71 |    1:48.41   |       13046      |      21186      
       3  |  4:42.37 |    2:57.10   |       21187      |      34471      
       4  |  7:39.47 |    2:25.06   |       34472      |      45352      
       5  | 10:04.53 |    2:26.33   |       45353      |      56335      
       6  | 12:31.11 |    2:26.40   |       56336      |      67325      
       7  | 14:57.51 |    2:00.64   |       67326      |      76389      
       8  | 16:58.40 |    2:21.52   |       76390      |      87016      
       9  | 19:20.17 |    2:04.27   |       87017      |      96343      
      10  | 21:24.44 |    2:40.39   |       96344      |     108382      
      11  | 24:05.08 |    1:57.01   |      108383      |     117158      
      12  | 26:02.09 |    2:03.36   |      117159      |     126419      
      13  | 28:05.45 |    1:50.37   |      126420      |     134706      
      14  | 29:56.07 |    2:35.17   |      134707      |     146348      
      15  | 35:03.24 |   24:35.30   |      157749      |     268403

I'd like to cut the tracks without re-encoding. How should I do it? I've tried using MeGui's audio cutter, but couldn't really figure out how it works, because I don't know how to make ".clt" cutfiles for audio files. What I'm looking for is either some help make those clt files, or a similar tool that can cut audio files frame/sample accurately.

I'd also like to know what the 4th and 5th columns mean?

Thanks in advance for your help.

[TJohns]

I'm pretty sure Audacity allows you to save a range, so load the source in, mark the start/end of a section, and then choose the SAVE SELECTION AS function. Repeat for each track...

Trev

[Cornucopia]

Re: your columns,

Column1=Track #
Column2=Inpoint (in MM:SS:FF) (BTW, Frames could be 1/30 sec, 1/60 sec, 1/75 sec, or 1/100 sec depending on which standard is used)
Column3=Outpoint (also in MM:SS:FF)
Column4=Inpoint (in absolute samples from the beginning of the file)
Column5=Outpoint (also in samples)

Are you trying to make an Audio CD? In that case you really don't need to make any cuts, just use the cutlist to make a seamless CUE sheet, and burn.

[V Bot]

I think you have to burn with Nero to keep the tracks numbered/marked. If this is a continuous mix cd or live cd without the standard blank gaps between tracks. At least that's how I had to do it with a continuous mix cd. Created the Cue sheet with Exact Audio Copy and burned with Nero.

[Cornucopia]

Don't need Nero. Use Imgburn, as it's free and (these days) seems to give better burns. Also fully supports CUE file features (with the exception of rare Multi-session/CD-Extra).

The whole thing with the cue sheet and gaps is that you make sure there is NO "Pre-GAP" or "Index 0" other than the 1st track. ALL cuts reference the SAME WAV/MP3 file, with the each subsequent Track starting with an "Index 1".

See this URL for a Wikipedia example of GAPLESS CUE SHEET: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cue_sheet_(computing))

Then you have to have a burner that supports DAO/SAO, and burn it that way. That's the default for cue sheets, so you shouldn't have to do anything else.

Oh yeah, one IMPORTANT thing that people seem forget about: ALL CUTS NEED TO BE ON A CD FRAME (1/75th of a SECOND), for it to be perfectly, completely seamless.

Scott

[Lastman369]

Thanks for your replies, but I'm not making an audio CD.

I just have the whole album in one file, and would like to make an mp3 file per song. I know there are lots of ways to cut & convert it to mp3, but (since I have the exact In- and Outpoints of each track) I'd like to cut it as precisely as possible (=frame/sample accurately). For similar cutting of video files I could use MeGui's AVS Cutter, that's why I tried to use it now aswell.
The problem is that I don't know how to use the Audio cutter tool of MeGui.

[manono]

HeadAC3he can cut with frame accuracy.

[Cornucopia]

manono,

If you mean "Frame accuracy" in terms of video frames, 1/30th sec is pretty lame as a timebase when cutting audio. Even 1/75th (1 CD frame) or 1/100th sec may not be good enough for music cuts - you need sample accurate cutting (1/44,100th or 1/48,000th sec).

Since the OP isn't needing an AudioCD, and PROBABLY doesn't want to reencode or do actual separating of the cuts, the whole point is really to find an app that can create a cutlist or regionlist and then find a player that supports cutllists/regionlists within a single file as the playlist for that filetype. WAV files support cutlists or regionlists being stored WITHIN the file and some editors (Sound Forge, ProTools) allow for creating and incorporating these. And there are a few apps that will correclty read the regionlist in a WAV and use it as the playlist.
MP3, OTOH, probably doesn't have internal support for such a thing unless it's proprietary. You maybe could use an external text cutlist as the playlist, but then you'd always have to keep the media and the cutlist in a folder together and help the app that supports this type understand that they go together. I don't know of any apps that do this, but I haven't attempted to do any research on it either.

Of course, if all you're trying to do is non-destructively cut the MP3 stream into separate mp3 files, use MP3streamcut, mp3streameditor, etc. (There are a couple of good ones out there - Google it). You'll have to live with their timebase resolution, whatever that may be. If you want visual, precise, sample accurate here, you'll probably end up needing to reencode or convert the file(s). And for that, I'd recommend a decent audio editor.

Scott

[manono]

No, I meant audio frames. Here's a WAV file from a music video just over 4 minutes long with over 11 million frames. The number of video frames at 23.976fps is around 6000. Audacity can make fine cuts, but you can also cut pretty precisely using HeadAC3he:

[olyteddy]

Thanks for your replies, but I'm not making an audio CD.

I just have the whole album in one file, and would like to make an mp3 file per song. I know there are lots of ways to cut & convert it to mp3, but (since I have the exact In- and Outpoints of each track) I'd like to cut it as precisely as possible (=frame/sample accurately). For similar cutting of video files I could use MeGui's AVS Cutter, that's why I tried to use it now aswell.
The problem is that I don't know how to use the Audio cutter tool of MeGui.

Be warned, that due to padding the last frame of the MP3 file you will lose seamlessness, unless you play it in WinAmp or some other player that can look ahead. Most portable players don't.

[b66pak]

use besplit:

here is the line:

Besplit -core( -input my.wav -prefix part -type wav -a -ending ) -split( 0 173.946666 282.493333 459.626666 604.706666 751.546666 897.68 1018.533333 1160.226666 1284.586666 1445.106666 1562.12 1685.6 1796.093333 2103.32 )

_

[Cornucopia]

No, I meant audio frames. Here's a WAV file from a music video just over 4 minutes long with over 11 million frames. The number of video frames at 23.976fps is around 6000. Audacity can make fine cuts, but you can also cut pretty precisely using HeadAC3he:

manono, just because HeadAC3he decides to use "Frames" as their nomenclature, doesn't make it right. AUDIO DOES NOT HAVE FRAMES - JUST SAMPLES. Sounds like HeadAC3he was designed by a guy who was previously only working with Video.

Now, if HeadAC3he actually does cut on the sample, that's great!

I'd like to hear from the OP...Do you want a single, monolithic MP3 with a cut/region list, or do you want multiple MP3 files?

Scott

[Gavino]

just because HeadAC3he decides to use "Frames" as their nomenclature, doesn't make it right. AUDIO DOES NOT HAVE FRAMES - JUST SAMPLES. Sounds like HeadAC3he was designed by a guy who was previously only working with Video.

In audio formats, the word 'frame' is commonly used to denote the smallest addressable time interval, roughly equivalent to a GOP in video. In MPEG audio (and this terminology is used in the standard), a frame is 1152 samples.

However, for a PCM WAV file, 1 frame = 1 sample, so in Manono's example, the cut is sample-accurate.

[Constant Gardener]

I use Claudiosoft's free "Wave Splitter" utility - put in start and stop times and it extracts a .wav file. I've never noticed any artifacts.

[Bonie81]

I cent percent agree with Tjohns that I'm pretty sure Audacity allows you to save a range,
It definitely does, coz i am using Audacity over by a year now.