I'm having trouble with my EMC 8 Audio. Once I am done burning tracks to disc (whether in Advanced Projects or Editor), I find that the first split-second of several newly-burned tracks have been "clipped" - meaning the playback of certain tracks begins during the first second of actual music. This happens whether I am ripping tracks from a CD or copying the entire CD. I've tried resolving the issue by heeding every suggestion offered by Roxio but nothing works. Has anyone else experienced this problem?

So, the source of your audio is another CD from which you've ripped the tracks. It should make no difference whether you're grabbing individual tracks or all of them.

I'll assume, possibly incorrectly, that you're ripping to .WAV files so that you avoid the loss incurred by going to .MP3? I'm also assuming that you're staging them to your HD first rather than copying directly to CD?

If you play back the tracks from your HD, does the problem exist there? That is, does playback start into the first second of music? If so, go back to the original CD and check the same track, does it have the same problem? It's entirely possible that the start point of the track is actually into the music, I've heard of improperly mastered tracks on commercial discs.

Next question, does this ever happen on the track 1 of the source disc?

If the problem occurs on the ripped track, but not the original disc, then the problem is occuring during the ripping process, and we need to know what part of EMC 8 you're using to rip the track. Are you doing it from the Home audio application? From Creator Classic? Sound Editor? There are several ways to rip tracks from within the suite, and they behave differently, so let us know how you're doing it and we'll work from there.

Dave, thanks so much for taking an interest in solving my clipping problem. I will answer your questions in the order you asked: Yes, I'm ripping to .WAV from commercial CD sources. Yes, I am staging the "rip" to my HD. No, if I play the tracks back on my HD, the problems does NOT exist. Also, if I import the "problem" track into Sound Editor as a clip to view the wave-form, the problem also does NOT exist there, either! I do not believe the problem is in the mastering of the commercial source CDs, since the problem is happening with so many of them and the source discs all play perfectly. No, my "clipping"problem never happens to Track 1 of my Roxio burned disc. It randomly happens to OTHER tracks. Sometimes, the problem doesn't even happen at all - but it IS happening more and more of the time and it doesn't matter from which commercial source disc the tracks come from.

I tend to agree that the problem may be ocurring during the rip process rather than the burning process (although I'm not 100% certain). Usually, I rip tracks using "Convert CD". But to see if other parts of EMC8 worked better or gave me the same problem, I've also tried ripping with Advanced Projects and Sound Editor. The problem STILL occurs - and only with the EXACT same songs that gave me the problem with "Convert CD"! Again, this problem is happening on numerous commercial CDs I use, not just one. Also, if I am in Sound Editor and the "problem track" is displayed as a clip, like I said before it looks totally normal. But if I try to add an extra few seconds to the start of the clip and export it to my HD for burning (just to give the song extra "lead" time due to the clipping), my addition of extra seconds doesn't take. It's as if I didn't even add those extra seconds. Yet if I add extra seconds to an already-perfectly-ripped clip, it takes perfectly.

Oh, one other thing... the clipping problem is not present when I skip from track to track on the burned CD. When I skip to songs, each track will start and play normally. It's only when the burned CD plays from track-to-track (when one song ends and another begins) that the problem exists. This seems to indicate that the track was, in fact, fully ripped from the source CD but for some reason isn't carrying over properly to either the HD or to the CD burning software. Again, not all tracks do this but way too many do and the problem is getting worse.

Thanks for listening. Any thoughts? Have a great day!

Okay... if the problem doesn't exist when you play the .WAV files, then it's not a ripping problem.

When you add the extra seconds in sound editor, are you subsequently exporting the track? You can't just save the project, because that only saves the changes you want to make, it doesn't change the .WAV file. You have to actually export to a new file and then use the new file in your project. (It sort of sounds like that's what you're doing, but if you're adding seconds to the beginning at it's not "taking" then I need to verify.)

Now, what part of the suite are you using to write your new CD? Are you writing from the Home Page of EMC 8? Or from Creator Classic? Or from Music Disc Creator? My suggestion would be Music Disc Creator.

Hello again, Dave ~ Yes, when I add the extra seconds in sound editor, I am subsequently exporting the track. Yes, I am writing my new CD from the Home Page of EMC 8 and then clicking on Advanced Projects.

Partly by experimenting on my own and partly through Roxio's tech support, I think I've found a way to fix the "already-clipped" .WAV files. I am not sure this stops the clipping problem from the onset (ripping) stage but it seems to fix the damaged files after the fact: Roxio thought that, perhaps, my Roxio temp files were full so they suggested I run 'temp' and '%temp%' and delete as many files as possible. Once I did this, I went into Sound Editor to try once again adding a second or two to the start of the "clipped" .WAV files. Here is how I did it (and it seems to be working):

1) add the file to Sound Editor

2) add about 25 extra seconds (much more than is necessary) to the start of the .WAV clip

3) split the clip so that only an extra second or two is tacked onto the start of the clip

4) "select all" so that the entire clip is highlighted

5) ensure that DC offset is checked on

6) export the new file.

Like I said, this technique (together with clearing out my Roxio temp files) seems to fix the already-damaged ("clipped") files. I will see if keeping my Roxio temp files empty also cures my problem from the very start as I plan to rip some new tracks in the coming days. I will keep you posted. Thanks for everything!!