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I often find myself talking to men of a certain age, and yes it’s nearly always men, about vinyl records. In this modern age of MP3 files and music downloads, you would be forgiven for thinking that anyone under the age of thirty, who isn’t a gigging DJ, has probably never even seen a vinyl record let alone played one. And if that they have heard of such arcane technology then they have probably filed the information away in the back of their mind along with Edison and his experimental wax cylinders.

But, as the recent Record Store Day proved, there is still an active market for physical forms of music and there are a lot of independent music stores around the country with knowledgeable staff dedicated to selling music in a tangible physical form.

It surprises me how many people confess to still having large stacks of old vinyl albums lying around, collected in their youth when the latest release from their favourite band was a momentous occasion, before the demands of adulthood and responsibility took their toll. Too sentimentally attached to their record collection to bin it and with no means of playing it, the records live suspended in limbo, the dusty vinyl grooves lie idle, and their formerly much-loved music remains unheard.

With their record decks long since consigned to either a recess in the attic or the bottom of a skip with equally unwanted VHS players and cassette players, how are these poor people ever to listen the tracks that they grew up with?

Unlike their lost youth though, all that classic music does not have to remain lost. Normally the people I talk to who are lamenting their unplayed vinyl will have MP3 players of some description and will be comfortable with transferring music to and from their computer’s hard drive. So what can they do? The answer is surprisingly simple and seems to fall out of my weekly TV listings magazine every time I open it, in the form of all those leaflets and brochures that someone so diligently sticks in there ever week. Before you throw them straight into the recycling it’s probably worth having a look through them, because almost inevitably somewhere in there will be a device for transferring your beloved vinyl and cassette tapes onto your computer’s hard drive or directly onto a CD.

A lot of the machines will be large chunky devices in tasteful retro-style pine cabinets, but if you don’t want your children to mock you or friends to shake their heads in despair at your woeful interior design skills then there are a number of stylish vinyl turntables out there for sale which will manage the job of transferring music to your computer without a piece of varnished wood to be seen.

The process is relatively easy and pain-free even for the most timid technophobe. Normally, a standard USB connection plays the music into a software program such as the free-to-download editors Audacity and Cool Edit, which will record the music and then allow you to chop the sound into single tracks and save it to your computer’s hard drive.

MP3 files are the most popular sound files as they compress audio into smaller sized files allowing you to keep the precious memory space on your hard drive and music player uncluttered and free for yet more music. They also play out on most modern music systems, though you can also save them in other popular formats such as Windows Media or WAV. WAV files (short for Waveform) are uncompressed sound files and will take up much more room on your system.

So there you are, it really is as easy as that; plug, play and away you go. Take the plunge, buy an MP3 turntable and bring life back to your record collection. You now officially have no excuse to neglect the music that defined your life. The fun I have had experiencing music I haven’t heard in decades is worth every penny I spent.

Brett is a Content Producer for ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ WebWise, and has been creating web content for the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ for ten years. He loves fine ale and vintage wine, cathedrals, music of all genres and classic British comedy, and has a huge collection of rare vinyl records.

For more information on audio editing, have a look at ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ Bitesize's guide to audio software.