Audio Bibles

[Phillip]

Originally posted by EaglewingIS4031:
"Jesus is my boyfriend songs" is my personal term for CCM music that is weak on doctrine and praise or worship. alot of these songs could be secular if they just changed Jesus' name to something else.

I enjoy CCM when it is good. I also like Southern Gospel when its not all about "streets of gold."
Any way this is a topic for another thread.

This is true and I'll stop talking about it with this post.

This reminds me of the term 7/11 music. Modern Priase songs are 7 words repeated 11 times.

This IS the first time I have heard this one.

I honestly think you would like our station. We play only "laid back" adult contemporary Christian. We even listen to all of the words to make sure there is no doctrinal error.

We have the state's maximum security prison here and a prisoner just sent us $75.00 to help with our electric bill.

He says it shines a light into an otherwise very dark hole. I must admit I had tears in my eyes when I read his letter today. (There was more to the letter, but I'm not publishing it here.)

 

[EaglewingIS4031]

Are you Comercial, or listener supported. I used to be in Radio before I became a high school teacher. I was operations manager at a Country station for years, before the Lord got a hold of me. If you are a Comercial station (with a freq. above 92mhz,) are you hiring?

 

[Phillip]

Originally posted by Rich_UK:
Eagleswing its really good. I paid £135...(Around $200) for it, which is quite expensive, but its really a blessing. Everythings more expensive here but I don't mind when its gonna bless me for years.

After all, you are "Rich" aren't you?

All this time I thought you were just a "rich UK citizen).

Forgive me, its late and I'm still in the office.

Any licensing fee for the NIV has and is high.

I don't know if they had such tremendous over-head due to the large translation staff, or they are simply using its popularity to maximize profits, but the NIV always has the highest licensing fees. I am not saying this is bad, just stating a fact.

This is the exact reason the SBC translated their own Bible; mostly to reduce the huge payments for royalties to use the NIV in their material.

Typically SBC Sunday school books have both the old KJV and the NIV side-by-side. It is costing them a small fortune to pay for this. It was cost effective (and reasonable) for Holman to provide their very own translation. Plus, from a marketing view it makes sense--just think of how many SBC churches will be buying Holmans.

Again, not judging anybody just stating a fact based on business decisions.

 

[Phillip]

Originally posted by EaglewingIS4031:
Are you Comercial, or listener supported. I used to be in Radio before I became a high school teacher. I was operations manager at a Country station for years, before the Lord got a hold of me. If you are a Comercial station (with a freq. above 92mhz,) are you hiring?

Sorry!

I used to own a secular "rock-n-roll" FM that I put on the air and finally sold. (In my rebellious days.)

Worked radio as both a disk-jockey and Engineer since high-school (mid 70's), did a lot of consulting for engineering afterwards while working as a design engineer.

Loved radio so much; I don't have to tell YOU how it gets in your blood. We applied for one of the very first Low Power FM stations (non-commercial), but we are on 93.3. The transmitter literally sits in my home office in the bookshelf and is operated 24 hours a day using automation software on a Dell computer.

The antenna is a single bay on a 40 foot pole above the house, driven by a 240 watt transmitter.

We can hardly get our churches to cough up the $100 a month electric bill even though we run their services each week--2 churchs-one donates good, the other thinks its not their project, but they sure love the free services and announcements we give them.

We cover about 15 miles in each direction, my house in on a small hill. Covers town real well, plus our state Maximum Security Pen. where three or four thousand prisoners are housed. They claim dozens listen to us there. Apparently, they have a good little core group of Christians in there. Remember, this is the maximum security. You have to be a three time BAD person to get put in this place.

Its my way of still getting a taste of radio and not having to worry about making payroll each week. It is a lot of fun and we do have a good audience.

I think we were in the first 100 licensed Low Power FM stations in the nation. (Most of the others trying to figure a way to cheat the system and make money.)

How's THAT for hijacking a subject thread?

 

[EaglewingIS4031]

Rats! I was hoping you were a 50K AM so I could pick you up on the DX at night. I have to SSB CB to get my radio fix in. I would love to start a Christ centered station if I had the finances.

I got saved because our country station began carring a local Baptist church on Sunday mornings. I was responsible for setting up the equipment at the remote locale (ie the church). That is where I met the pastor, when I was putting the equipment in. He Befriended me and before to long I was attending the Sunday morning services and helping in the AV booth.
The Church was going to be producing "Heavens Gates & Hells Flames" on Memorial Day weekend of '95. The Pastor asked me to help out with the sound and the video feed to the overflow room in the gym. I didn't get to see much of the first night's show I was to busy getting the buggs out.
But on the second night I got the watch the show the Holy Spirit enlightened me and the Gospel made sense, I was reborn that night! Priase God.

 

[Rich_UK]

Phillip you're right tho. NIV do take the cake when it comes to prices.

Funny thing is, most christian stores here are wayyyy over-priced. The mark-up on products is a joke. I know this because at The Tabernacle (Spurgeons Church) bookshop, they sell their products for a really good price. They show the prices that other christian stores are selling them for and its a joke! Also, my old church stock books and music in their bookstand and they don't make a profit. They buy them for trade price and sell them for the same. So called christian business's are ripping people off at times.

I've stopped buying a lot of cd's for the reason that EaglesWings stated....most of the new stuff is really short on substance.
Although, I'll be buying the new single thats just come out...
Mary is my girlfriend.

 

[EaglewingIS4031]

Ha! My mother is Catholic, can I get a special cut rate price on that one, Rich?

 

[Rich_UK]

lol my mothers a catholic too... How about I'll pay you and you take it off my hands

 

[BruceB]

Pine_Island_Mrs., I know this thread has taken a "musical turn" but I just checked out a New Testament set of cassette tapes a friend loaned to me. It is the NKJV NT, narrated by Cliff Barrows. I played the first tape, Barrows uses a moderate speed in his narration, but doesn't use the "disk jockey" style voice modulation; he is steady and even in his delivery. The chapter number is given, but not the verse number. It is produced by Bible Alliance Inc., P.O. Box 621, Bradenton FL 34206 (941)748-3031 (I don't know a thing about this organization). The package clearly states that the set is "Not to be SOLD under any circumstances!". You may wish to contact them to see if they are loaned out - that way you could listen to the New Testament and develop a sense of what you like and don't like before you buy an expensive set. BruceB

PS I just found this webpage, they are for the sight impaired, but your doctor may be able to attest to your need for you as well. http://www.richmondproducts.com/bible_cassettes.htm

 

[Pine_Island_Mrs]

Thanks BruceB but I don't think cassettes would work for me. My car doesn't have a cassette player. Just a cd player, isn't that strange? I think I just about decided on the NIV Complete Bible Audio (64 cds). Thanks again.

 

[Rich_UK]

Pine Island Mrs, you won't regret that choice. Its a wonderful audio bible. Like I said earlier, I use an Attrac3 personal CD player, so I was able to compress the entire NT (16 cds) of the NIV audio bible onto 1 cd. Such a handy thing to be able to do. I might start the slow process of compressing the OT aswell....I reckon I could fit it onto around 3 CDs.

 

[Pine_Island_Mrs]

Rich, is the Attrac3 an MP3? I'm very ignorant of MP3 format. Would MP3's play on my car cd player? Is it hard to compress into 1 cd. That would truly be more convenient. How do MP3's differ from regular cd's? Don't mean to hijack my own thread but I'm need to learn as much as I can about it so I can keep my Bible with me, in the car or in my personal cd player or regular cd player. Thanks for patience.

 

[Rich_UK]

Ok here goes...

Rich, is the Attrac3 an MP3?

No, Attrac 3 is a different file format to MP3. It is a more compressed file format. What happens is this. When you buy one of those personal cd players, you also get with it a CD Rom with software on it. This software is for your PC. It allows you to copy normal audio CD's (Whether music or the audio bible)...These are called *Wav* format files.

The software copies the CD and it compresse's it into a file format called Attrac 3. This is a much more compressed file, which saves on storage. For example, you can get up to 30 audio CD's (compressed into Attrac 3 format) onto a CD. This is good for storage. An MP3 file is also a compressed file format.It's not as good quality as some formats such as real media, or windows media format, but it has its uses. Especially if one is converting music onto an Ipod or some other MP3 players.

If you've got a personal CD player then you probably don't need a new one. But if you are interested in compressing the Bible onto 4 or 5 CD's then its a good way to go about it. I got the entire NT onto 1 cd and its great!

The CD player which I bought is made by sony and cost me £100. Probably around $100 there as things are cheaper there. You can probably get them for even cheaper than that.

The software that compresses the files is pretty easy to use. It also compresse's MP3 files that are already on your PC if you so wish. For instance, I could probably fit around 40 1 hour sermons in MP3 format, onto 1 cd. Its a useful bit of kit.

If you do buy one and need any help, pm me or email me and I'll be pleased to help.
The CD player is good tho because it plays normal CD's, MP3 CD's, Attrac 3 CD's. CD RWs. Its good.

Hope this helps.

 

[Phillip]

Rich, since this IS a "debate" site, I will debate a little wicha'. IMHO the MP3 as long as recorded at 128 bps or higher is CD quality or higher. Sadly, many voices are recorded at about 48 bps, which gives it a mechanical computer sound.

New CD players are coming out all the time that will play MP3. It is unlikely the car player will; however, due to the date.

Our Christian radio plays strictly MP3's at 128 to 160 Mhz and I dare anybody to tell the difference between the music and CD music.

MP3's typically get a compression rate of about 10 to 1. In other words, 100 megabytes will convert to a 10 megabyte or lower, depending on bits per second of the compression rate. If you are not stereo, then you can cut it down even more.

ALL DVD players will play MP3's. They will show the menu on the television screen and you pick the ones you want to play.

If you buy a walk-man style CD player or any new CD player, you can pay a little more and it will play MP3's. The reason it cost more is that the MP3 ands for Motion Picture and they have to pay a fairly large royalty in order to put in the software to decode the MP3 format.

At Wal-Mart a typical "low-cost" CD player in walk-man format and head-phones is around $20 to $30. Whereas one that will also play MP3's will run $50 or higher. But, then again, look at the savings in disk space. This will also give you a good back-up of your CD's in case they get damaged. Record and compress the CD's on a computer with a CD recorder and put the originals where they are not exposed to light or wide-temperature ranges. Use your copied CD for carrying in the car.

You will pay enough for the CD's so you need to protect them and it is okay if you record a backup set for your OWN use.

Even if you cannot compress them, give them to someone with a computer and let them make a back-up set for you. At typically a quarter for a blank CD, it is a cheap way to protect your investment. Just remember that home recorded CD's scratch easier. Don't use a paper label either, they can gum up your player. Write on them with a permanent marker, the type used to identify clothing. (Of course, write on the top side that doesn't have the music on it.)

 

[Rich_UK]

I've listened to MP3 at a higher rate, but thru a top quality cambridge audio Amplifier with mission speakers and I can usually tell the difference. Maybe on a radio I wouldn't be able to but my ear is usually pretty good.
Your right about a lot of the voices being recorded at a lower rate tho. Usually a downloaded sermon is pretty bad quality. Mind you. Some of the sermons themselves are pretty awful, let alone the sound

 

[Rich_UK]

By the way, the NIV audio bible is recorded in normal cd format anyway (wav) so she won't need to upgrade unless she really wants to.

 

[Phillip]

Rich, I won't debate you can hear a difference considering the level of equipment that you are using. It is just that the difference is quite subtle. You are right about radio. Radio audio is processed quite heavily anyway so that it has a decent signal-to-noise ratio, especially in cars. So, even a cassette can sometimes be made to sound half way decent if the heads are aligned and cleaned.

You have also probably "trained" your ears by listening to "high-end" equipment, which would make the difference; whereas I don't think your typical person would notice the difference unless they could hear it played one format and the compressed format right next to each other.

We agree. No argument here.

 

[Rich_UK]

Yeah good point Philip. Listening to one format alongside another would be a good way to distinguish the difference but like you said, the typical person isn't gonna notice and probably isn't gonna care about the subtle difference. To be honest, I only like the high end equipment for listening to music. I appreciate a good sound when it comes to music but I also appreciate that the accoustics of the room need to be good too to fully benefit from a decent Amp and speakers. Ever used mission speakers? They are reasonabley priced and really good quality. Thanks for the convo..I always like to learn something new.